Great Pairings of TV Shows and Video Games (2018 Edition)

As 2018 fades away, we wanted to take one last look at some of the best from that crazy year.  Some of the best shows, to our mind, actually seem to pair pretty well with some of our favorite games.  While a lot of these titles aren’t perfect, they do pair nicely.  So if you’re looking for a great show or game for 2018, here are a few great ones that pair really well together.

Not to spoil, but both of these two will be back in Season 2 (on April 7th!)

Don’t miss: Killing Eve

Killing Eve may have been my favorite show last year.  There’s a reason Sandra Oh is winning every acting award she can for this show, but Jodie Komer’s assassin Villanelle is the more interesting character.  The two engage in fun cat-and-mouse exchange for much of the back half of the season, but each is also interesting in their own orbits, particularly Villanelle.  As much fun as her obsession with Eve gets, I really enjoyed the occasional glimpses we see of her assassinations.  She’s meticulous, ruthless, and deeply disturbed (but super stylish; I wish she ran my Stitch Fix).

No witness will remember the lumbering bald guy with the conspicuous bar code in a tailored suit walking around the raceway.

….It pairs well with Hitman 2

Agent 47 enjoys his work about as much as Villanelle enjoys hers.  He’s also creative, also employs disguises, and often tries to get in and out of elaborately elegant locations without his targets knowing he was there.  There are some interesting differences though; Agent 47 lives a relatively monastic existence while Villanelle is a wildly indulgent between assignments.  Agent 47 uses his preposterous featureless to gain access to areas (that’s being generous; this brawny, bald, bar-coded guy is about as inconspicuous as Wario).  Villanelle, on the other hand, uses her attractiveness as camouflage as she tracks her targets.  Add to that her dark backstory and she really seems to be a female counterpart to Agent 47.  I almost wish there was a Villanelle outfit I could wear in Hitman 2, or that Sandra Oh was a playable character.

Yeah……things aren’t looking good.

Don’t miss: The Terror

The Terror was an AMC/BBC show last year that detailed the events of a doomed ship trying to chart a path through the north pole.  Through some poor planning and bad decisions, the crew gets stuck in the northern ice and faces a series of challenges as rations diminish, crew members start turning against each other, and a seemingly supernatural polar bear starts hunting the crew.  There are a ton of great actors throughout the cast that make even these dark, depressing events captivating to watch.

Of the 60 crew who perished, I think this guy got off relatively easy. See, his limbs are all still attached and his skull hasn’t exploded.

….It pairs well with Return of the Obra Dinn

The Return of the Obra Dinn is about as close to a video game adaptation of The Terror as there is ever likely to be.  The Terror ends with teams finding the abandoned ships and beginning to investigate what happened; Obra Dinn begins with the discovery of the ship and sends you back into the events of the doomed crew.  As an investigator capable of recreating the moment of each crewmember’s death, you explore each frozen tableau – stepping over bodies and around monsters – searching for information about how each person died (hint: it’s always “horribly”).  I’d love to watch a movie about the events of the Obra Dinn in sequence; the breakdowns, the betrayals and the supernatural monsters that beset the crew of the Obra Dinn were just as exciting as the ones that affect the crew of The Terror.  Experience them both and you’ll never get on a boat again.

Watch these two battle it out for the title of King of Character Actors.

Don’t miss: Escape at Dannemora

I didn’t notice Escape at Dannemora until Patricia Arquette started winning awards for her portrayal of a corrupt prison guard who may have helped two inmates escape prison.  I was surprised to find that Paul Dano and Benicio del Toro were also on the show (playing the inmates) and the whole thing was directed by Ben Stiller.  How did I miss this show?  Well, it’s on Showtime, so there you go.  Even so, the show is surprisingly good!  While I really admired the depiction of prison life, the creepy relationships between Arquette and Dano and Del Toro, and the eventual escape, the show ends with it’s most masterful portion: a surprisingly visceral depiction of the crimes that brought the inmates to prison.  It’s dark, compelling stuff.

Both of these guys really need to rethink their hairstyles. And life choices.

….It pairs well with A Way Out

A Way Out also does a good job depicting a relationship that develops between two men who are incarcerated for very different (but violent) crimes.  While their escape takes up a little more  of the story than Dano’s and Del Toro’s, the teamwork you have to engage in to escape prison makes for compelling gameplay (in contrast to the show where Dano does all the work).  I wasn’t real happy with the ending of A Way Out, but the rest of the game was an excellent, unique cooperative experience that definitely warrants a playthrough.