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We Confess! Our Guiltiest Entertainment Pleasures of 2024

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7 hours ago

December 23, 2024

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We Confess! Our Guiltiest Entertainment Pleasures of 2024

The Hollywood Reporter’s staff spends plenty of time watching, dissecting and, yes, even enjoying prestige TV and Oscar-worthy cinema — but sometimes we just needed to close those blinds and hit this junk food.

Published on December 23, 2024

Sabrina Carpenter, Demi Moore in ‘The Substance’ and Glenn Close in ‘The Deliverance’

Christopher Polk/Rolling Stone/Getty Images; MUBI/Courtesy Everett Collection; Aaron Ricketts/Netflix

Yes, awards and critical acclaim are nice (and a few entries on this list have received some already), but in a year as trying as 2024, the entertainment we most frequently turned to was of the comfort-food variety — with a big helping of junk food, too. With that in mind, we asked The Hollywood Reporter staff to share some of the deepest, darkest secrets lurking in our Netflix queues, Spotify playlists and TikTok algorithms. These are our guiltiest pleasures of the year.

Briefcases and Bikinis

Image Credit: Monty Brinton/NBC

A spinoff of the early aughts game show of similar name, Deal or No Deal Island mashes together Howie Mandel’s cash competition with the physical challenges of CBS’ Survivor…except there’s no Mandel, or Jeff Probst. Instead, Joe Manganiello leads the contestants through weekly physical challenges — ziplines and mazes and mud pits abound — which end in the acquisition of cash-filled briefcases to form miniature versions of the Deal or No Deal Banker’s Challenge. Season one featured several iconic “islanders,” including Survivor royalty Boston Rob, who left in week 11 on the heels of a cheating scandal, as well as a particularly memorable tiger print shirt on Maganiello and a delightfully CG-looking yacht where the anonymous banker, eventually revealed to be Mandel, hides out. Thankfully, the show was renewed, and will return in early 2025. — Zoe Phillips
The Chain Gang

Image Credit: FilmMagic

The “guilt” from the pleasure of listening to the Doughboys podcast comes primarily from attempting to recommend it to friends and family, because — as the hosts themselves will attest — it is incredibly stupid. Each week Nick Wiger and Mike Mitchell invite a guest to join them in reviewing a chain restaurant, from Taco Bell to Nordstrom’s Bar Verde (the definition of “chain restaurant” has understandably loosened over the years). However, like so many podcasts in this, our dumbest, era, the true joy comes not from learning what to order from IHOP’s special Indiana Jones x Xbox menu, but instead from hearing the absurd banter between Wiger and Mitchell and the Doughboys Extended Universe of guests. Each episode kicks off with a thoroughly-researched restaurant introduction by Wiger — often alluding to the questionable politics and business practices of our beloved chain-restaurant conglomerates — and quickly devolves into detailed information of how last week’s hot chicken affected the ’boys’ bowels, their new year’s resolution to not say foul words on the podcast anymore (“crim,” anyone?), or dubious legends about each man’s anatomy. And if you’re just dumb enough, you can pay an extra $5-8 to their Patreon to listen to Nick and Mitch narrate building a grocery-store gingerbread house for a full hour. See? Stupid. And I eat it up. — Kelsey Stefanson
Glenn Close’s Potty-Mouthed Possession

Image Credit: Aaron Ricketts/Netflix

Anyone who sampled the lurid delights of The Paperboy knows Lee Daniels is no stranger to campy pulp. But not even Nicole Kidman peeing on Zac Efron can prepare you for the escalating craziness of The Deliverance — a collision of demonic possession horror with fraught domestic melodrama, in which three generations of women fix each other’s hair while lip-syncing Valley of the Dolls dialogue. The movie’s biggest hoot is Glenn Close as baseball bat-wielding Alberta, a brassy, born-again cancer sufferer who never met a cold-shoulder cutout blouse she didn’t love. ‘Berta’s wardrobe crimes are epic — the ripped skinny jeans, the contrast pushup bras, the shredded Daisy Dukes, the bizarre trampy funeral getup she wears for a mother-daughter porch chat. Alberta’s stare-down with Mo’Nique’s social worker is heaven. But just wait for her Satanic hag swerve in the third act, with pointed razor teeth, a sparse tangle of hair over a veiny scalp, the fingernails of Nosferatu and gold hoops, natch. Her taunting of poor Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor’s Pentecostal pastor yields an eye-watering insult that might be the most outrageous line spoken in a movie all year. — David Rooney
Milli for Murder

Image Credit: Miles Crist/Netflix

The year was 1989 and Milli Vanilli were at the height of pop superstardom, cranking out hit singles “Girl You Know It’s True” (No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100) and “Blame It on the Rain” (No. 1) before dropping a moody, breathy slow jam “Girl I’m Gonna Miss You,” which also reached the top of the song charts. It was pre-lip synch scandal for the group, though that would come soon enough, ending their stratospheric ride. Leave it to Ryan Murphy — and his longtime music supervisor Amanda Krieg Thomas — to resurrect the duo’s swansong as the soundtrack to Monsters: The Lyle and Erik Menendez Story. Used to great effect, the R&B-leaning track is heard repeatedly, serving as a leitmotif for some of the series’ most brutal scenes, like the brothers murdering their parents, and also its most poignant, the prison drive that separates the brothers. Who knew prefab pop could feel so somber. — Shirley Halperin
An Apple Movie a Day

Image Credit: Courtesy of Apple TV+

This is the year in which Apple had to revise its film strategy, with the underperforming Argylle setting things off on the wrong foot. But even though they didn’t get a commensurate amount of buzz or box office laurels, two Apple titles were among my favorite films of this year: the George Clooney-Brad Pitt two-hander Wolfs (which earned headlines for losing its full theatrical release at the last minute) and the Channing Tatum-Scarlett Johansson period rom-com Fly Me to the Moon (which I saw multiple times on the big screen). Both are a delight and a reminder of the magic we’re missing out on when studios don’t give lighter, original fare a chance for theatrical. Not every comedy needs to perform like Deadpool & Wolverine (yes, I also saw that more than once in the theater, although it didn’t need my support) to justify a run at the multiplex. — Ryan Gajewski
Ballroom Drama

Image Credit: Eric McCandless/Disney

Dancing with the Stars is so much more than just a dance competition — it’s a case study in family dynamics, the power of social media and the intersection between religion and competitive dance. Utah’s deep-rooted ballroom culture breeds DWTS pros, and even beyond the LDS hub, the ballroom scene is small, meaning the competitors grew up as both rivals and best friends, brothers, sisters and dance partners. They date, they split up, they marry and they have kids. They’re also all very, very attractive. And don’t get me started on the celebrity showmances. I could write a novel about the show’s impact, but instead, I’ll leave you with my Thanksgiving Day Instagram post. Maybe I need some more shame. —Erin Lassner
Scrollable Culinary Criticism

Image Credit: Mario Tama/Getty Images

I’ve become addicted to TikTok food reviewers. They alternate between enraging (the pastrami is from “Katz’s Delicatessen,” not “Cats Deli”) and engaging (the quality of iPhone cameras makes almost everything look delicious), but has quietly become a place I return to for food content. The travel/food category has been around forever, and always seems to evolve and change, somehow spanning both the highbrow and the lowbrow. Anthony Bourdain gave way to both Guy Fieri and Stanley Tucci, for example, but with new places and Instagram-friendly dishes always popping up, there is no better place to stay on top what I should be eating, and gramming. Food Network is out, FoodTok is in. At least until it gets banned. — Alex Weprin
Even More Demi Moore

Image Credit: MUBI/Courtesy Everett Collection

Never would I have imagined that my personal favorite film of 2024 would be a body-horror dramedy written and directed by someone who I’d never heard of (Coralie Fargeat) and starring Demi Moore, but from the night of it’s Cannes world premiere through this very moment, I’ve been addicted to The Substance. I don’t think there’s been a funnier, darker or smarter sendup of Hollywood since Billy Wilder and Gloria Swanson gave us Norma Desmond in Sunset Blvd. back in 1950. Sure, the third-act, in particular, is off the wall, but it’s worth enduring to get to the coda on the Walk of Fame. — Scott Feinberg
My Own Spotify Wrapped

Image Credit: Gilbert Flores/Billboard/Getty Images

I just knew that my Spotify Wrapped would reveal that my top song of the year was something from Beyonce’s Cowboy Carter or Kendrick Lamar’s “Not Like Us.” I also knew I was lying to myself because I played the shit out of Sabrina Carpenter’s “Espresso” since it was released in April. The song is the DEFINITION of a pop smash. And the fascination with Carpenter didn’t end there: Her album is pure fire. Her tour live show was fun as hell. And her Netflix Christmas special is cheeky and cheerful. She’s so damn likable that it makes sense the Grammys would let her qualify for best new artist though she’s on her sixth album. — Mesfin Fekadu
Digging Up the Dead

Image Credit: Patrick McElhenney/20th Century Fox Film Corp./Courtesy Everett Collection

Bones (RIP). I have been rewatching the entire series for a good part of the year. Considering the show ran for 246 episodes, I’m convinced I’ve found the perfect way to waste approximately eight calendar months of your life. There’s something immensely comforting about Emily Deschanel playing the smart and serious Bones – yes, that’s what they actually call her – alongside David Boreanaz as rule-breaking bad boy (who is still an FBI agent) Special Agent Booth. It’s basically The X-Files without the aliens. I could go on and on about how great the “will they, won’t they” of the first six seasons are – until they actually do and it becomes immensely less fun – but it’s best to just watch all 12 seasons yourself. —Nicole Fell
“Who is She?”

Image Credit: David Livingston/Getty Images

I’m not sure how I stumbled upon Total Trash Live, a tabloid recap show that airs Monday nights on Instagram (and then on YouTube) hosted by comedian Pete Zias. But I’ve been addicted to it ever since. Zias improvises the whole thing, pulling his trademark magnifying glass to his eye and uttering his catchphrase — “Who is she??” — as he pores through the pages of the Enquirer and Star. Like Dominick Dunne and O.J., he’s really found his muse with the Luigi Mangione saga. (The CEO assassin’s McDonald’s capture allows Zias to explore other strange obsessions, like his love of the Filet O’ Fish.) The bottom line is that Total Trash Live makes me laugh. I think it’s that voice of his — imagine Divine hosting E! True Hollywood Story. —Seth Abramovitch