For many of the 2010s, as streaming platforms proliferated, cable networks produced their very own authentic programming and the demand for TV reveals exploded, it felt like absolutely anything might get made. A divorce dramedy set amongst lecturers at an artists’ colony? A hallucinogenic riff on the X-Males? A Groundhog Day for nihilistic East Village stoners? Sure, sure, and sure.
Nevertheless it seems not each media firm must make its personal reveals if it will possibly entice as many, or extra, viewers by simply licensing previous seasons of Prison Minds, and as of 2023, we formally reached the Peak TV downslope, with the variety of American scripted reveals dropping 24 % in comparison with the earlier 12 months. As Netflix, to call one, begins taking fewer dangers, buying and selling distinctive fare like GLOW for shovelware like The Evening Agent, it will possibly really feel like TV has closed its doorways to true weirdos. Fantasmas is HBO’s finest — and, at present, possibly solely — proof that TV nonetheless has room for radical creativeness.
Julio (Julio Torres, who additionally created, wrote and directed all six episodes of the season) is unclassifiable. (Lady in a rideshare: “I’m a instructor. You’re a…?” “A Julio!” he beams.) Our first glimpse of Julio at “work” finds him at Crayola, making his personal facial approximations of assorted colours, then pitching the corporate on a transparent crayon: “Some issues aren’t one of many regular colours, or play by the foundations of the rainbow. Take into consideration air, or smells, or reminiscence. Shouldn’t they be allowed to be colours? To paint one thing clear is to acknowledge that possibly issues are completely different, and that’s simply tremendous! To paint one thing clear is to reimagine coloring as we all know it.”
After the assembly, Julio catches up together with his robotic assistant Bibo (voice of Joe Rumrill), who needs a break day to get his enamel cleaned. Julio doesn’t thoughts Bibo taking the time, however is anxious that Bibo might have unrealistic expectations for the outing that find yourself disappointing him, on condition that Bibo doesn’t have enamel. Bibo, in flip, is anxious that Julio has been ignoring notices from his landlord about an imminent eviction; Julio has a lot much less curiosity in that topic than he does in shopping for a sublime new earring within the form of a golden oyster.
As Julio does his errands and visits with pals new and previous, the motion periodically follows a tangent right into a separate story: a surprisingly emotional episode of Melf, about an alien becoming a member of a human household, taking part in on the iPad in Julio’s rideshare; an elucidation of Julio’s view that the letter Q (Steve Buscemi) comes up too early within the alphabet.
Half sitcom, half sketch present, Fantasmas is as unclassifiable as Julio himself.
Torres first turned identified on this planet of comedy as a author on Saturday Evening Reside. Throughout his tenure, the present’s nerdiest viewers might make certain that the strangest, most singular and queerest sketches have been his.
Throughout his time on the present, Torres collaborated with comic and author Ana Fabrega and Fred Armisen on HBO’s Los Espookys. A principally Spanish-language sitcom set in an unspecified Latin American nation, Los Espookys revolves across the titular “horror group” — 4 pals who make a enterprise, of types, hiring themselves out to create sensible results for determined purchasers. For instance, the group is approached by a scientist learning alien exercise who wants them to pose as extraterrestrials throughout a tutorial evaluation in order that her grant is renewed.
Torres performs Andrés, a spoiled chocolate inheritor who shares many qualities in widespread with the characters he’d created for SNL: a deep sensitivity to the pure world; a penchant for dramatic hand gestures; and an understanding that seemingly odd objects could be enchanted (or cursed).
Fantasmas looks like Torres took the entire obsessions we’ve seen him write about — in SNL, in Los Espookys, in his 2019 HBO stand-up particular My Favourite Shapes, and in his feature-film writing-directing début Problemista, launched earlier this 12 months by A24 — and remixed them with the least quantity of construction we’ve seen him make use of so far.
Bob Odenkirk has talked and written about all the cash that he, as an SNL author, noticed wasted on the development of units that will solely be used as soon as, and the way he saved these budgets low on his personal sketch collection, Mr. Present. Torres goes Odenkirk one higher with a Dogme 95-esque aesthetic: The manufacturing design is intentionally synthetic, with areas delineated utilizing crudely assembled pipes and brackets, garishly lighted avenue scenes projected round them. Probably the most convincing results are reserved for Julio’s goals; or to offer Melf ‘80s-sitcom-caliber verisimilitude; or once we make a journey to a TikTok home (the sectional snakes by way of the home and out the door, however the area behind it’s a snarl of digital cords that may by no means be untangled).
If the present could be mentioned to have a story by way of line, it’s the query of when or why an artist ought to compromise their imaginative and prescient. Problemista is the story of Alejandro (Torres), an aspiring designer of bizarre toys for particular youngsters (or adults?), who’s moved to the U.S. to use to a particular program at Hasbro. Dropping the job that sponsored his inexperienced card launches Alejandro right into a harmful grey zone of under-the-table employment, as professional documentation of his immigration recedes additional and farther from his grasp. On the planet of Fantasmas, the usual ID is a Proof of Existence card, which Julio has taken a principled stance in opposition to looking for, believing he’s an exception who doesn’t want it.
Because the distractions Julio’s created to delay his house search solely generate extra issues he wants to unravel, Vanesja (Martine Gutierrez) — a efficiency artist who’s been doing a bit as Julio’s agent for thus lengthy that now she primarily is simply his agent for actual — presents alternatives that might get him out of hassle, however at the price of his artist’s soul. Can Julio type out all his points himself, or will he be compelled to endorse a queer-targeted bank card created by ExxonMobil, or write a remake of The Lion King for the latest streaming service, Zappos?
Fantasmas can really feel like a throwback to the peakiest of Peak TV days, when a present you liked might really feel prefer it was made particularly for you and 4 different individuals. Followers of Julio Torres will feast on it, not solely as a result of each body feels prefer it’s giving us direct entry to his mind, aesthetic and sensibility, however as a result of it’s packed together with his former collaborators: Fabrega, Gutierrez, Bernardo Velasco, River Ramirez, Spike Einbinder, Eudora Peterson, Sam Taggart, Kim Petras and Greta Titelman all cross-over from Los Espookys; SNL’s Aidy Bryant has an instant-classic sketch in a parody advert for an unconventional bathroom accent; and Emma Stone seems each in an extended sketch within the season finale and as an govt producer on the collection.
Individuals who aren’t as properly versed within the Torres oeuvre, nonetheless, might have a more durable time getting a grip on what — or, reasonably, how a lot — is occurring right here. If they will open their minds, they could discover out {that a} story of a cursed Pomeranian portrait trolling Grindr for twinks or a authorized case through which a horny Mrs. Claus (Julia Fox) has to testify in opposition to a whistleblowing elf (Bowen Yang) is precisely what their comedy weight-reduction plan was lacking.
Or possibly not! Fantasmas positively received’t be for everybody, however everybody must be glad it might nonetheless be made.
