It’s no secret that I keep track of and write about a lot of my gluttonous overconsumption of television. I don’t write about everything I watch because some of it is not worth writing about, and some of it, like Game of Thrones or The Walking Dead, have been written about and analyzed to death. I’m not really interested in picking at the bones that remain of the overconsumed shows. I love them, anxiously wait for them, but I don’t have much to add to the discussion.

It’s the shows that people don’t watch and pick apart, those under-the-radar entertainment bits, that I sometimes feel an urge to write about. Often when I am surprised that I find myself watching a certain show (and liking it), it makes sense.

Recently I ran out of things to watch (summer is tv doldrums – with some highlights, but largely not as robust as other times), and scrolled through a number of “best things you aren’t watching” lists, many of which listed iZombie as a good choice. I had misconceptions about the show, much as I would about any show focused on zombies (a concept I am not fond of), and was pleasantly entertained when I finally did dig in and watch all of it. I don’t find the performances that compelling (they’re normal) but the inside jokes and references – and the Seattle setting – which too was part of the joke, as it is sometimes very obviously Vancouver, which they take no pains to hide (at least the cars have Washington plates) – kept me pushing “play” on episode after episode.

But that’s it – it’s mildly clever, pleasant … and not something I can summarize or from which I can pick out some unique aspect. (OH! Except that they mentioned Celtic FC of Glasgow, and what other American tv show would ever do that?) And, that, my friends, is probably the point. The show holds up a mirror: are we not all zombies, overfeeding on mindless tv and other vacuous entertainment (while the rest of the world burns down), despite not being “hungry”?

Photo (c) 2013 Mike Mozart.