Thanksgiving is a time for binge-watching
Thanksgiving is a day of plenty. Plenty of football.
Which may leave you, the non-football fan — shhhhh! — at a loss when dessert is over and everyone descends on the big-screen TV in a big, boisterous, tortilla-dipping, touchdown-cheering mob.
What to do? Here's a suggestion. Sneak upstairs to the other TV and start binge-watching some of our favorite film and cable sagas.
You can revisit old reliables like "The Godfather" series, or catch up on the new show that everyone's been raving about. Meanwhile, there's this advantage: you'll be strangely absent when it comes time to volunteer for cleanup.
Here are some suggestions from the Better Living staff.
"American Gods." (Starz). Odin, Vulcan, Jesus, Ibis, a leprechaun and a genie are all — to coin a phrase — slobs like one of us in this earthy 2017 fantasy series (Season One wrapped up in June), based on the Neil Gaiman novel. Fun, and food for thought, as these old gods battle the new gods of technology.
"Insecure." (HBO) Singledom isn't all it's cracked up to be — even if you're as attractive and smart as Issa Rae, who developed this edgy, anxious (and very funny) comedy series with Larry Wilmore. Heads up: This series, which completed its second season last month, is serious cringe-core comedy. Expect adult language and themes.
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"I, Claudius" (BBC, available through Amazon). Stressed by 2017's political climate? Here's therapy: the wickedly brilliant 1976 BBC series about the first five Roman emperors. Production-wise, it's pokey by today's standards, but the writing (Robert Graves' novels, adapted by Jack Pulman) is superb, and what a cast: Derek Jacobi, Sian Phillips, Brian Blessed, Patrick Stewart, and the late John Hurt are all in beautiful form. If Rome could survive Caligula, we can survive anything.
"The Godfather, Parts I and II." It's never not the right time to watch the epic gangster saga of Don Vito Corleone (Marlon Brando in Part I, Robert De Niro in Part II), overlord of New York's greatest crime family, and the beloved son (Al Pacino) who becomes his Lucifer — the golden boy who falls from grace to become the most feared gangster of all. Part III, as all serious fans know, is never to be mentioned aloud.
The "Up" Series. Before there was reality television, there was this fascinating documentary saga, which began in 1964 as "Seven Up!" and spun off into seven more (so far) movies. The series, begun by the late Paul Almond and continued by Michael Apted, revisits the same group of Britishers — starting at age 7 when they're full of beans, and then checking in with them every seven years as the mill of life grinds them into surprising, and sometimes sad, forms. (They're pushing 60 now.) Together, these films are a fascinating, rueful meditation on time, class, aging, and cultural change.
The British "Office." (BBC, available through Amazon). You giggled, cackled and winced at the American version of this show, about a clueless office manager and his drones. But did you ever see the British original — which is even edgier and more merciless? Ricky Gervais is the insufferable boss in the 2001 original, which has the advantage of being only 12 episodes long (plus two Christmas specials).
"The Night Of." (HBO) A Pakistani-American teen is railroaded into prison for a murder he didn't commit — or did he? The veteran crime writer Richard Price ("Clockers") did this grimly realistic, mortifying 2016 look at the criminal justice system in New York that will have you nailed to your seat for eight episodes. With Riz Ahmed as the suspect and John Turturro as the lawyer with foot eczema (don't ask).
"In Treatment." (HBO). This 2008 series, based on an Israeli original, has an ingenious premise. Each half-hour episode is a different therapy session: a cross-section of Dr. Paul Weston's (Gabriel Byrne) patients from Monday to Thursday. Every fifth episode — "Friday" — is his therapy session with his shrink (Dianne Wiest) where he talks smack about all the people in the other episodes. Yes, it's mostly talk. But it's riveting.
"Stranger Things" (Netflix) A young boy disappears, and a girl with telekinetic powers aids in the search, in this sci-fi horror Web series. The first season, set in 1983, particularly beguiled children of the 1980s who were reared on "E.T. the Extra Terrestrial," "Poltergeist" and "Gremlins," but it transcended pastiche on the strength of its storytelling and its young cast. (Wynona Ryder and Matthew Modine, both stalwarts of '80s film, helped round out the ensemble.) The second season, "Stranger Things 2," debuted in October, adding the one time 1980s child star Sean Astin of "Goonies" fame to the mix.)
"Master of None" (Netflix) Aziz Ansari is an actor trying to make it, professionally and romantically, in New York in this incisive comedy-drama web series. Particularly in its second season, released in May, the series plays with the convention of serialized TV storytelling by introducing standalone episodes that explored individual themes (gender, religion, immigration) or paid homage to filmmakers like Michelangelo Antonioni and Federico Fellini.
This article originally appeared on NorthJersey.com: Binge-watch these shows on Thanksgiving