The Morning Show | Chaos, It's the New Cocaine
I have something I have to admit: I’m 34 years old and I am a morning show tv addict.
This wasn’t a choice. I watched whatever my Big Momma watched growing up. And every morning for as long as I can remember, she watched The Today show. And so did I.
Now, Big Momma has been gone well over 10 years now, but I still turn on The Today Show every morning while I get ready for work. So it’s no surprise that when I watched the trailer for The Morning Show on Apple TV Plus, I was interested.
The Morning Show is a drama about the behind the scenes life of morning television and how co-host Alex Levy, played by Jennifer Anniston, is blindsided and tries to keep it together after her longtime co-host of 15 years, Mitch Kessler (Steve Carell), is fired for sexual misconduct allegations. Sound familiar?
Listen, I know they said it’s based off the book Top of the Morning: Inside the Cutthroat World of Morning TV by Brian Stelter, but YALL… this is a straight up Today Show/ Weinstein biopic. Spoiler alert: Mitch has a button under his desk that closes and locks the door like Matt Lauer.
I will say this show is complicated. There are so many plots happening. Alex is trying not to break from the situation and in the same breath let the network know her worth. We see Mitch trying to save his career by spending most of his time yelling he is innocent and how all his encounters were consensual. Then there is Cory Ellison (Billy Crudup), the head of the news division, who is simultaneously trying to hire a new co-host and push Alex out. And in the middle of all of this is Reese Witherspoon’s character Bradley Jackson who is a small town reporter who gets boosted to stardom when she loses her shit on a protestor after learning that her hard demeanor kept her from getting the late night anchor spot on her local station and the video goes viral on social media. And for fun, throw in tackling the nuances of the #metoo movement, cancel culture, and some weekend anchor drama on the side.
It’s a lot to take in yall.
And take it in I did. I flew through those first 3 episodes. I want to know why Jennifer Anniston is so angry. Does Mitch get a redemptive arc? Will Reese Witherspoon end up being America’s new morning show sweetheart? And I really want to know if the ladies will end up sticking it to the network run by a gaggle of men. And most of all, when is the lone person of color anchor gonna get some damn respect! (I won’t hold his disdain for Gilmore Girls against him. Stars Hollow is an EXPERIENCE.)
So I’m greenlighting The Morning Show. I’ve seen a lot of critics try to pan it but compared to the crappy shows network television is producing these day (looking at you PERFECT HARMONY) it’s a winner for me. It’s honestly giving me HBO show vibes. And I look forward to seeing how the rest of the season turns out.
Side note: for everybody who is irritated that there is another streaming service out there that we have to pay for, Apple TV Plus is free for a year if you’ve recently purchased a new Apple device. Happy watching!
TFS Rating: B