TV OT: Who are TV's ultimate design duos? A (not) definitive dissection. Plus, 'The Walking Dead' returns

Disclaimers:

8) Tarek El Moussa and Christina Haack ("Flip oregon Flop") - Separate the creation from the artist, immoderate radical say. Those radical are not me. The ratings for this long-running amusement mightiness bespeak radical are precise into decoding the play betwixt these exes connected surface and to each their own. Me? Reading astir toxic behaviour off-screen makes maine sad, and I ticker these shows to thin into a blessed escape. I overmuch similar Haack's solo show.

7) Mina Starsiak Hawk and Karen E. Laine ("Good Bones") - This mother-daughter duo thin to remake smaller homes — arsenic opposed to Southern mini-mansions — and I truthful admit that. Minor demotion connected this database for occasional questionable plan choices. They erstwhile utilized a clump of mismatched doors arsenic a partition and the effect was more "Monsters Inc." than chic.

6) Ben and Erin Napier ("Home Town") - I privation this sweet-seeming, folksy brace were my neighbors -- but they wouldn't needfully beryllium my prime renovators. Our styles conscionable don't lucifer up, and that's ok. I conscionable retrieve an occurrence made maine truthful irate, I looked it up aboriginal online, screengrabbed each the things that annoyed maine (e.g a achromatic spray-painted wrought robust chandelier) and texted them to my sisters. (Clearly, this Petty LaBelle was drinking a hater-ade cocktail that night.) Look, I americium not ever my champion self.

5) Lyndsay Lamb and Leslie Davis ("Unsellable Houses") - Thanks to my ma for reminding maine this amusement exists, and we bask it. I admittedly haven't watched this brace arsenic overmuch arsenic I've seen immoderate the others, but what I person seen, I liked. They person a batch of scope successful their benignant offerings.

4) Jonathan and Drew Scott ("Property Brothers," "Celebrity I.O.U.") - It's hard to fertile these location betterment OGs immoderate little than this due to the fact that you indispensable respect those who helped physique a genre. That said, 1 of my favored peeves is erstwhile homes for families are styled with furnishings that is not household affable — things with crisp corners oregon impossible-to-clean textures. (Enjoy your suede sofa for the 5 minutes it'll beryllium clean.) It conscionable sets everyone up for disappointment. Sometimes, these well-meaning dudes miss the details.

3) April Brown and Sarah Sklash ("Motel Makeover") - These ladies aren't remaking homes connected their caller Netflix bid but my conjecture it's lone a substance of clip until the women I'm present dubbing the Terracotta Motel Warriors (when you watch, you'll recognize why) participate that phase. This show, premiering August 25, follows them arsenic they enactment beingness backmost into a motel -- overmuch similar they did with their precise fashionable June Motel -- utilizing neon signs, sunset overgarment colors and a batch of grit arsenic the contend with the commencement of the pandemic. I watched it 1 sitting and can't privation to spot much from these pistillate entrepreneurs. Also, idiosyncratic needs to instantly greenlight a spin-off with their man-of-few-words contractor, Rick, who is low-key hilarious. (One of the champion lines was his reappraisal of his first-ever solid of rosé. "That's freakin' horrible.")

2) Dave and Jenny Marrs ("Fixer to Fabulous") - Nothing kills maine much than erstwhile renovators instrumentality an older location with quality and crook it into an all-white asylum. This mates does a bully occupation of keeping the unsocial aspects of older homes intact portion renovating, and my gut tells maine they'd bash adjacent much if they didn't often person modern-leaning clients to reply to.

1) Chip and Joanna Gaines (Magnolia Network) - Did you truly deliberation I was going to unseat the king and queen of aspirational alley? Never. Yes, I'm arsenic implicit the modern farmhouse look arsenic everyone else, but if you've watched their caller show, "Fixer Upper: Welcome Home," you'd cognize this brace has evolved a batch since that 2017 repetition you watched the different day. The marque seems to person entered a caller epoch that trends distant from the grey boxes and plays overmuch much with textures and tones. Oh, but this epoch inactive has shiplap. You gotta person shiplap.

A 'Dead' stop? Not truthful fast

CNN's Brian Lowry has a dispatch connected the last play of "The Walking Dead." He reports:

"'The Walking Dead' kicks disconnected its 11th and last play connected Sunday, but if you're reasoning astir what you're going to deterioration to the finale party, don't fret, there's inactive plentifulness of time.

The super-sized play volition really dwell of 24 episodes, offering a agelong clip to physique up toward immoderate benignant of decision successful 2022, adjacent though it truly won't be, since assorted spinoffs proceed and different 1 has already been announced by AMC.

The archetypal 2 episodes don't grounds overmuch consciousness yet of gathering toward thing major, though they bash contiguous a bully premix of the cardinal characters, with overmuch of the hostility predicated connected the narration betwixt Maggie (Lauren Cohan) and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan), who is beauteous convinced that she'll termination him the archetypal accidental she gets.

'The Walking Dead' has been specified a staple of AMC's lineup that it's understandable the web wouldn't beryllium successful immoderate hurry to portion with it. Still, for each the hoopla astir this being the last season, similar the show's endless proviso of zombies, it's going to beryllium a long, dilatory shamble toward the exit."

All hail the King?

For the Stephen King completists, Lowry besides had this to accidental connected "Chapelwaite":

"Having watched a seemingly endless watercourse of Stephen King adaptations -- which understandably picked up aft 'It' -- there's a definite fatigue built into the process. Yet adjacent with that it's hard to gin up overmuch enthusiasm for 'Chapelwaite,' a bid based connected King's 'Jerusalem's Lot' premiering Aug. 22 connected Epix.

Set successful the 1850s, Adrien Brody stars (and besides produced the miniseries) arsenic a widowed begetter of 3 who moves into the family's creepy ancestral home, wherever expectedly creepy things statesman to happen.

Exceptionally bleak, the amusement wins immoderate points for its gothic look and atmosphere. But amid a glut of King adaptations that precocious see Apple TV+'s 'Lisey's Story,' and aft previewing the archetypal mates hours, if you person the courageousness for 10 episodes of this, you're either a truly large instrumentality of the writer oregon made of sterner worldly than I am."

Non-fiction files

One much from Lowry, who fundamentally has a doctorate successful watching documentaries:

"HBO has fundamentally fixed Spike Lee an unfastened lane to riff connected New York City and the unfolding crises that it has faced passim this period successful 'NYC Epicenters 9/11➔2021½,' a scattered representation successful its archetypal 2 chapters of the Covid effect and the Black Lives Matter movement, featuring interviews with a immense and varied assortment of New York residents. That database includes Mayor Bill de Blasio, who Lee presses astir his narration with Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Not surprisingly, Lee -- who occasionally provides his ain comments, successful summation to conducting hundreds of interviews -- works successful blistering commentary astir erstwhile President Trump (whom helium refers to arsenic 'Agent Orange'), but Cuomo doesn't fare overmuch better. The politicos interviewed see erstwhile New York governors, among them George Pataki, who refers to the arc of Rudy Giuliani's vocation arsenic 'sad.'

Premiering Sunday, the archetypal 2 installments are frankly a small each implicit the place, arsenic Lee tends to bash with his documentaries, weaving successful a dizzying assortment of (some peripherally related) topics. The third, by contrast, focuses squarely connected the Sept. 11 attacks, with the past of the 4 two-hour chapters to play connected the 20th day of those events."

Paw-somely uplifting

This week, I attempted to dainty my "White Lotus" hangover with the literal hairsbreadth of the canine and watched Cesar Milan's caller show, "Better Human, Better Dog." In the bid Milan -- known to galore for his aged programme "Dog Whisperer" -- attempts to gully a enactment betwixt people's ain emotions and hang-ups and their misbehaving pets.

While admitting that this amusement marries my 2 favourite subjects -- dogs and myself -- I'll accidental the bid satisfies the hunger for thing lukewarm and fuzzy successful the aforesaid mode "Great British Bake-Off" oregon "Queer Eye" does. And conscionable similar those shows animate you concisely to effort thing caller oregon amended yourself, this 1 volition bash the aforesaid -- adjacent though you'll yet spell backmost to bribing your unsocialized pandemic pooch with Pringles to behave erstwhile visitors travel over.

Should watch/Will watch

It's a dilemma I woody with each play truthful I'm sharing it with you:

I cognize I should ticker "The Chair" due to the fact that Twitter is going to beryllium talking astir it and ruin the champion parts for maine if I don't zoom done it.

I'll astir apt treble diagnostic "My Girl" and "My Girl 2," which I didn't recognize were present streaming connected Netflix, and your miss loves a bully cry.