‘The Morning Show’ S2 review: Remorse and reinvention at scandal-scarred television network

A drone swoops through the deserted streets of New York City in the opening scene of the second season of The Morning Show (Apple TV+). It’s clearly a pandemic-related lockdown. And then the show dials back to December 2019.

Season one of the show, created by Jay Carson and Kerry Ehrin, focussed on the Me-Too allegations that disrupted operations at the television network UBA. The incident resulted in the dismissal of, among others, The Morning Show’s star anchor Mitch Kessler (Steve Carell).

The hosts of The Morning Show now include Bradley Jackson (Reese Witherspoon) and Eric Nomani (Hasan Minhaj). A publishing house has commissioned a tell-all book by Maggie Brener (Marcia Gay Harden) about the sexual harassment allegations. Bradley’s co-anchor Alex Levy (Jennifer Aniston) is finishing a book manuscript.

The new season, which has multiple directors, is less about the workings of the morning show and more about the people and their emotions. The spotlight is on remorse, redemption, reinvention and untold truths. There’s also a burgeoning pandemic.

There is way too much going on in the world for the employees and decision makers of UBA to be anything but affected. Through returning characters Mitch, Alex, Daniel (Desean Terry), Mia (Karen Pittman) and Yanko (Nestor Carbonell) and new additions Stella Bak (Greta Lee) and Laura…

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