Signal

Publisher

Latest documents

• If you build it ...

  Lego-obsessed Christchurch mums Emily Fryer and Sarah Mosley are taking on master builders from around the world.

• Getting lost in translation

  The global rise of a small subset of K-dramas is impacting the entire Korean TV landscape — and it’s not all for the best, writes Sung-Ae Lee from The Conversation.

• Shifting times, shifty teens

  Barbara Ellen looks into the latest effort from a divisive documentarian and, for something completely different, a summertime teen thriller.

• Terrific telly

  RNZ’s Karl Puschmann tackles the tough assignment of picking the best shows of the year so far.

• Tech bros and golf pros

  Succession creator Jesse Armstrong’s satire of super-rich tech titans is undercooked, and Owen Wilson’s washed-up golfer is above par, writes Barbara Ellen.

• Breaking Gile-bad

  Didn’t finish watching The Handmaid’s Tale? You’re not alone. RNZ’s Yasmine Jeffery looks at why people switched off.

• One more time around

  Why are we rewatching Friends or The Sopranos for the 10th time instead of tackling new shows? Television experts Alex Casey and Linda Burgess talk to RNZ’s Jogai Bhatt about the irresistible pulls of nostalgia and predictability in a rewatch.

• From the farm to fame

  University of Otago student and Kaitāia farm boy Noah McBirney-Warnes did not think his involvement with a choir would lead to participation in an international documentary series. But he is prepared to make the most of it, he tells the ODT’s JohnLewis.

• Hardy joys

  Sure, the Guy Ritchie gangster drama MobLand is so cartoonish you could dismiss it as crass twaddle. But watching Tom Hardy threaten people is irresistible, writes Jack Seale.

• Crimeandpunishment

  Gangs of London is back for season three with more nerve-shreddingly tense TV, featuring bruising punch-ups, exuberant shootouts galore and a genuinely jaw-dropping Die Hard-inspired fight scene. Keeping track of all the allegiances can be tricky, though, writes Graeme Virtue.

Featured documents

• Down the rabbit hole

  What is real, and what isn’t? Karl Puschmann loses track as he follows comedian Nathan Fielder down an increasingly mind-bending spiral in Fielder’s new reality (?) show The Rehearsal....

• Wick-ish games

  You can always count on Hollywood to try to squeeze every last drop of success out of anything popular — and so arrives Prime Video’s new John Wick prequel miniseries The Continental. Ben Allan has a look to see if any of the magic has rubbed off....

• DrDeathtalksaboutlife

  Dawson’s Creek star Joshua Jackson on turning bad in Dr Death, becoming a pandemic parent, and how veteran actor Sir Patrick Stewart helped his career....

• Screen Queen

  Be it her calming speech in lockdown, or her landmark decision to televise her coronation, the Queen embraced TV in a way that helped her connect to her subjects, writes Mark Lawson....

• Hero satire takes new twist

  The black-hearted superhero satire The Boys has its first live-action spinoff with the arrival of Gen V. Ben Allan signs up for superhero classes....

• Martha’s version

  Martha Stewart is an ‘‘unreliable narrator’’ but also ‘‘a visionary’’, documentary director R.J. Cutler tells the Los Angeles Times’ Meredith Blake....

• Boldly going

  The latest Star Trek show, Strange New Worlds, is a spin-off of a show set in the past of a future, a prequel to both an unused pilot and a double episode of television that aired over 50 years ago. Confused? USA Today has the rundown....

• Look who’s back

  At first, the reboot of Frasier struggles. But after a few episodes, the chemistry and the magic are back, all helmed by its lead’s faultless performance — and it is a joy to watch, writes Lucy Mangan....

• Shadow of a fantasy

  Shadow and Bone is good but it could have been so much better, writes KellyLawler....

• NULL

  THE press release accompanying volume four of Stranger Things makes a reckless boast: “Over five hours longer than any previous season!” The show is among Netflix’s biggest hits, but it returns at a time when the streaming platform’s business model — hook subscribers by hurling cash at bloated mega-...