John Krasinski has become "America's Quarantine Dad" with Some Good News

Slate

The 40-year-old Jack Ryan star and The Office alum's YouTube coronavirus quarantine talk show premiered one month ago today with an episode that has since racked up more than 17 million views. Some Good News has offered "wholesome and canny coronavirus counterprogramming," says Willa Paskin, who adds that the show is "wholesome and canny career management by Krasinski, who, with SGN, is slipping into the role of America’s Quarantine Dad easily, as if it were a pair of slippers." Paskin adds: "America, of course, already has a celebrity dad: Tom Hanks, whose very blood is apparently being used to contribute to the commonweal. That Hanks might be edging, numerically speaking, into grandfather territory is of little consequence. (The 63-year-old does have three grandchildren.) What with our abusive presidential father, the American public is so desperately in need of reassuring authority figures someone tossing out Life Savers candies might get a second look. With SGN, Krasinski is doing more than that. In the past few years he has bulked up his familiar sitcom star persona with some action-hero brawn, becoming a vintage dad: corny, a little overconfident, but with his heart in the right place...Like a good dad, Krasinski is here to make the best out of the worst. His dark hair and beard growing slightly longer every episode, he introduces viral tweets, photos, and videos with gusto, good spirit, and a jokey cadence that belies his earnestness... In collecting all of this in one place, SGN isn’t just providing examples of our ability to inspire, entertain, and distract one another in these trying times. It’s trying to become another such example, sampling others’ uplifting and creative gestures into a remixed megagesture."