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The Arts Intel Report

A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler
A Cultural Compass
For the World Traveler

The Flight Attendant

Streaming on HBO

The Flight Attendant is far from prestige television, and that’s exactly what makes it so great. Adapted from a 2018 mystery novel of the same name, its protagonist—you guessed it—is a flight attendant. After hitting it off with a first-class passenger en route to Thailand, she meets up with him in a Bangkok bar for a blurry night of shots that ends in his hotel room. Waking the next morning, her head throbbing, she finds that her new beau’s is practically severed. That’s right: he’s been murdered and she, apparently, slept through it. What’s worse, the flight attendant remembers next to nothing about their date, which, we soon find out, is a recurring problem for her. Though it follows a somewhat disturbing trend among female-centered mystery stories—using blackout drinking as a narrative device—the show is nonetheless super fun. The normally uber-cheesy Kaley Cuoco, playing the titular attendant, kills it as a semi-functional alcoholic out to solve the whodunit of her own innocence. Plus, Rosie Perez co-stars, and though her subplot is mystifying, it’s not really a problem because, well, it’s Rosie Perez. —C.J.F.