Reviews

The Televised Verbal Smackdown Felt Around the World
TVFirstLook (Oct. 4, 2012)

Ouch. Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney has been practicing for last night's debate for weeks, according to his team. It paid off. Mitt delivered 90 minutes of punches with a smile - and with wide eyes that spent most of the night searching for President Obama's eyes, whose face was often slumped over in defeat.



Funny Stand-Up Comedian is an Even Better TV Show Host
TVFirstLook (Oct. 4, 2012)

If you have ever watched comedian Gabriel Iglesias perform his routine, you know this: he's chubby (or fluffy). And he's pretty funny. He may not be the funniest comedian out there. But he consistently delivers laughs.



Not Everyone Loves CBS's Elementary (Although, We Do)
Wired (Oct. 4, 2012)

Elementary (CBS, 10pm) - If I want a contemporary takes on Sherlock Holmes, there’s Sherlock on BBC America. If a want detective eye candy in the 10pm Thursday night slot, I already have Patrick Jane in The Mentalist. If I want Sherlock Holmes and Watson in New York City, I already have Goren and Eames in Law & Order: Criminal Intent.



Important Work Shaped Into a Compelling New Show
TVFirstLook (Oct. 2, 2012)

Every once in a while a TV show quietly exposes an ugly side of life and sets about fixing it. Rarely, as in the case of Nat Geo Wild's Animal Intervention (9pm), it then fashions that into a compelling, entertaining show.



Emmy-Winning Homeland is Cant-Miss-TV
San Francisco Chronicle (Sept. 28, 2012)

Last Sunday's Emmy Awards left viewers and critics with more than enough to argue about for a year or so, but the one thing virtually everyone agrees on is that the awards to Showtime's Homeland (Showtime - Sunday, 10pm) and to the show's two stars, Damian Lewis and Claire Danes, were completely justified.



The Good Wife's New Season Starts Strong
Newsday (Sept. 28, 2012)

The Good Wife (CBS - Sunday, 9pm) - A strange new client walks in the door. As long as his money is good, Diane (Christine Baranski) and Will (Josh Charles) don't worry too much about his past.



CBS Legal Drama is Well Made But Isn't Great
USA Today (Sept. 28, 2012)

CBS, on the other hand, is betting that most people don't feel like struggling through a sci-fi show's complexities at the end of the work week, and would be more interested in a highly polished, proficiently made, thought-free hour of popular entertainment.



666 Park Avenue Takes a While to Take Hold
New York Daily News (Sept. 28, 2012)

A stylish ambience and a familiar cast might not be enough to make 666 Park Avenue (ABC - Sunday, 10pm) into another unlikely Sunday night hit for ABC.



CBS's Sherlock Holmes Update is Rock Solid
The Hollywood Reporter (Sept. 27, 2012)

Elementary (CBS, 10pm) - There was every reason to believe that a disaster was in the making when CBS decided to do an American version of Sherlock Holmes, especially after the modern-day British Sherlock had been so acclaimed. And yet -- super-simple deduction -- there also was every reason to believe that the franchise would be perfect on CBS, home to television’s best procedurals.



Shawn Ryan's Last Resort Delivers This Season's Most Exciting Premiere Episode
Variety (Sept. 27, 2012)

Last Resort (ABC, 10pm) plays like a high-stakes chess game, with shifting loyalties and ample uncertainty regarding who can be trusted.



Is The Neighbors This Year's Worst Sitcom?
Boston Globe (Sept. 26, 2012)

ABC’s The Neighbors (9:30pm) is this season’s awful sitcom, the one that defies all kind of sense. It makes you want to ask ABC, as Seth Meyers asks in his new SNL news segment, What are you doing?



Jimmy Fallon's Idea for a Show Needs a Rethink
USA Today (Sept. 26, 2012)

Guys with Kids (NBC, 8:30pm) was co-created by Jimmy Fallon, who says he saw some guys carrying their kids in Baby Björns and thought it would be funny to do a show about them. Unfortunately, that seems to be about as far as his thinking went.



Outrageous Animated Comedy is Funny When It's Not Awful
TVFirstLook (Sept. 25, 2012)

Tonight, while CBS is a half-hour into airing the series debut of what will be one of the 2012 fall TV season's critical darlings, Vegas, Comedy Central will debut an animated show about frequently fornicating animals and reprehensible park rangers from executive producer Daniel Tosh (Tosh.0).



Old-Fashioned Style Works Great for Dennis Quaid in Vegas
Kansas City Star (Sept. 25, 2012)

Co-created by Nick Pileggi (Casino), Vegas (CBS, 10pm) is the kind of show John Ford could have sunk his choppers into. It not only has a white-hat-wearing good guy in Dennis Quaid and a black-suited villain in Michael Chiklis, it also spins on that most American of themes: the civilizing, for better and worse, of the wilderness.



Ben is Annoying Even When Ben is Perfect
New York Daily News (Sept. 25, 2012)

Ben and Kate (Fox, 8:30pm) - Kate Fox (Dakota Johnson) knows Ben (Nat Faxon) because she’s his sister. She’s been giving him her tickets for years.



The Mindy Project is Good If You Like Mindy
Boston Globe (Sept. 25, 2012)

Despite a few flaws, The Mindy Project could evolve into an interesting hybrid, an anti-romantic-comedy romantic comedy. On the show, which premieres Tuesday night at 9:30pm, Kaling plays Dr. Mindy Lahiri, a talented OB/GYN whose private life needs all kinds of work. That’s the project of the title.

Gay-Straight-Buddy Sitcom is Just an OK Comedy

Variety (Sept. 24, 2012)

In its first season, 2 Broke Girls demonstrated it's possible to hit paydirt on CBS with a comedy when the casting and chemistry are right, even if the writing is formulaic.



Mike Rowe Lifts a Glass to Booze's Shaping of America
TVFirstLook (Sept. 19, 2012)

No matter what you think about Mike Rowe, the deep-voiced host of Discovery Channel's Dirty Jobs and an ubiquitous narrator, over the years he has created a "Mike Rowe Style." Not taking himself too seriously, he turns the cameras around onto themselves, exposing the charade of TV and making snarky jokes that bomb as often as they make you laugh.
 
Powerful Civil War Documentary Suffers from Its Length
TVFirstLook (Sept. 18, 2012)

Death has had a huge impact on the United States of America. From 1861 through 1865, some 750,000 soldiers were strewn bloody, dead and dying in villages and in the fields of farmers and slaves during the Civil War.


Plot Holes May Bump Off The Mob Doctor
Shari Anne Brill, TVFirstLook (Sept. 17, 2012)

Now that House has hung up its shingle, Fox has launched a new medical drama in its place.
 
Downton Abbey Season Three Debuts in UK to Rave Reviews
TV UK MSN (Sept. 17, 2012)

Downton Abbey - With a gloriously-crafted mini-society of characters to play with - plus a couple of new faces (watch out for O'Brien's gangly nephew) - there is so much to enjoy.

J. J. Abrams' Revolution Likely Facing a Dim Future
Variety (Sept. 17, 2012)

[Revolution - NBC, 10pm] the J.J. Abrams-produced series deals with a lingering conspiracy and battle for survival.
 
Violence, Sex and a Comfortable Season-Three Groove
Variety (Sept. 14, 2012)

After the scintillating highs and surprises of its second season, Boardwalk Empire (HBO - Sunday, 9pm) returns following a passage of time, which can always be a trifle unsettling. In short order, though, the program finds its groove, with new rivals, shifting relationships and strained allegiances, all set against the intoxicating backdrop of the booze-running 1920s and wildly corrupt Harding administration.
 
Revamped The X Factor Tries Really (Really) Hard to Be Good
TVFirstLook (Sept. 13, 2012)

Ugh. The X Factor (Fox, 8pm) isn't awful. It's just not very good.
 
TVOne Goes Inside the Often Dark Lives of Parolees
TVFirstLook (Sept. 12, 2012)

The best documentaries and TV docu-series take you inside the lives of people that are utterly unlike your own. On shows like A&E's standard-setting The First 48 that's the lives of murderers and the homicide detectives tracking them down.
 
Bumpy Start for Fall 2012's Most Anticipated New Talk Show
TVFirstLook (Sept. 11, 2012)

There's no doubt about it. Of the five new talk shows debuting this fall, Katie Couric's show Katie comes with the highest expectations.
 
Ryan Murphy Sitcom Shows Loads of Promise (and Potential Peril)
Variety (Sept. 11, 2012)

NBC's most promising new half-hour, The New Normal (9:30 pm) exhibits some of the excesses audiences have come to expect from Glee and Nip/Tuck creator Ryan Murphy, but also contains heart and a message.
 
Blistering New Season of FX's Incredibly Great SoA
Press & Guide (Sept. 11, 2012)

Sons of Anarchy, the extraordinary biker drama on FX, kicks off Season 5 (10pm) in typically blazing fashion. There's a crash on the highway, lots of gunfire, violence, explosions, some kinky sex ... and that's before the opening credits even roll. Best of all, there's the introduction of new cast member Jimmy Smits, looking like we've never seen him -- all tatted up and rocking a salt-and-pepper goatee.
 
All My Children's Susan Lucci Hosts Deadly Affairs
TVFirstLook (Sept. 7, 2012)

With each new original series from Investigation Discovery, there is increasingly an ID style - murder done light, sort of like an Agatha Christie mystery. In a good way.
 
Syfy's Ghost Hunters Still Good But Grant Wilson is Missed
Detroit News (Sept. 5, 2012)

Ghost Hunters (Syfy, 9pm) - Grant Wilson left the show a few months ago at the midseason finale to pursue other interests, among them the gaming company Rather Dashing Games. Grant was my favorite, and the show suffers a bit for his absence. The hunts are still fun (and tonight’s episode is a doozy), but co-founder Jason Hawes doesn’t have the same rapport with his other teammates.
 
Incredible Documentary Series May Be Too Graphic for Most People
TVFirstLook (Sept. 4, 2012)

Any show that makes you feel faint may be too true to real life, no matter how good it is. Chicago Trauma (Nat Geo Channel, 10pm) is better than good - it's bordering on great. Yet, it is so extremely graphic that it may be too much to watch.
 
High-Powered Leslie Blodgett and Dylan Lauren are Commanders in Heels
TVFirstLook (Sept. 3, 2012)

If nothing else, OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network is admirable for trying to make television entertaining while delivering a positive and inspirational message. It doesn't always do that well. But it always does it admirably.
 
Coma Miniseries Starts Strong But Crashes Like a Derailed Crazy Train
TVFirstLook

The best thing about Coma, the Ridley Scott and the late Tony Scott remake of the 1978 movie that Michael Crichton adapted from Robin Cook's book, is that the first part on Monday (A&E, 9pm) is gripping, entertaining and thoroughly enjoyable. Although, it has its flaws.
 
Inspirational Movie Has a Universal Message
BeliefNet (Aug. 25, 2012)

Somebody's Child (GMC - Saturday, 7pm) - Asked why he wanted to do the film, Michael Jai White said “The script attracted me. One wonderful thing about is that it’s about a family and it’s not necessarily a black family. I feel it’s a very universal story.” 
Harvey Keitel Heads Up Great TV-Movie Cast
New York Post (Aug. 24, 2012)

Fatal Honeymoon, airing Saturday night (Lifetime, 8pm), re-examines the case of Tina Watson, a 26-year-old American from Alabama who drowned while scuba diving in 2003 in Queensland, Australia.
 
Discovery Delivers Another Solid Unscripted Alaska Series
Boston Herald (Aug. 24, 2012)

Discovery, already home to such Alaska-set series as Bering Sea Gold, Bering Sea Gold: Under the Ice, Flying Wild Alaska and Gold Rush, keeps the state’s cameramen employed with this new unscripted series.
 
Watered-Down Religion Makes for a Bland Game Show
Washington Post (Aug. 23, 2012)

Comedian Jeff Foxworthy of “you might be a redneck” fame is the show’s host, and beneath his cheesy mustache grin, one detects weariness, a half-there quality of a man contractually obligated to middle-American blandness. It’s a Bible show, so he can’t tell any real jokes.
 
Burn Notice Losing Its Spark in Tonight's Season Finale
South Coast Today (Aug. 23, 2012)

When Burn Notice began, it had some of the whimsy pioneered by USA shows Psych and Monk. It was more tongue-in-cheek than cloak-and-dagger. Tonight's finale has plenty of shootouts and explosions, but it's not that much fun.

 Mike Rowe Gets Dirty Down Under
TVFirstLook (Aug. 22, 2012)

If nothing else, Australia is beautiful. It's got an endless coastline, the stunning barrier reef, shimmering skyscrapers in its cities, tree-lined streets in the 'burbs and an orange-y, dusty expanse in between, from coast to coast. It makes for a great TV backdrop.
 
Syfy Reality Show is Best When It Sticks to Make-Up
TVFirstLook (Aug. 21, 2012)

Syfy's Face Off (9pm) is a Project Runway-type show where the contestants compete for $100,000 for slathering on the most incredible special effects make-up. Like, in tonight's premiere, when they create a character that would seamlessly fit into Star Wars' cantina scene.

Photographer Nigel Brennan Recounts the Terror of Being Abducted in Somalia
TVFirstLook (Aug. 20, 2012)

National Geographic Channel's scary but illuminating Locked Up Abroad (10pm) zeroes in on that moment when a person makes a life-changing decision, as in a really bad life-changing decision. You know, like agreeing to be a drug mule or picking up a suitcase that acquaintance asks you to take on a trip to the Middle East.

MTV Takes a Great British Guy Comedy and Makes It Better
Variety (Aug. 20, 2012)

The Inbetweeners (MTV, 10:30pm) - Drawing heavily on situations from the original series but distinct in its rhythms as redeveloped by writer Brad Copeland (Arrested Development), the series centers on 16-year-old Will (Joey Pollari), who must forgo an Ivy League-bound private education because his parents have split.

Three Reasons to Watch HBO's (Loved and Hated) The Newsroom
The Huffington Post (Aug. 19, 2012)

There is a significant amount of criticism aimed at HBO's The Newsroom (Sunday, 10pm) and I agree with much of it. I wanted the show to be subtler, like Mad Men, with anchorman Will McAvoy at the heart as a conflicted soul whose every move not only reveals, but reinforces his character (and the character of his industry).

Kelsey Grammer is Outstanding as a Chicago Mayor on Borrowed Time
New York Daily News (Aug. 17, 2012)

Boss (Starz - Friday, 10pm) - To look at the situation in the cold, practical terms that Kelsey Grammer’s Tom Kane favors, the degenerative illness that gives him only a couple of years to live forces him to accelerate everything he’s doing. That makes an already first-rate show even better.

Refreshing Oprah Reality Show Avoids Gimmicks
Shine (Aug. 17, 2012)

Best of all, the show is authentic. "Keep in mind, there was no artificial drama 'produced' in this series," says host and matchmaker Paul Carrick Brunson.

BBC America's Valiant Effort Falls Flat
Variety (Aug. 17, 2012)

TV so seldom ventures out of its designated boxes there's a strong impulse to root for that which dares try. Yet the underlying ingredients in Copper (BBC America - Sunday, 10pm) -- a Civil War-era drama set in a bustling New York City, and produced by acclaimed writer Tom Fontana -- prove far more tantalizing than the resulting series.

Seriously Funny Delivered Dry
TVFirstLook (Aug. 17, 2012)

You've got to give it to Comedy Central. When it comes to stand-up comedy routines, they know how to chop, slice and dice. So,what's left over is a tight set that's funny with nary a moment of awkward unfunniness.

Girl Scouts Change a Real Estate Agent's Life in Delightful Movie
NewsOK (Aug.17, 2012)

Jessalyn Gilsig (Glee) stars as single workaholic real estate agent Julie Sterling assigned by her boss Lola (Patricia Richardson) to lead a struggling Girl Scout troop in the Hallmark Channel movie Smart Cookies, (Hallmark Channel - Saturday, 8pm).

IFC's Violent Comedy Almost Lives Up to the Hype
Variety (Aug. 16, 2012)

Bullet in the Face (IFC, 10pm) - Described as the "most violent sitcom ever" by series creator Alan Spencer (of Sledge Hammer! renown), it's not so much offensive as gleefully juvenile, broadly parodying graphic-novel noir like "Sin City" or Guy Ritchie films. While hardly for everyone, to a genre-savvy crowd that can appreciate the joke, score it as a near-miss.

(Reliving) Childhood Has Never Been So Much Fun
New York Times (Aug. 15, 2012)

CW’s Oh Sit! (8pm), a raucous competition show that has its premiere on Wednesday night, is a hilarious return to the childhood you never had — the fun, danger-filled, almost-anything-goes one.

Dull Show Digs Up Cool Toys
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Aug. 15, 2012)

These may be toys, but this ain't child's play," says Jordan Hembrough, star of Toy Hunter (Travel Channel, 10pm). In each episode he travels the country finding items to buy that he can turn around and sell for more money.

Light-Hearted Summer Show is Worthy of a Marathon
TVFirstLook (Aug. 14, 2012)

The title of Syfy's new reality show Collection Intervention (10pm) may give the impression that it's in the same TV family as A&E's Hoarders, where real people's lives are overtaken by the filth they live in.

The Closer Sequel Starts Off Bumpy
TVFirstLook (Aug. 13, 2012)

When TNT's The Closer ends its seven-season run tonight, the Kyra Sedgwick drama isn't ending as much as it's morphing into Major Crimes (10pm), a show featuring much of The Closer's cast and, most important, its creator James Duff.

Chef Gordon Ramsay Derails with Hotel Hell
Variety (Aug. 13, 2012)

Chef Gordon Ramsay has elevated his food-throwing tantrums into a kind of performance art, yielding expletive-laden outbursts as impolite as they are perfectly tailored to reality TV.

Well-Intentioned Celeb-Heavy Reality Show Is Sorta OK
Los Angeles Times (Aug. 13, 2012)

Stars Earn Stripes (NBC, 8pm) - Eight celebrities — actors Dean Cain and (NFL-bred) Terry Crews, "WWE diva" Eve Torres, singer Nick Lachey ("Nothing prepares you for battle like a boy band"), boxer Leila Ali, Olympic gold-medal skier Picabo Street, Biggest Loser trainer Dolvett Quince and "four-time Iron Dog champion" Todd Palin (joining what has become the family business) — are paired, for purposes of training and game play, with skilled operatives with backgrounds in the armed services and civilian law enforcement, every last man jack of them a pinup waiting to happen. (And every last man jack of them a man.)

Old Tricks Drag Down NBC Sitcom Animal Practice
Variety (Aug. 10, 2012)

Enter Animal Practice (NBC - Sunday, 11pm) where most of the boasting has been about audience-testing scores for a Capuchin monkey, providing an indication of where the show falls on the evolutionary scale.

AMC Western is Fixing Trouble Spots in Season Two
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Aug. 10, 2012)

Hell on Wheels (AMC - Sunday, 9pm) has intermingled its characters more than in season one -- it no longer feels like you're watching a dozen different TV shows now that the main characters actually interact with one another. And the show's pace seems more brisk, less stodgy. Best of all, Hell on Wheels continues to look awful in the best sense.

Outstanding Doc Captures Bob Marley's Enduring Influence
Newsday (Aug. 4 2012)

Considering his resilience as a cultural icon, it seems impossible Bob Marley has been dead for 30 years, and equally remarkable that no one until now has produced a movie as ambitious as the man himself, a musical and political force who led one of the more remarkable lives in the history of pop.


Well-Made Mysteries Aren't Afraid to Be Quiet
TVFirstLook (Aug. 3, 2012)

Biography Channel's new unscripted series The Unexplained (Saturday, 10pm) may, at first, give you the impression it's one of countless, nondescript shows where psychics try to intuit clues about a crime or unsolved mystery.



Dance Show is All Talk (and More Talk)
TVFirstLook (July 31, 2012)

Watching Oxygen's new reality show All The Right Moves (9pm) is similar to watching a dancer twist her ankle on stage but soldier on anyway. There are moments of brilliance. But, wow, it's mostly just painful to watch.



Interesting Tidbits Go Only Skin Deep
New York Times (July 30, 2012)

For a depressing number of people who find fame in the pop culture world, aging brings either humiliation or obscurity.



Incredible Olympic Athlete's Story Deflates
TVFirstLook (July 26, 2012)

Cheryl Haworth, by her teens, was living the type of life that needs to be made into a documentary.


Documentary Captures the Magic of The Godfather
TVFirstLook (July 24, 2012)

You can't help but watch The Godfather and not be struck by how great it is. The Francis Ford Coppola mafia movie is violent and a frightening reflection of New York's meanest streets.



Emotions Boil Under the Surface on Adoption Series
TVFirstLook (July 23, 2012)

There may be no decision a mother makes that's more life changing and heart wrenching than deciding to give her baby up for adoption. No matter that the decision is often the best one for the baby, the mother, the father and everyone else involved.


Warehouse 13's Four-Star Return
New York Daily News (July 23, 2012)

It hardly seemed possible that Warehouse 13 (Syfy, 9pm) could have as much fun in the opening episode of this new season as it had in the finale last season.


Alphas is Getting Better Than The X-Men
Detroit News (July 23, 2012)

Alphas (Syfy, 10pm) - The similarity to X-Men is no surprise. Creator Zak Penn co-wrote two of the X-Men movies. What is surprising is that Alphas is rising above the comparison.


The Remarkable Life of Gay Activist Vito Russo
queerty.com (July 23, 2012)

Vito Russo was like the Zelig of the gay community, or maybe its Forrest Gump. He was there at Stonewall, there at the Gay Activist Alliance’s “zaps,” there for the founding of GLAAD and there as ACT UP challenged the mainstream to address the AIDS epidemic.



Sullivan & Son is a Modern-Day Cheers That So Far Isn't as Funny
TVFirstLook (July 19, 2012)

Watching the first of tonight's two Sullivan & Son episodes (TBS, 10pm) is kind of like sitting in the front row of a Broadway play where the actors are performing for the people in the nose-bleed seats. What you get is an assault of over-acting that drowns out the show's humor, which Sullivan & Son has its fair share of.



Julia Meltzer and Laura Nix Documentary Sheds Light on Syria
The Revealer (July 19, 2012)

The Light in Her Eyes (PBS, 10pm) - By putting Houda’s work into context, the filmmakers show that work to be a feminist act—the process of playing with this position and deciding whether it is convincing is one of the pleasures of the film.


The Beauty of Birds and the People Who Follow Them
North Jersey (July 16, 2012)

If you love watching birds or you love someone with this affliction, you've got to see Birders: The Central Park Effect, a new hour-long special debuting Monday on HBO (9pm).


Eureka's Satisfying Series Finale
Newsday (July 16, 2012)

Eureka (Syfy, 9pm) - As of Tuesday, it'll all be on DVD, and I'm looking forward to looking back with Colin Ferguson's common-sense sheriff, Salli Richardson-Whitfield's savvy doctor, Joe Morton's disillusioned brainiac turned mechanic and all their quirky cohorts.


Drama Takes on Weighty Issues and Handles Them Well
New York Daily News (July 13, 2012)

While Political Animals (USA - Sunday, 10pm) only runs for six weeks, it’s neither a typical USA series nor a typical summer series, breezy as a warm day on the beach.



Slow, Complex and Brilliant Breaking Bad Returns
Variety (July 13, 2012)

Breaking Bad (AMC - Sunday, 10pm) - Mostly, series creator Vince Gilligan (who wrote the first two hours) continues to milk suspense and dark humor from a concept that often moves about as quickly as watching someone back into a parking space with a distracted squirrel in it.


Lesbians of the Hyper-Sexed-Up Variety
TVFirstLook (July 12, 2012)

If reality TV has done nothing else for the good of society, it has exposed most of us to people and lifestyles that may otherwise have remained mysterious, scary and, as a result, kept at arm's length. Like, the lesbian community.


Terrifying Dates Never Seemed So Dull
TVFirstLook (July 11, 2012)

The cable network I.D. Investigation Discovery has nailed down a fun formula for making murder entertaining. Murder isn't entertaining. But the way I.D. shows tell stories of murder is more than fun. It's addictive. Dark, but addictive.


NY Med Masterfully Stitches Together Documentary and Reality TV
New York Times (July 10, 2012)

NY Med (ABC, 10pm) is shot in a vérité style without any apparent manipulation or staging, and with an evident seriousness of purpose.


Imrpov Show is Like Whose Line with Diminishing Returns
Variety (July 10, 20120

Trust Us With Your Life (ABC, 9pm) comes from the creators of Whose Line Is It Anyway? so they -- and ABC -- have nobody to sue but themselves.


Eric McCormack is a Monk-Like Investigator on the Highly Polished Perception
TVFirstLook (July 9, 2012)

There's a certain type of TV crime solver whose personality quirks are so easy and fun to watch that the sorta-easy-to-figure-out crimes they're investigating are simply a platform to put that personality on display.


The American Dream Crushed by Unemployment
Channel Guide Magazine (July 9, 2012)

In the opening moments of HBO’s disquieting new documentary Hard Times: Lost on Long Island (9pm), balding, bespectacled Alan Fromm — an unemployed corporate trainer — catalogs the catastrophes he survived prior to losing his job a year earlier: struck by lightning at 15; heart trouble at 21; in the World Trade Center during the 1993 bombing; on the Long Island Rail Road when Colin Ferguson gunned down 25 passengers nine months later; and in the north tower on 9/11.


Fascinating Look at the Night Sky
USA Today (July 5, 2012)

PBS airs The City Dark (PBS, 10pm) as part of its POV documentary series. The 60-minute film is definitely worth watching, even if you have a lovely view of the night sky right outside your window.


Fun and Informative Show from the Storage Wars Team
TVFirstLook (July 4, 2012)

If a hotshot reality show producer like Mark Burnett, or say Thom Beers (Discovery Channel's Deadliest Catch, A&E's Storage Wars), got their hands on PBS's Antiques Roadshow they'd shake off the dust and toss in the type of reality-TV elements that have people coming back again and again to shows like Storage Wars - real information about old objects, plus some tension (is it worth anything?) and a bit of competition tossed in the mix.


Thrillingly Different History of England
San Francisco Chronicle (July 3, 2012)

If you think you've seen enough documentaries on English history to write a dissertation on the subject, you haven't seen Michael Wood's the Story of England (PBS, 8pm), blessedly free of royalty, beheadings, missing princes and imprisoned pretenders to the throne, but thrillingly alive with details about the quotidian life of a small village.


Matt LeBlanc's Funny Satire Gets a Bit Less So in Season Two
Seattle Post Intelligencer (June 29, 2012)

Episodes' (Showtime - Sunday, 10:30pm) first season was a gas, as married British writers Sean and Beverly (deliciously droll Stephen Mangan and Tamsin Greig) are wooed to the States to adapt their award-winning comedy about a portly British schoolmaster, which to their horror is mutated into a comeback vehicle for Matt LeBlanc (doing a daringly unsparing and disarmingly beguiling version of himself), who becomes a high-school hockey coach in a piece of retro claptrap titled Pucks.


Great Comedy Gets Off to a Disconcerting Start
TVFirstLook (June 28, 2012)

Louie has an annoying girlfriend, which is annoying. Then, Louie has another annoying girlfriend, though less so, which is alarming. Louie, the FX comedy starring Emmy-nominated Louis C.K., is a brilliant single-camera comedy that in past seasons was great because of its simplicity. (FX, 10:30pm).


Comedy Isn't All That Funny
New York Post (June 26, 2012)

Retired at 35 (TV Land, 10pm) - Return — or don’t — to the retirement community for Season 2 of the laugh-track heavy Florida un-comedy. Parents Jessica Walter and George Segal should fire their agents for sticking them in this conventional, trite story about a 20-something who decides to ditch his career to move into his parents’ retirement community.


Britney Spears Superfan Chris Crocker is More Fascinating than this BioDoc
TVFirstLook (June 25, 2012)

When YouTube sensation Chris Crocker burst onto the pop culture scene a few years back, hysterically crying "leave Britney alone," he was catapulted from online oddity (with a big following) to celebrity status.


Exciting Reality Show from The Amazing Race's Van Muster
The Macon Telegraph (June 22, 2012)

TNT kicks off a new reality competition Sunday night at 10pm. with the debut of The Great Escape. If it feels a lot like The Amazing Race, it shouldn't be a surprise since both shows were co-created by Bertram Van Muster.


Aaron Sorkin's Gibber-Jabber Platform
Washington Post (June 22, 2012)

Aaron Sorkin’s The Newsroom, the big new series of the summer that premieres Sunday night on HBO (10pm), fails to meet the high expectations that greet it, save one: It is crammed with incessant gibber-jabber.


Wilfred is One Piece of FX's Must-See Thursday
TVFirstLook (June 21, 2012)

Thursday this summer is going to be a great night for TV. Starting next week, FX's Thursday lineup will include Charlie Sheen's great new sitcom, Anger Management, and Louis C.K.'s groundbreaking gift from the TV gods, Louie. And, sandwiched in between is the gloriously offbeat Wilfred (a special preview airs tonight, 10:30pm).


Jersey's Version of Lucy and Ethel (with F* Bombs)
Variety (June 21, 2012)

Snooki & JWOWW (MTV, 10pm) - Distilled into a half-hour, there's just enough to keep the show from overstaying its weekly welcome, and audiences have clearly demonstrated their fondness for the Jersey bunch -- perhaps especially for these two -- even if it's as an oddity or object of derision.


Well-Intentioned Comedy Feels Rushed to the Altar
TVFirstLook (June 20, 2012)

TV Land's new comedy The Soul Man (10pm) has the makings of a funny sitcom and, yet, the show feels like it wasn't given nearly enough time to work out the kinks. It doesn't quite come together. But it shows enough promise that, maybe with time, it will be the funny show it should be.


Steven Mackintosh is Outstanding in BBC America Caper
Variety (June 20, 2012)

Inside Men (BBC America, 10pm) - It's such a bravura, tightly wound performance -- played with restrained intensity by the kind of star seldom featured on American TV -- as to keep one glued to the show right up until its slightly anticlimactic, disappointing payoff.


ABC Family Comedy Stinks
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (June 20, 2012)

A stench, not unlike that of a dirty diaper, hangs hot and heavy over ABC Family's Baby Daddy (8:30pm), a comedy series for a generation that never saw any of the Three Men and a Baby movies. Because that really could have been the title of this occasionally cute but mostly brain-dead show.


Life in the Big City's Kinda Dull
TVFirstLook (June 19, 2012)

Ever since reality TV burst onto the scene 12 years ago, people have wondered if shows like Survivor are staged, scripted or real. And, years before that, MTV's original Real World seemed sorta real - you know, as real as shoving seven strangers into an apartment and filming it can be.


Bounce TV's Family Time is Comedy on a Budget
TVFirstLook (June 18, 2012)

For anyone who has seen a Tyler Perry show like TBS's House of Payne or Meet the Browns, Bounce TV's Family Time (9pm) is a familiar comedy about an African-American family.


Nothing Appealing About Dating Show (or Dating Experts)
San Francisco Chronicle (June 18, 2012)

Miss Advised (Bravo, 10pm) - Three women who ought to know better basically don't when it comes to their own social lives.


Real Life for Dogs Isn't All Fluffy and Sweet
New York Daily News (June 18, 2012)

TV shows about dogs tend to be heartwarming. So dog fans should know that One Nation Under Dog (HBO, 9pm) is not.


Anger Management is TV's Next Great Sitcom
TVFirstLook (June 15, 2012)

If the road to greatness for an actor is a year-long, often embarrassing meltdown, then you can count on a whole bunch of actors jumping on Charlie Sheen's crazy train.


Noah Wyle Hit is a Bit Better in Season Two
Variety (June 15, 2012)

With its focus on survivors of an alien invasion forging their own unified (and sometimes quarrelsome) resistance, the show Falling Skies (TNT - Sunday, 9pm) essentially amounts to a dumber version of The Walking Dead, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.


The New Blue Lagoon is Beautiful (and Good)
New York Post (June 15, 2012)

Blue Lagoon: The Awakening (Lifetime - Saturday, 8pm) - Look, it ain’t Lina Wertmüller’s “Swept Away” — it’s more like Survivor: Paradise. Even so, I might be insane, but I enjoyed every silly minute.


JR's Back and He's Still a Power-Hungry Meany
TVFirstLook (June 13, 2012)

Ooh, dang, Dallas is good. It's fun, too. Although, any hope for Emmys or critical accolades may be a long, long wait. Why? Dallas (TNT, 9pm) is a soap opera, plain and simple. As it turns out, that's a good thing.


Encore Miniseries is Gritty But Not Great
Kansas City Star (June 13, 2012)

If Thorne (Encore, 9pm) is not exactly enjoyable, it does generate a good degree of tension and dread, and some quite unpleasant scares.


Broadway-Bound Kids Get the Trapper Treatment
TVFirstLook (June 12, 2012)

Provided you can stomach precocious kids who sing and act (and kids who can't but whose parents force them to anyway), and you'll need a good, strong stomach, then Oxygen's The Next Big Thing is a charming, engaging show.


A Not-Bad Summer TV Series
Newsday (June 12, 2012)

Bartering amounts to a $12-billion-a-year industry -- a stat supplied by the International Reciprocal Trade Association and mentioned at the outset of Barter Kings (9pm).


Hurricane Hunters is a Worthwhile New Addition to Hunter Shows
TVFirstLook (June 11, 2012)

Hit shows like Auction Hunters and House Hunters are delivering big ratings for networks like Spike TV and HGTV. Now, The Weather Channel is tapping into the trend with Hurricane Hunters.


Gilmore Girl's Follow Up is Beautiful and Sweet
St. Louis Post-Dispatch (June 11, 2012)

The quips, chatter, banter and backtalk are Amy Sherman-Palladino's stock in trade. Find that annoying and you might not be mad for Bunheads (ABC Family, 9pm). But skip it and you'll be missing a show that is beautiful and sweet, funny and touching. It could be the next best thing to returning to Stars Hollow, Conn., in its glorious Gilmore Girls years.


HBO Vampire Drama Returns to Fine Form in Season Five
Variety (June 8, 2012)

True Blood (HBO - Sunday, 9pm) -the drama's fifth season finds it back on the true (if not righteous, thank goodness) path, sinking its teeth deeper into arcane vampire politics while adding several strong new characters and squandering less time on subplots that make you want to zap past them.


Beautifully Made Nature Doc on National Geographic
New York Daily News (June 8, 2012)

Most of us pretty much accept that it can get remorseless and unforgiving out there in nature. So National Geographic’s new Untamed Americas (Sunday, 9pm), a four-hour series spread over two nights, is really reinforcing a point rather than introducing it. In either case, it does its job beautifully, with amazing footage of stories and events that may or may not have happy endings.


Talk Show Spoof is Kinda Funny
South Coast Today (June 8, 2012)

Fake talk shows have been around almost as long as the real thing. And when they work, they're only slightly more ridiculous and artificial than the targets of their satire.


George Lopez Dating Game Show is Atrocious
TVFirstLook (June 7, 2012)

Take Me Out is terrible. No, it's atrocious - and not in the so-bad-it's-good way, either. The dating game show hosted by former TBS talk show host George Lopez debuts tonight on Fox (8pm). You can only wonder, "What shows did Fox turn down in favor of this?" It's monstrously bad.


Rare Scripted Summer Series' Ghosts are (So Far) Celibate
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (June 7, 2012)

NBC’s Canadian import Saving Hope (9pm) seems like it’s been designed for that small minority of Grey’s Anatomy viewers who actually liked the Ghost Denny storyline, although so far the hospital-confined ghosts on Saving Hope are not having sex with any humans.


Swamped-Up Cops Knockoff is Amusing
Media Life Magazine (June 7, 2012)

Although A&E’s new series Cajun Justice (10pm) is little more than a bayou version of Cops, the local color still works.


Pretty Good Reality Show is Pawn Stars with Hot Rods
TVFirstLook (June 6, 2012)

When it comes to creating new TV shows, there's nothing wrong with imitation. And when History Channel's Pawn Stars is your source material, all the better.


Necessary is Bland by Comparison
Newsday (June 6, 2012)

But compared to the other members of the slick quartet of returning USA hits this week -- (Royal Pains, plus Suits and Burn Notice, both back tomorrow), Necessary Roughness (10pm) still feels bland and unexceptional.


Ryan Murphy's Talent Competition is an Audition for Glee
TVFirstLook (June 5, 2012)

The Glee Project (Oxygen, 10pm) from Glee producer Ryan Murphy is an entertaining talent competition where 14 twentysomethings audition for a seven-episode role on next season's Glee (Fox).


Gordon Ramsay's Hell's Kitchen is Still Fun (but Showing Its Age)
TVFirstLook (June 4, 2012)

There comes a point for many TV shows, a few seasons in, when they either freshen up or start to feel like a dulled-down version of what they used to be. For Fox's Hell's Kitchen (8pm), it's neither.


Push Girls is Like Real Housewives in Wheelchairs
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (June 4, 2012)

First, they came for the housewives. Then, they came for the cupcake makers; then the little people. Now reality TV turns its gaze toward women in wheelchairs for Sundance Channel's Push Girls (10pm), a slightly more highbrow reality show.


The Wild West Has Never Been So Dull
San Francisco Chronicle (June 1, 2012)

A&E's new modern-day Western Longmire (Sunday, 10pm) has the look and feel of a show cooked up by a bunch of bored TV industry types while they were waiting for the valet to bring their car to them at the Beverly Hills Chuck E. Cheese.


Well-Made Reality Show May Be Too Well Made
TVFirstLook (May 31, 2012)

First, hats off to The CW for giving a relatively highbrow reality show a shot. And, here's to hoping they succeed with Breaking Pointe (8pm), a reality drama about aspiring ballet dancers at Salt Lake City's Ballet West.


Cooking Competition Goes Up in Smoke
TVFirstLook May 30, 2012)

By now, nearly a decade into watching cooking competitions, we know what makes for a fun-to-watch show like Food Network's Iron Chef America or The Next Food Network Star.


Dogs is Easy-Breezey Summer TV
Variety (May 30, 2012)

Dogs in the City [is an] breezy summer fill-in CBS will unleash at 8pm featuring "dog guru" Justin Silver, who is described as "a master at resolving issues between canines and their owners -– no matter whose behavior is at fault."


American Colony Reveals Life in a Little-Known Hutterite Community
TVFirstLook (May 29, 2012)

American Colony: Meet the Hutterites (Nat Geo Channel, 10pm) is a documentary series that's squeezed into an unscripted-reality format that is at its best when it avoids reality gimmicks.


Overly Long but Perfectly OK Kevin Costner Movie
New York Times (May 28, 2012)

Hatfields & McCoys (History, 9pm) is a perfectly respectable piece of work, and probably better than we could have expected for a History mini-series.


Nicole Kidman and Clive Owen Star in HBO's Mess of a Movie
Variety (May 28, 2012)

As swollen and heavy-handed as a bad imitation Hemingway contest, everything about Hemingway & Gellhorn (HBO, 9pm) screams vanity project, including the marquee talent, Cannes premiere (it's not TV, after all) and timing to achieve maximum exposure during the current awards window.


Soliders' Surprise Homecomings Pack an Emotional Punch
Boston Herald (May 28, 2012)

National GeographicChannel’s Witness: G.I. Homecoming ((10pm), honors some of the videos that went viral, augmented with fresh interviews with the returnees and their families.


Mermaids is a Strange (and Not Very Good) Tale
New York Post (May 25, 2012)

If you loved (or even remember) the fantastically nutty Alien Autopsy, you will fall madly for Mermaids: The Body Found, an equally nutty special — on Animal Planet, of all places.


OK Guy Comedy May Not Be Worth a Second Visit
Variety (May 24, 2012)

The sitcom equivalent of empty calories, Men at Work (TBS, 8pm), really ought to be titled Juvenile Guys at Play, for all the time the central quartet of sex-obsessed dudes spend at the Manhattan magazine (or as the kids will say, "The what?") where they ostensibly work.


Traveling the World Through Time
Wall Street Journal (May 22, 2012)

PBS's Civilization: The West and the Rest (8pm) is a fascinating travelogue through history that asks "how Western civilization managed to rule the world throughout the whole of modern history." But its writer and narrator, Harvard historian Niall Ferguson, doesn't stop with that question.


Goldfathers Joins TV Trend but Doesn't Fit In Yet
TVFirstLook

National Geographic Channel's Goldfathers: Race for Gold (Friday, 8pm) has all the elements you'd expect in an on-the-job reality show about Alaska gold miners.


Sherlock is Great Television
San Francisco Chronicle (May 4, 2012)

Sherlock (PBS - Sunday, 9pm) is an electric marriage of great writing with great performances. Benedict Cumberbatch is weird and wonderful as Holmes, Martin Freeman dry and sardonic as Watson, and Andrew Scott turns in a stunning tour de force as Moriarty.

Eddie Izzard and Elijah Wood Star in So-So Treasure Island
redeyechicago.com (May 4, 2012)

I was more than excited to see Syfy's darker, updated version of the Robert Louis Stevenson classic.

Ingredients Don't Come Together on TV One's Cooking Competition
Media Life Magazine (May 4, 2012)

My Momma Throws Down (TV One) - Although the ethnic angle provides some fresh flavor and the game-show format sets up some spontaneous chuckles, the ingredients never quite come together.

Fantastic Documentary Profiles Prolific NYC Architect Costas Kondylis
TVFirstLook (May 2, 2012)

With the exception of a small handful of brand-name architects like Frank Gehry, most architects and their work go unnoticed or overlooked. Even architects whose beautiful, tall skyscrapers are well known and often photographed live, work and die without a lot of recognition.

Bravo Reality Show is a Whole Lot Better Than It Sounds
TVFirstLook (May 2, 2012)

OK, hats off to Bravo. The network that's best known for sub-basement dreck like Don't Be Tardy for the Wedding figured out how to spruce up the home-makeover genre while giving home decorator Jeff Lewis a show that makes him more likable than he was on Flipping Out.

Hot Rods and Superheroes on Disney XD's Motorcity
Detroit Free Press (April 30, 2012)

Motorcity (Disney XD, 9pm) is an ambitious adventure series aimed at young males -- specifically hot-rod-loving cartoon addicts.

The Ad Biz Isn't as Much Fun as Mad Men
Chicago Sun-Times (April 30, 2012)

Unlike another AMC unscripted series, Comic Book Men, you don’t have to be an insider to appreciate or understand The Pitch (AMC, 9pm).

Smithsonian Doc's Slow Build Pays Off
TVFirstLook (April 27, 2012)

The Hunt for Bin Laden (Smithsonian Channel - Sunday, 8pm) covers a lot familiar ground before it gets going. But once it does, about an hour in, it goes from dull and slow to incredible and amazing.

Real Housewives Spinoff Isn't Just Bad It's Deplorable
Media Life Magazine (April 26, 2012)

Don't Be Tardy for the Wedding (Braov, 9pm) - Although the success of the Real Housewives franchise proves that millions of viewers enjoy watching self-indulgent, foul-mouthed, ill-tempered women fight, America would be a better place if Bravo stopped presenting their behavior as acceptable and even admirable and stopped rewarding the perpetrators with fame and wealth.

Erik Aude is Tortured in Pakistan
TVFirstLook (April 25, 2012)

There's a lesson to be learned from National Geographic Channel's Locked Up Abroad (10pm). If a friend, a colleague or even a family member asks you to pick up a bag in a foreign country, or take a bag to a foreign country, don't do it.

DWTS's Jaleel White Hosts Gross-Out Game Show
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (April 25, 2012)

Jaleel White, formerly known as Urkel on Family Matters, hosts this game show, which is pretty much a televised version of that dark room in a haunted house where you dip your hand in a jar and feel something gross.

The L.A. Complex Tries Hard but Falls Short
TVFirstLook (April 24, 2012)

The CW drama The L.A. Complex (9pm) tries really, really hard to be a great show - so hard that you can't help but hope it'll be better than it is. What it is, is a CW-type drama on the CW that just feels awkward, strange and kinda off.

Julia Louis-Dreyfus Stars in Awkwardly Funny Sitcom
TVFirstLook (April 20, 2012)

Veep takes a bit of time to seep in. The HBO sitcom starring Seinfeld's Julia Louis-Dreyfus gets off to a slow start this Sunday (10pm).

Birdsong is Similar to Downton Abbey but More Intense
Wall Street Journal (April 20, 2012)

Birdsong, the latest PBS Masterpiece Classic (Sunday, 9pm) offering, is set in the same time period as Downton Abbey. The series ends in 1918—after the charnel house of World War I in which Britain lost what Masterpiece host Laura Linney calls "the heart of their working class and the flower of their aristocracy."

CMT's Jennie Falters Despite Reality Show Tricks
Media Life Magazine (April 20, 2012)

In CMT's Jennie Garth: A Little Bit Country (Friday, 9pm), it's title star, probably the blandest cast member on Fox's fondly remembered teen series Beverly Hills, 90210, was evidently too dull to hold our attention for a half hour, so the producers had her hire a personal assistant, in this case a loud Canadian woman named Corinne.

Happily Divorced's Rita Moreno Checks Out the Single Life
TVFirstLook (April 18, 2012)

TV can be challenging. Dramas drain your emotions. Reality shows make you cringe. And sitcoms make you think. Sometimes, you don't want to think. Sometimes, you just want to laugh.

Stylish Documentary Captures Curious Tale about 9/11 Survivor Tania Head
TVFirstLook (April 17, 2012)

In the aftermath of the 9/11 terror attacks, there were stories of death, loss, pain and survival. One of those stories was Tania Head's. She survived despite being in the South tower of the World Trade Center when it was hit by a plane.

Eureka's Final Season Kicks Off with a Cliffhanger
TVFirstLook (April 16, 2012)

Syfy's cute, funny and inconsistent Eureka (9pm) kicks off its fifth and final season tonight with a fast-paced episode that zips by with every character's life radically changing in an instant - well, in four minutes.

Great New Reality Show with Top Gear's Richard Hammond
Newsday (April 16, 2012)

Richard Hammond's Crash Course (BBC America, 10pm) - The U.K. Top Gear wag gets his giddy on, going from driving cool cars to running them over into rubble, employing even bigger vehicles in this original series made here by BBC America (not the U.K. folks).

Respectable Telling of Dickens' Unfinished Edwin Drood
Variety (April 15, 2012)

Masterpiece has enjoyed a cozy relationship with Charles Dickens, from Bleak House to the recent Great Expectations.

A Flood of Storylines Sinks Julian Fellowes' Titanic
Los Angeles Times (April 14, 2012)

While watching Titanic (Saturday 8pm; Sunday 9pm), ABC's ill-paced, sanctimonious and overly stuffed four-part miniseries airing this weekend, it is impossible not to compare it with the James Cameron film of the same name.

Girls Isn't Sex and the City and That's OK
New York Times (April 13, 2012)

Girls (HBO - Sunday, 10:30pm) - Lena Dunham’s much anticipated comedy about four single women in New York, which starts on Sunday night, is worth all the fuss, even though it invites comparisons to Carrie Bradshaw and friends, and even though it incites a lot of dreary debate about the demise of feminism.


Cliched Cop Show is a Dud
USA Today (April 13, 2012)

All cop shows have things in common; creators can't be expected to reinvent the wheel. But we can ask them to at least spruce it up a little. You can't just grab a discard from the back of the Hill Street Blues garage and call it your own.


Ambitious Nick Cartoon is Reminiscent of The Hunger Games
Los Angeles Times (April 13, 2012)

It’s doubtful that they have Saturday morning cartoons in the police-state future of The Hunger Games (in fact, they probably don’t even have Saturdays in the no-fun nation of Panem), but if they did, Katniss Everdeen would see a kindred spirit in The Legend of Korra, the ambitious new Nickelodeon series that premieres April 14 (11am).


Baggage Battles is Storage Wars in an Airport
TVFirstLook (April 11, 2012)

Every day, 70,000 pieces of luggage are lost in airports around the world. And, not too far behind are hundreds of buyers who want to snap up each bag for a steal and sell its contents for a profit.


James Van Der Beek Stars in Predictable But Funny Sitcom
Media Life Magazine (April 11, 2012)

Don't Trust the B---- in Apartment 23 (ABC, 9:30pm) allows us to add another show to the list of sitcoms about young single women who use colorful terms for their private parts.


Suped-Up Cars on Not-So-Suped-Up Show
TVFirstLook (April 10, 2012)

Syfy's new reality show Dream Machines (10pm), from the producers of Discovery Channel's American Chopper and Food Network's Iron Chef America, has all the elements of a good show and, yet, its premiere episode tonight falls flat. Very flat.


Titanic Discoverer Bob Ballard is on a Mission to Save the Ship
TVFirstLook (April 9, 2012)

With the 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic just days away, coupled with the No. 2 box office hit of all time - James Cameron's Titanic, it seems improbable that there are any details about the ship, its sinking and its discovery by Bob Ballard in 1985 that are left untold.


Mama's Boys is Better Than You'd Expect
New York Daily News (April 9, 2012)

The best way to make someone happy, and that includes TV viewers, is to underpromise and overdeliver. That may be the strategy, deliberate or otherwise, with Mama’s Boys of the Bronx (TLC, 10pm), a show whose title sounds like it will embody the worst tedious indulgence of reality TV and turns out to be quirky and fun.


Jennifer Love Hewitt is a Working Girl in New Lifetime Drama
New York Daily News (April 8, 2012)

We all know and love the hooker with the heart of pure gold. The question with The Client List (Lifetime, 10pm) is whether we will still love her in a show that on several levels is selling pure trash. Okay, delicious trash, perhaps. But still, trash.


A Welcome Return for Nurse Jackie
TVFirstLook (April 6, 2012)

For three seasons, Jackie Peyton (Edie Falco) has lived the kind of life that can't last. She's a great nurse, a lousy mother and a worse wife with a boatload of problems. Well, actually, one huge problem that affects every aspect of her life, and her family's lives.


Miami Mad Men with Cigars
New York Times (April 6, 2012)

This series is a triumph of music, set design and lighting, not imagination. It has film noir aspirations, but Magic City (Starz - Friday, 10pm) is closer to a nighttime soap opera — Dynasty, with none of the campy self-awareness. The story is engrossing but it isn’t really very interesting.


Homeless Build a Makeshift City in OWN Documentary
New York Times (April 5, 2012)

Tent City U.S.A. (Gabriel Byrne is an executive producer) examines an encampment of homeless people in Nashville, a city, we’re told, where the rate of homelessness is well above the national average.


Shonda Rhimes Stumbles in DC
Media Life Magazine (April 5, 2012)

In her new series Scandal (ABC, 10pm), [Shonda] Rhimes moves the location of all the romantic tomfoolery from West Coast hospitals to Washington, D.C., a change of venue that works against the show.


Well-Made Comedy Gets Bogged Down by Its Goodness
TVFirstLook (April 4, 2012)

Best Friends Forever (NBC, 8:30pm) is the type of show you want to hate but can't quite, despite it all. That "all" is a whole lot of pretension that, hopefully in time, gives way to the show's often-great writing, relatable characters and super-nice-looking sets.


Survivor Meets Chopped on BBC America Reality Competition
TVFirstLook (April 3, 2012)

In the very first scene of BBC America's No Kitchen Required (10pm), chefs Michael Psilakis, Madison Cowan and Kayne Raymond are hanging halfway down the side of a stunning 200-foot rust-colored cliff. Each is rappelling from yellow ropes with bright blue waves crashing below them.


American Masters Profiles Mysterious Author of To Kill a Mockingbird
TVFirstLook (April 2, 2012)

To Kill a Mockingbird, the book and the movie, have been classics for so many decades, with 50 million copies of the novel sold, that the pre-civil rights story about tomboy Scout, her lawyer father Atticus and the wrongly convicted Tom continue to find new fans and remains required reading in most schools.


Murder of Rosie Larsen Upends Life in Seattle
TVFirstLook (March 30, 2012)

On The Killing (Sunday, 8pm), the story of the murder of Seattle teenager Rosie Larsen is secondary to the telling of that story in this incredibly well-made, multiple-Emmy-nominated, but often seriously depressing AMC drama.


Gillian Anderson is Miss Havisham in Dickens' Great Expectations
The Epoch Times (March 30, 2012)

Great Expectations (PBS - Sunday, 9pm) is solidly entertaining television, even if the tragic love story fizzles somewhat.


Game of Thrones as Strong as Ever in Season Two
thr.com (March 30, 2012)

Game of Thrones (HBO - Sunday, 9pm) - The acclaimed HBO fantasy series that was Emmy nominated for best drama last season, returns as strong as ever.


Thin Premise Wears Thin Fast
New York Daily News (March 30, 2012)

Saving the Titanic (PBS - Sunday, 10pm) would be a great 15-minutes segment on an “untold stories of heroism on the Titanic” feature. All by itself, lasting an hour, it feels a little thin.


It's Like Jersey Shore Only a Lot Less Fun
Variety.com (March 29, 2012)

Jersey Shore is getting into the franchise business, spreading the wealth by spinning off its well-tanned assets into stand-alone components.


Moving Documentary About Alzheimer's Impact
New York Times (March 29, 2012)

Perhaps years from now, after a scientific breakthrough has turned Alzheimer’s disease into a memory as distant as polio wards are to younger Americans today, someone will stumble upon Scott Kirschenbaum’s hard-to-watch documentary, You’re Looking at Me Like I Live Here and I Don’t (PBS, 10pm), and be stunned.


DI Joseph Chandler Investigates History's Most Gruesome Crimes
TVFirstLook (March 28, 2012)

Sometimes, a TV show starts out so strong that in later seasons you find yourself willing it to be as good as it once was.


Five Star Review for Mad Men Season Five
New York Daily News (March 23, 2012)

For virtually all of Sunday’s season opener, the drama flows as smoothly and seductively as Dusty Springfield's “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me,” which — okay, one more spoiler here — underscores a long key scene.


Kiefer Sutherland Show's Leaning Toward Dud
USA Today (March 22, 2012)

After an extremely promising pilot, "interesting" is where Touch (* * ½ out of four, Fox, Thursday, 9pm) seems to be landing.


A Love Letter to L.A.
TVFirstLook (March 21, 2012)

You know, somewhere in a Silver Lake cafe, there's a twentysomething who's defending the old-fashioned sitcom treatment he's been working on. It's a multi-camera comedy with a laugh track and pacing that goes something like this: Set up line. Set up line. Joke. (repeat).


Alec Baldwin Narrates Seven-Part Nature Series
TVFirstLook (March 16, 2012)

The creators of the epic Planet Earth nature series from BBC and Discovery, which set a lofty new benchmark by which all nature series are judged, unveil their new partnership this Sunday at 8pm.


Billy Zane and William Devane are Leprechaun Killers
newsday.com (March 16, 2012)

Leprechaun's Revenge (Syfy - Saturday, 9pm) is good. And bad. Both good bad and just bad. The script plays it straight, then twisted, creating a tonal mess, but it's an entertaining mess, and stylishly filmed.


More Drama on Season Two of Sarah Shahi Show
San Francisco Chronicle (March 16, 2012)

Well, quicker than you can say ho-hum, the producers of Fairly Legal (USA - Friday, 9pm) introduce a new element with Friday's relaunch in the person of Ben Grogan (Ryan Johnson), an ambitious litigator who ends up becoming a partner in the firm and alternately charming and infuriating Kate.


Ashley Judd is a Spy on a Mission
New York Times (March 15, 2012)

Missing (ABC, 8pm), created by the screenwriter Gregory Poirier (National Treasure: Book of Secrets), isn’t a particularly good show.


New Workplace Reality Show Follows Blood and Guts
New York Times

It seems impossibly retro in this computer-generated age, but at least one guy is still creating creepy
movie effects out of resin and blood bottles.


Native American Cops Catch Crooks and Howling Spirits
TVFirstLook (March 12, 2012)

There's a reason Fox's Cops has been on the air for 23 seasons. It's fascinating and scary to become part of the danger of catching criminals and murderers, but watching from a safe distance.


The Doc's Family is at Arm's Length in Doc Martin Season Five
TVFirstLook (March 9, 2012)

As the fifth season of American Public Television's Doc Martin gets underway, doctor Martin Ellingham (Martin Clunes) is the same funny-grumpy, rude, phobic and socially awkward English seaside village doctor that he's always been. (Find Doc Martin TV listings here).


Julianne Moore is Sarah Palin in Fumbled Campaign
New York Times (March 9, 2012)

Game Change, an engaging HBO docudrama on Saturday [at 9pm], is told through the eyes of the advisers who developed the losing strategy of Senator John McCain of Arizona and Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska. In this iteration Steve Schmidt (Woody Harrelson), the senior adviser, is the war hero, and Senator McCain (Ed Harris) comes off as a crusty old soldier who follows orders but can’t help grousing.


Ryan Seacrest's Shahs Proves that Persians are Despicable Too
newsday.com (March 9, 2012)

Shahs of Sunset (Bravo - Sunday, 10) - Really, what is there left to say? If you suck in a breath anywhere within the confines of Beverly Hills - and, better yet, behave in a manner that says in big, bold bright letters: "Kick Me! I'm a Rich Obnoxious Jerk!" - then you, too, would be fodder for a Bravo reality series.


Serial Killer Looks Into the Camera and Cries
TVFirstLook (March 8, 2012)

A&E's The First 48 (9pm) is a great show for a lot of reasons, but mostly because there's suspense built into every episode. A real-life murder is committed. Police show up and start piecing together the crime scene. They find clues. A clock ticks down the first 48 hours of tracking down the killer.


Academy Award Winning Documentary Debuts Tonight
latimes.com (March 8, 2012)

With all the attention on celebrity and glamour at the Academy Awards, it's rare that the award for short documentary film gets much notice.


Manhattan's Looking Fine in Bravo Reality Drama
TVFirstLook (March 7, 2012)

Bravo's Million Dollar Listing spinoff, Million Dollar Listing New York (10pm), is a drama about Manhattan's hottest realtors, and their dramatic encounters with one another, that's packaged as a reality show about New York real estate. And it works perfectly.


Megan Mullally Adds Curious Wrinkle to Breaking In
TVFirstLook (March 6, 2012)

The first few minutes of the second season premiere of Breaking In (Fox, 9:30pm) feels like a strange half-sleeping dream where Karen from Will & Grace is hanging out on the Thirtysomething set. Oh, and Christian Slater is there, too, and he's still cool. You know, as much as he ever was.


Melodramatic in the Best Sense of the Word
TVFirstLook (March 2, 2012)

It's too bad that "soap opera" carries a negative connotation these days because, when it's done right, there's nothing quite as fun as watching a well-made TV (melo)drama. Lifetime's Army Wives, which begins its sixth season on Sunday at 10pm, is a soap opera of the highest order.


Big Hair, Big Fun on ABC's New Sunday Soap
New York Daily News (March 2, 2012)

GCB (ABC - Sunday, 10pm) is fun in a familiar sort of big-hair soap opera way, and its real challenge will be shedding the two major pieces of baggage with which it arrives: the b-word connection and the fact it will be judged against the Sunday night ABC soap it’s sort of replacing, Desperate Housewives.


Middling Cop Show Remains So
GreenvilleOnline.com (March 2, 2012)

Breakout Kings (A&E - Sunday, 10pm) is a slick, violent, moderately suspenseful crime series about two U.S. marshals — Charlie Duchamp (Laz Alonso) and Ray Zancanelli (Domenick Lombardozzi) — who recruit three hardened, escape-artist convicts to help them catch criminals on the lam. The idea: “It takes a thief to catch a thief.”


Another Promising New Show from NBC
latimes.com (March 1, 2012)

Awake (NBC, 10pm),whose first hour has been available online since mid-February, finally makes its television premiere Thursday on NBC. I have been waiting for this moment since last summer, since the pilot first went out to the press.


Quiet and Pretty Documentary Moves a Bit Too Slow
TVFirstLook (Feb. 28, 2012)

The Amish on PBS's American Experience (8pm) opens and closes with scenes of tourists piling into Amish villages in Pennsylvania. It's meant to underscore, but not in a mean-spirited way, that most of us know Amish people as curiosities and little else.


Revisiting Japan's Earthquake and Tsunami
New York Times (Feb. 28, 2012)

PBS gets an early start on observing the first anniversary of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan with Inside Japan’s Nuclear Meltdown, a Frontline (10pm) episode on Tuesday that doesn’t feel particularly definitive but certainly recaptures the fear, uncertainty and courage engendered by the disaster.


Hal Sparks Stars in Comedy About Re-Engineered Kids
New York Times (Feb. 27, 2012)

Lab Rats (Disney XD, 8:30pm) - Donald (Hal Sparks, in hair gel and tight clothes) is a wealthy inventor and overgrown child who dabbles in genetic engineering, training three teenage siblings for combat missions — one with superhuman strength, one with speed and the other with smarts — in a lab far below his oceanside home.


Shannen Doherty Stars in Fun Hansel and Gretl Update
newsday.com (Feb. 25, 2012)

Surprise, surprise -- Witchslayer Gretl (Syfy, 9pm) has got some pretty good characters, as well as witch-battling gadgets, sneaky story twists and even a smart line or two.


The 2010 Tony Award Winner for Best Musical
San Francisco Chronicle (Feb. 24, 2012)

[It's] too bad when it comes to the Great Performances presentation of the Tony-winning musical Memphis, airing Friday night on PBS (9pm).


Incomplete Look Into Modern-Day Lynching
TVFirstLook (Feb. 21, 2012)

Documentary filmmaker Keith Beauchamp (The Untold Story of Emmett Louis Till) introduces a compelling and shocking theory at the beginning of The Injustice Files: At the End of a Rope (Investigation Discovery, 8pm).


American Experience's Bill Clinton is Flawed but Hardly So
TVFirstLook (Feb. 20, 2012)

Republicans have Ronald Reagan. Democrats have Bill Clinton. But, where Reagan's mistakes and blunders are fading, Clinton's missteps are increasingly the stuff of legend. And define him. Notably, that includes women other than his wife: Gennifer Flowers and Monica Lewinsky, to name just two of dozens.


Downton Abbey Season Finale is Beautiful and Moving (and Forgivably Slow)
TVFirstLook (Feb. 17, 2012)

Sometimes perfection takes time. Such is the case with the second season finale of Julian Fellowes' historic, wonderful and gloriously well-acted Downton Abbey (PBS - Sunday, 9pm).


Final Season of HBO Comedy is Offensive (and Funny)
columbusalive.com (Feb. 17, 2012)

Going by the first three episodes, Season 3 looks as unabashedly offensive (sensitive parents beware) as it is outrageously hilarious, but that’s the beauty of Eastbound & Down (HBO - Sunday, 10pm).


Ricky Gervais' Wince-Inducing Drawf Comedy
thr.com (Feb. 17, 2012)

Life's Too Short, HBO - Sunday, 10:30pm - Ricky Gervais and Stephen Merchant have once-again mastered the art of wince-inducing comedy meant to skewer people who have an inaccurately bloated view of their own fame or self-worth.


Everybody Loves Raymond Documentary Stalls
SouthCoastToday.com (Feb. 16, 2012)

Exporting Raymond (HBO, 8pm) has moments of insight and looks into another society's culture and sense of humor.


Black History Month Doc Loses Focus
New York Times (Feb. 16, 2012)

Shukree Hassan Tilghman begins More Than a Month (PBS, 10pm), his investigation of whether Black History Month is a blessing or curse, with his tongue in his cheek.


Reality Hit Tests Marksmen's Skills
TVFirstLook (Feb. 14, 2012)

History Channel's reality competition Top Shot (10pm) is a somewhat-under-the-radar show that should be getting a lot more attention than it does. On the show, which kicks off season four tonight, two teams compete in a wide range of shooting skills.


Hulu's First Original Series is a Winner
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Feb. 14, 2012)

If quality is rewarded, Hulu deserves to have a hit with its first scripted series, Battleground, debuting today at Hulu.com. A far cry from past attempts at original, scripted series created for online sites, Battleground plays like a smart, well-written comedy series you might find on a premium cable network -- minus the profanity and nudity.


Courteney Cox Comedy Deserves Some Love
newsday.com (Feb. 14, 2012)

Cougar Town (ABC, 8:30pm) is back, in name and spirit -- and that's all to the good.


Touching Portrait of Civil-Rights Era Couple
THR.com (Feb. 14, 2012)

The Loving Story (HBO, 9pm) is a perfect time capsule that illuminates the racist past of our country with a uniquely personal and poignant emphasis. It’s a film that will continue to be enjoyed whether viewed on Valentine’s Day, during Black History Month or any other time of year.


Raw Footage Transports Viewers to Martin Luther King Jr.'s Final Days
TVFirstLook (Feb. 10, 2012)

Historical figures like Martin Luther King Jr., who have shaped our lives and culture, have a way of becoming mythical characters far removed from our everyday lives, no matter how extraordinary their place in history. Often, their lives are defined by a few events, a few speeches and a horrific death.


Kevin Smith's New Jersey Comic Book Store is a Star
San Francisco Chronicle (Feb. 10, 2012)

Who's your favorite comic book hottie, "goggles Catwoman" or "purple-dress Catwoman"? If that sentence makes even the slightest sense to you, I regret to inform you that you are a geek.


Paranormal Activity Team Drums Up a Horror Dud
St. Louis Post-Dispatch (Feb. 7, 2012)

I'm not the biggest fan of the horror genre, although I love The Walking Dead and American Horror Story.


Smash Brings Luster Back to the Peacock Network
Shari Anne Brill, TVFirstLook (Feb. 6, 2012)

I can't remember the last time I was this excited about a new NBC show. Based on watching the Smash pilot (Monday, 10pm) as well as upcoming episode Callback, NBC has succeeded in getting a new show on the air that people will be talking about, in a good way.


David Steinberg Interviews Chris Rock
TVFirstLook (Feb. 2, 2012)

Inside Comedy (Showtime, 11pm) is a curious show. Not bad. Not good, yet. Curious. The half-hour talk show kicked off last week on Showtime and tonight, host David Steinberg sits down with comedian Chris Rock.


Weak Jokes Sitting Atop a Shaky Foundation
TVFirstLook (Jan. 31, 2012)

Former MADtv performers Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele seem like nice guys. Funny, too. So, hopefully, they'll find work soon after their new Comedy Central show is canned. Which should be any moment now.


Brit Import has Real-Life Royalty Slumming It for Dates
New York Post (Jan. 31, 2012)

On [Undercover Princes - TLC, 10pm], three real-life princes — 46-year-old Crown Prince First is Manvendra of Rajpipla, who reigns from one of India’s richest royal families. There’s a barrier to finding a princess, however. Prince “Manny” is gay.


Drag Queens Strut Their Stuff in Upbeat Reality Show
TVFirstLook (Jan. 30, 2012)

Oh, sure, guys putting on makeup and sporting fake boobs may never be deemed family-friendly television. But, somehow, drag queen diva RuPaul has been churning out the upbeat, thoroughly entertainaing and utterly non-threatening RuPaul's Drag Race for going on four seasons.


Hit Starz Drama Returns to Sandals, Blood and Sex
New York Times (Jan. 27, 2012)

Spartacus: Vengeance [Starz - Friday, 10pm] is fueled by debauchery, extreme violence and soap-opera plotting rather than special effects, however, and those elements aren’t as clearly in focus as the new season begins.


Great New Reality Show from Deadliest Catch Crew
Washington Post (Jan. 27, 2012)

Bering Sea Gold, premiering on Discovery Friday night (10pm), doesn’t seem at first like it has crossed any new frontier, relying on elements and structure familiar to the form. Enticingly (to the network), it combines the ocean and the gold and the cold and the reactive testosterone among bad-tempered desperados.


David Steinberg Talks Comedy with Comedians
New York Times (Jan. 26, 2012)

[Inside Comedy - Showtime, 11pm] - In the three episodes provided for review the show still seems to be tinkering with its format. One features only Larry David, which may be a bit more Larry David than is absolutely necessary. Another has Brad Garrett, Martin Short and Billy Crystal, and you end up feeling as if you didn’t see enough of any of them.


Fox Previews Keifer Sutherland's Quirky New Show
New York Times (Jan. 25, 2012)

Touch [Fox, 9pm] happens to have been created by Tim Kring, the writer and producer also responsible for Heroes. But the earlier show, with its unapologetic pulpiness, was initially a lot of fun.


Captivating Twist on Serial Killer Shows
Variety (Jan. 25, 2012)

Investigation Discovery is big on serial killers, but finding new wrinkles for its true-crime programming can become a bit of a challenge. After all, TV probably has more shows devoted to these prolific criminals than have ever been documented in reality.


One Long Hour with Joan
TVFirstLook (Jan. 24, 2012)

Joan Rivers is an iconic comedian who broke ground as one of the first female standup comics to make it big. Of course, she's a whole lot more than that: reality TV star (The Celebrity Apprentice, one-time Tonight Show guest host, home shopping hawker). And she's funny.


Sports Memorabilia Show Shoulda Been a Contender
New York Times (Jan. 24, 2012)

All-Star Dealers (Discovery Channel, 8pm), a sports-memorabilia addition to the bloated auction/pawnshop/storage locker subgenre of reality television, should have been a winner, with endless stories to draw on and a built-in fan base. But rather than find its own formula, it was content to borrow from existing shows, and it borrowed all the wrong things.


Unhappy Lovers with Weapons
TVFirstLook (Jan. 20, 2012)

ID: Investigation Discovery is rolling out another docu-series in the mold of its great Disappeared and its pretty good Fatal Encounters. Meaning, Scorned: Love Kills (Saturday, 10pm) is a true-life story with murder at its core.


Boxing Coach Battles Parkinson's in Moving Doc Series
espn.go.com (Jan. 20, 2012)

On Freddie Roach (HBO - Friday, 9:30pm) is an oddly engrossing show. It follows the daily life of the five-time trainer of the year (and newly elected International Boxing Hall of Famer) in his Hollywood, Calif., Wild Card Gym, on the road to Las Vegas for a big fight and at home, all while he battles Parkinson's disease, which many -- Roach included -- believe was caused by all of the blows to the head he took as a fighter.


Rob Lowe Channels Accused Killer Drew Peterson
Chicago Tribune (Jan. 20, 2012)

There are surprises in Drew Peterson: Untouchable (Lifetime - Saturday, 8pm) beginning with the choice of Rob Lowe to play the man. Peterson evoked many emotions during his odd and troubling run in the public eye between fourth wife Stacy Peterson's disappearance in October 2007 and his arrest in May 2009, but comparisons to an almost blindlingly handsome actor were not among them.


Animated Comedy Falls Flat Despite Best Efforts
TVFirstLook (Jan. 19, 2012)
The team behind FX's funny and bordering on great It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia try their hands at animation with Unsupervised (FX, 10:30pm) - a show that has a lot of elements that should work, but don't.


Much-Loved FX Comedy Still Groovy
toonzone.net (Jan. 19, 2012)

Archer (FX, 10pm), man and show, are very nearly at their best in the first new episode of the year, The Man From Jupiter. His opening line is classic Archer: When the girl he's invited back to his place says she needs to wait for her friend, he snorts: "Yeah, obviously we're going to wait for her. She's the hot one." That earns him a slap and a laugh from a bar patron who turns out to be Burt Reynolds.


Missing People and Missing News Coverage
Washington Post (Jan. 18, 2012)

Find Our Missing, a handsomely produced 10-part docu-series about unsolved cases, premieres Wednesday night on TV One (10pm), and it is not nearly outspoken enough about its cause: It’s a show about cases of black people who vanished suspiciously and who, for reasons that should probably embarrass producers at local and national news operations, never got the same amount of media attention as their white counterparts.


Four-Part Series Examines Little Understood Creatures
New York Times (Jan. 18, 2012)

[On PBS's Inside Nature's Giants, 10pm], viewers who can handle the rather blunt footage of the dissections can learn quite a lot. The scientists explain the evolutionary adaptations that enable sperm whales to dive to potentially crushing depths, along with other interesting tidbits. (“Sperm whales can suckle for up to 13 years,” the narration relates.) Once they reach the stomachs, they also gain insight into why this particular animal died.


Gripping Cop Drama is in Fine Form
TVFirstLook (Jan. 17, 2012)

TNT's Southland (10pm) is one of those dramas that is so good, but in a quiet, subtle, not-in-your-face way, that it sometimes goes unnoticed. But it's also the type of show that if you stumble upon it one night, you're reminded just how good it is.


Great FX Series Returns as Good as Ever
The Plain Dealer (Jan. 17, 2012)

The second season of FX's Justified (FX, 10pm) certainly went out with a bang -- the bang of gunfire and all the dramatic bang for the buck you could possibly desire. One of those shots hit our hero, Raylan Givens (Timothy Olyphant), leaving the deputy U.S. marshal with one nasty wound to his side.


Poignant Profile of the Civil War General
Deseret News (Jan. 17, 2012)

The flamboyant life and military career of Custer is thoughtfully examined in a new PBS documentary, Custer’s Last Stand (PBS, 8pm).


Fun Syfy Drama Delivers on Sexy Promise
TVFirstLook (Jan. 16, 2012)

Generally speaking, there are about a million missteps that a sci-fi TV series can take, if TV history is any clue - bad acting, cheap sets, confusing storylines. You get the idea.


J.J. Abrams Unleashes the Criminals
New York Times (Jan. 16, 2012)

In Alcatraz (Fox, 8pm), which has its premiere Monday night on Fox, they import a bunch of hardened criminals from the past and set them loose in San Francisco.


Vampires and Werewolves are Young and Hot
blogcritics.org (Jan. 16, 2012)

Syfy’s Being Human (9pm) is that rare remake of a British show that actually works. After a stellar first season, the show returns for its second go.


Skillfully Made Horror Series Debuts Tonight
redeye.com (Jan. 14, 2012)

Created by Jack Thorne (British versions of Skins and Shameless), [The Fades - BBC America, 9pm] is a six-part horror series skillfully crosses "Superbad" with "The Sixth Sense" and just a drop of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It's a funny, creepy, touching thriller that had me laughing one second and peeking between my fingers the next.


OK Movie is Not an OK Sitcom
THR.com

Though the creators of Napoleon Dynamite (Fox - Sunday, 8:30pm), Jared and Jerusha Hess, believe that the movie was essentially a three-dimensional cartoon to begin with, animating it doesn't actually make it better (or even funny), even if you bring back the original cast to do the voice work. That's partly because Napoleon Dynamite already was an acquired taste.


Amusing Sitcom with a Strained Premise
TVFirstLook (Jan. 12, 2012)

Rob Schneider, best known for his stint on Saturday Night Live and countless bit parts in Adam Sandler movies, is a likeable, goofy, peculiar guy - just like Rob, the character he plays in his new sitcom of the same name (situated in CBS's sweet spot - at 8:30pm tonight, right after The Big Bang Theory).


Bones Spin-Off About a Guy Who Can Find Anything
Boston Globe (Jan. 12, 2012)

The series comes from Bones' creator Hart Hanson, and The Finder (Fox, 9pm) operates in the same universe as Booth, Brennan and the gang, having originated as a backdoor pilot from that show.


West Memphis Three Profiled in New Doc
EW.com (Jan. 12, 2012)

Paradise Lost 3: Purgatory (HBO, 9pm) is the third documentary that filmmakers Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky have made about the West Memphis Three. These young men — Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley — are shown being railroaded into the conviction for the murder of three little boys killed in 1993 in West Memphis, Ark. You don't have to have seen the other two films (made in 1996 and 2000) to become engrossed in this true-crime story.


The Fight to End Apartheid
Los Angeles Times (Jan. 12, 2012)

Have You Heard from Johannesburg? (PBS, 9pm) moves fast and stays gripping — I watched it all at a single sitting and never felt impelled to skip ahead or turn away.


Laura Prepon is Chelsea Handler in Generic Comedy
Newsday (Jan. 11, 2012)

Chelsea Handler is an acquired taste, but there's no particular taste that has to be acquired for this largely generic chickcom.


American Outlaw is More Interesting in Myth than in Fact
Deseret News (Jan. 10, 2012)

In PBS’ American Experience Presents Billy the Kid (8pm), viewers learn the real story of Billy the Kid. Filmmaker John Maggio has crafted an elegy to Billy the Kid by turning to little-known scholars and writers for this by-the-numbers, talking-heads documentary.


Stumbling Off the Catwalk
TVFirstLook (Jan. 10, 2012)

Lifetime's new fashion show, 24 Hour Catwalk (10pm), surely sounded good in its pitch meeting - Project Runway meets Food Network's Chopped. Four aspiring designers compete for a grand prize. They're chipped down to two designers who have 24 hours to complete a fashion line.


Abby Lee Miller is One of TV's Great TV Characters
TVFirstLook (Jan. 10, 2012)

No matter what you think of Abby Lee Miller, she's one of the most memorable characters to pop up on TV in a long, long time. Abby, a dance teacher in Pittsburgh, is loud, angry, big and scary - so scary it's hard to imagine being one of her young students.


MTV Doc Series Profiles Aspiring MMA Fighters
Media Life Magazine (Jan. 9, 2012)

By focusing on a few amateur fighters and their girlfriends, [Caged - MTV, 10pm] provides some real human interest and sociological insights.


Discovery Channel Focuses on Inmate's First Days Behind Bars
TVFirstLook (Jan. 9, 2012)

If Discovery Channel's new First Week In (9pm) serves any greater pupose than providing a somewhat entertaining hour of TV, it's as a reminder that, in case you have doubts, you don't want to go to jail.


Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein Lovingly Mock the Portland Vibe
Washington Post (Jan. 6, 2012)

Portlandia (IFC - Friday, 10pm), which bears the imprimatur of Lorne Michaels, still suffers some of the same bad habits of improv comedy workshops and SNL, where sketches don’t end so much as they peter out or careen off a cliff, devolving into redundant babbling contests of the same catchphrase.
But Armisen and Brownstein more than make up for their flops with exuberance to spare.


William H. Macy Series Kicks Off Season Two
Chicago Tribune (Jan. 6, 2012)

It would be easy to write the series Shameless (Showtime - Sunday, 9pm) off as another cable TV excuse to show nudity, alcoholism, rampant drug use, petty theft, unlicensed day care, home growing, purse emptying, fiscally motivated courting, foster child exploitation, credit card fraud, murder by information omission, wife cheating, ice-cream-truck-based beer selling, Little League bookmaking and behind-the-back name calling. But to compile such a list is to get at the great, rowdy, often comic joy of this series.


Glorious Second Season of the Incredible Downton Abbey
TVFirstLook (Jan. 6, 2012)

When the multiple Emmy-winning Downton Abbey debuted last year, much of the joy of watching it came from discovering a new miniseries that was clearly on its way to becoming an award-winning epic. The joy of watching it also came from first meeting Robert Crawley, Earl of Grantham (Hugh Bonneville), and his family.


Kill the Beast
New York Daily News (Jan. 5, 2012)

Watching the fifth-season premiere of MTV’s Jersey Shore (MTV, 10pm), I felt a little like a guy who has shown up a party just as the caterer is putting away the buffet. The event is still going, but it’s not quite the same, or filling.


Chilling Real-Life Stories
TVFirstLook (Jan. 4, 2012)

The cable network Investigation Discovery has mastered the art of telling a certain type of story. The tales are true and quietly told, with ominous music in the background and haunting narration throughout.


Cute Clothes and Cute Guys: What's Not to Like?
Newsday (Jan. 3, 2012)

Here are some reasons to check out the [Jane By Design] premiere Tuesday night at 9pm (ABC Family).


ABC's Predictably Unfunny New Sitcom
Chicago Sun-Times (Jan. 3, 2012)

Work It, premiering Tuesday (ABC, 8:30pm), is the latest in a series of freshman sitcoms about the supposed emasculation of today’s males: Last Man Standing, the short-lived Man Up and the even shorter-lived How To Be a Gentleman.


Escapee from The Rachel Zoe Project Strikes Out on His Own
TVFirstLook (Jan. 2, 2012)

One of the very few aspects of Bravo's unwatchable The Rachel Zoe Project that made that exercise in vanity somewhat tolerable was Rachel's assistant, Brad Goreski. He's a fashionista whose No. 1 client has seemed to be himself.


Highly Regarded Tom Shadyac Documentary Makes OWN Debut
The Seattle Times (Dec. 30, 2011)

I Am, which was originally titled Imagine, (OWN - Sunday morning at 8am), is for the most part a positive, expansive experience. The movie is open to the miraculous nature of existence and the potential for change rather extinction. It also celebrates the idea that a message movie can be funny and irrepressibly enthusiastic.


HBO Sitcom is More Touching Than Funny
TVFirstLook (Dec. 30, 2011)

Australian comedian Chris Lilley is like a friend who's fun to go to a party with, but who you can tolerate for only a few minutes in real life.


Get Past the "Why" and Alaska Becomes an Engaging Show
TVFirstLook (Dec. 29, 2011)

You can't help but be nagged by a couple of questions when watching Alaska: The Last Frontier (Discovery Channel, 10pm): Is there a Walmart behind the cameraman? And, Why in God's name...?


Working Stiffs Compete in Ben Bailey's New Game Show
TVFirstLook (Dec. 27, 2011)

Stand-up comedian Ben Bailey has made a name for himself as host of the in-a-taxi game show Cash Cab. The love-it-or-hate-it show is fairly entertaining. Which would be high praise for his well-intentioned but poorly executed new game show, Best in the Business (Discovery Channel, 8pm).


Funny but Loud On-the-Street Game Show with Billy Eichner
New York Times (Dec. 22, 2011)

With Broadway energy and public-access production values and charm, Billy on the Street (Fuse, 11pm) is billed as a game show, which it notionally is. People answer pop-culture trivia questions and win money, even if it’s sometimes just a dollar. But other than that, all formalities are gone, especially the neutrality of the host.


PBS' Independent Lens Profiles Unusual Family Obsessed with Art
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (Dec. 22, 2011)
The Woodmans (PBS, 10pm) is the story of Betty Woodman, an accomplished ceramist, and George Woodman, an abstract painter and former professor of art criticism, and their two children, Francesca and Charles Woodman, a professor of electronic art at the University of Cincinnati.


Bravo's Reality Competition Wraps Tonight
New York Post (Dec. 21, 2011)

The producers of Work of Art (Bravo, 9pm) have managed to take something that is never a big draw (excuse the unintentional cheesy pun), art, and have made it into something so enlightening and, yes, exciting that it’s positively magical.


Planet Green Goes Foodie
New York Times (Dec. 20, 2011)

Suzilla: The Mouth That Roars (Planet Green, 10:30pm) works a little like sports and a little like pornography: Ms. French, with her cheerleader looks and compact frame, bats her eyes as gigantic sandwiches or plates of barbecued chicken wings are placed before her and a large, confident man, and then proceeds to eat the dupe under the table.


Steven Smith Prowls the Streets of L.A. Looking for Food
New York Daily News (Dec. 20, 2011)

Midnight Snack (Planet Green, 10pm) is the latest food show for voyeurs, viewers who are fascinated by what other people eat.


NBC's Dull New Game Show
The Cleveland Plain Dealer (Dec. 19, 2011)

...the peacock network's new game show, Who's Still Standing? (8pm), manages to be both juvenile and dull. Now, try to stay awake through this next part.


One Side of Jerry Lewis' Life is Revealed
San Francisco Chronicle

Method to the Madness of Jerry Lewis, airing Saturday on the Encore cable channel (8pm), focuses almost exclusively on Lewis' eight-decade career, all but ignoring his personal life beyond his apprenticeship to his vaudevillian parents and brief interviews with three of his children who are directly involved with Lewis' work.


Graphic Novels Makes Its Debut as a Made-for-TV Movie
New York Daily News

Chiller’s first original movie isn’t going to knock anybody dead. Remains (Chiller - Friday, 10pm) is adapted from a Steve Niles graphic novel about post-apocalypse Reno, Nev., where a nuclear-type accident has turned most of the population into the undead.


Tori Spelling's Mother Candy Puts Gargantuan Home on Display
New York Times (Dec. 15, 2011)

Recalling the grand entrances once made by the likes of Ronald Reagan and Rock Hudson at the Spelling mansion, she invokes “Gone With the Wind.” But as the camera pulls back to show her in the empty vastness of the house she’s about to vacate, a different American classic comes to mind: “Citizen Kane.”


Funny Show from a Bunch of Staten Island Guys
New York Post (Dec. 15, 2011)

Ready for the most ridiculous, funniest hidden camera show ever? Then make sure to tune in tonight for truTV’s new show Impractical Jokers (TruTV, 10pm), possibly the funniest, most ridiculous show I’ve seen in years.


Catherine Bell is an FBI Agent on Tonight's TNT Mystery Movie
TVFirstLook (Dec. 13, 2011)

Titus Welliver, Catherine Bell, Cole Hauser

In the opening scene of Good Morning, Killer (TNT, 9pm), a teenage girl is tied up, crying and forced to talk to her mom on a phone. She has been kidnapped and the kidnapper is threatening to kill her. It's an unpleasant scene in an otherwise pleasant, if not great, well-made and beautiful mystery.

Pierce Brosnan, Melissa George
photo: NY Daily News

A&E's Two-Part Stephen King Adaptation Continues
New York Daily News (Dec. 12, 2011)

Matt Venne’s screen adaptation of the King novel (Bag of Bones - A&E, 9pm) plays choppily, cruising at times on unremarkable dialogue and ominous music and at other times feeling genuinely suspenseful.

The Hour's Dominic West Stars as Serial Killer Fred West
Philadelphia Inquirer (Dec. 9, 2011)

Fred West [is a] real-life British rapist and killer portrayed with unnerving cunning by The Wire's Dominic West in one of the few truly terrifying serial-killer films in years, Appropriate Adult, which the Sundance Channel will telecast Saturday night at 10.

Bag of Bones is a Bust
Chicago Sun-Times (Dec. 9, 2011)

Stephen King’s Bag of Bones is a bag of something, and it ain’t bones. Based on King’s 1998 thriller (which I trust is better than the two-part miniseries starting Sunday on A&E), Bag of Bones boils down to a hokey horror story that relies on cheap tricks — nightmares! sudden bursts of loud music! animal in the attic! — to deliver most of its chills.


History Channel Remembers Pearl Harbor 70 Years Later
Newsday (Dec. 7, 2011)

Seventy years ago Wednesday, FDR had a stuffy nose. He also had a scheduled dinner with Edward R. Murrow. The phone rang. He listened, and his only recorded-for-posterity response: "Oh, no."

Two Murders Three Decades Apart on TNT Mystery Movie
TVFirstLook (Dec. 7, 2011)

So far, in its short life, TNT Mystery Movie has quickly established itself as the place for pretty good, well-made and mostly entertaining made-for-TV mystery movies.

Celebs Recount Childhood Memories
New York Times (Dec. 5, 2011)

On The Mortified Sessions (Sundance Channel, 8pm), an engaging bit of fluff that has its premiere Monday night on the Sundance Channel, celebrities open their shoeboxes, talk about what’s inside and share childhood anecdotes.

Marcus Sakey Channels Anthony Bourdain
TVFirstLook (Dec. 5, 2011)

Travel Channel's Anthony Bourdain - the smoking, drinking, sarcastic and witty host of No Reservations - is one of those people it's best not to imitate. He's a character. And, like most characters, he's one of kind.

Christmas Sequel to 2009 Surprise Hit
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette (Dec. 5, 2011)

ABC introduced Disney’s Prep & Landing two years ago and it resonated as one of the more creative new Christmas specials. And why not? John Lasseter of Pixar fame is one of the executive producers of these stories of elves from the North Pole who help pave the way for Santa’s annual one-night deliveries.

Intense Two-Part Peter Pan Prequel
New York Daily News (Dec. 2, 2011)

Neverland (Syfy - Sunday, 9pm), a new prequel to the beloved story of Peter Pan, weaves a complex, often disturbing tale demanding considerably more of its audience than the breezy musical versions that regularly fly across our theater stages.

World AIDS Day Doc on PBS
New York Times (Dec. 1, 2011)

The Grove, on PBS in honor of World AIDS Day (click here for local listings), is a nicely made study of the difference between a personal memorial and a public one.

TLC's New Drunk-Driving Show
The Washington Post (Dec. 1, 20110

DUI (TLC, 9pm) is irresistible, picking up where Cops, Jail and other guilty-pleasure law-enforcement reality series usually don’t go. It is primarily interested in what happens to motorists after they fail a sobriety test. It follows them days and weeks into court appearances and the punitive phase of their charges.

Weed Wars is a Well-Crafted On-the-Job Show
The Hollywood Reporter (Dec. 1, 2011)

A well-crafted, behind-the-scenes look at California’s largest marijuana dispensary, Weed Wars (Discovery Channel, 10pm) is sure to spark further debate about medical cannabis, if not the outright legalization of pot in America.


Mediocre Sitcom Chock Full of Familiar Sitcom Faces
New York Times

The Exes (TV Land, 10:30pm), whose first episode is available online at Hulu (the television premiere is on Wednesday), is the sort of unashamedly traditional, nontransgressive show that can stop a conversation in certain parts of New York. Admit that you watch it, and people will scan the room, mumble something and walk away. (Yes, this actually happens.)



Sitcom Vets Lift Hot in Cleveland Above the Pack

Wendie Malick, Valerie Bertinelli,
Jane Leeves, Betty White

San Francisco Chronicle

Hot in Cleveland launches its third season (TV Land, 10pm) by dispatching the issues from the cliffhanger finale of last season. Elka (Betty White) was about to marry Fred (Buck Henry) when her ex-boyfriend, Max (Carl Reiner), barreled into the church, followed by Elka's supposedly dead husband, Bobby (Don Rickles).


New Fox Sitcom Doesn't Deliver on Provocative Title
New York Daily News

Fox's new sitcom I Hate My Teenage Daughter (9:30pm) is all title and not much show.




A Step Above Recent Scott Turow Adaptations
New York Times

Bill Pullman

[Scott Turow's Innocent - TNT, 9pm] is an engaging adaptation of Mr. Turow’s 2010 sequel to “Presumed Innocent,” which picked up the hero of that novel, Rusty Sabich, more than 20 years after he was cleared of the murder of his mistress and fellow prosecutor.

Familiar Show Gets a Spit-and-Polish Shine with a New Supernanny
TVFirstLook

There is almost nothing about America's Supernanny (Lifetime, 9pm) that you'd call original - not the concept, not the payoff. But, in this case, familiarity works in America's Supernanny's favor.

Subpar Acting Doesn't Detract from a Fun Whodunit
TVFirstLook

There's a scene about a quarter of the way into Rizzoli & Isles tonight (TNT, 10pm) that, in about two seconds, sums up the hit show - subpar acting in a whodunit that's thoroughly entertaining despite the actors' flat-line performances.



Friday, Nov. 25, 2011

Hoops & Yoyo Ruin Christmas (CBS, 8pm) is occasionally cute but it's not really as funny as the title would suggest, writes Rob Owen in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

Hoops, the pink one, and Yoyo, the green one, are joined in their adventure by a blue friend, piddles, and they get into a scrape when they hitch a ride on Santa's sleigh and discover how exactly Santa manages to visit every child's home in one night.



Wednesday, Nov. 23, 2011

[The Sound of Mumbai: A Musical (HBO2, 8pm) is a] moving documentary that follows kids from the Mumbai slums as they prepare to sing "The Sound of Music" with the Bombay Chamber Orchestra. With their big dreams and poor backgrounds, they may understand Rodgers and Hammerstein's aspirational music even better than the von Trapps - Melissa Maerz on EW.com.

Anthony Bourdain

Monday, Nov. 21, 2011

Anthony Bourdain, the star of the Travel Channel’s new series The Layover (9pm), is entertainingly snappish on TV, even though (or perhaps because) we can imagine how disagreeable he would probably be as a neighbor or coworker, writes Tom Conroy in Media Life Magazine.

When he is scornful, as is often the case when he serves as a judge on “Top Chef,” it’s nice to know we’re safe from his sarcasm. When he is pleased, his enthusiasm feels real.

Chris Harrison

Monday, Nov. 21, 2011

Just this side of ghastly, the new limited-run series You Deserve It (ABC, 9pm) combines the banality of game show razzle-dazzle with the agony of personal tragedy, writes Kevin McDonough on SouthCoastToday.

Every contestant plays a remarkably involved trivia quiz to win money for a friend or a relative in need. In the episode made available for review, a young woman competes on behalf of her college friend, a bereaved mother of two whose husband drowned only four months prior.



Friday, Nov. 18, 2011

There’s a noticeable imbalance in Woody Allen: A Documentary, a three-and-a-half-hour American Masters biography spooling out on Sunday and Monday on PBS, writes Mike Hale in the New York Times.

The first chapter, the longer and better of the two, follows its subject through just the first 10 films of his career, ending with “Stardust Memories.” Then the program’s director, Robert Weide, stuffs Mr. Allen’s 31 subsequent features into the 90 rushed minutes of the second night.

Watch Woody Allen: A Documentary on PBS. See more from AMERICAN MASTERS.

Wavy Gravy

Thursday, Nov. 17, 2011 The 2010 documentary, Saint Misbehavin': The Wavy Gravy Movie, about the guy Wavy Gravy - an activist, a clown a throwback to California commune living - premiers tonight on Showtime (7:55pm). A review from the New York Post's V.A. Musetto: The journey is entertaining, whether you witnessed the 1960s firsthand or heard about it from your grandparents. But the film ignores Wavy's childhood -- surely his early years had an impact on what he became in later life. And there isn't a single negative comment. Are we to believe that this wild-haired, in-your-face LSD disciple is Mr. Perfect? I doubt it.

John William, Steven Spielberg

Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011 The American Film Institute could have hardly chosen a more appealing pairing to inaugurate its Turner Classic Movies specials Master Class -- the Art of Collaboration (8pm) than Steven Spielberg and John Williams, whose 40-year relationship is one of the most fruitful and memorable in screen history - Brian Lowry in Variety. The ensuing hour manages to be both intimate and revealing, overcoming the seminar format to feel like a legitimate treat for discriminating movie fans -- one that ought to enhance their appreciation of a composer's contribution to films. Tuesday, Nov. 15, 2011 Engineering Evil, a History Channel special on Tuesday night (9pm), is devoted to the details of how the Nazis carried out the Holocaust, so you expect to learn about things like crematorium design, and you do. But another kind of engineering — call it human engineering — is also revealed here, writes Neil Genzlinger in the New York Times. The Nazi plan required a populace that was, at best, willing to look the other way and, at worst, a participant. The program documents how the Nazis began creating that reality even before their military expansion started, removing Jews from jobs in education, medicine and other fields and demonizing them in all sorts of propaganda. Monday, Nov. 14, 2011 Animal Planet is familiar as the home of garish shows like Fatal Attractions and My Extreme Animal Phobia, writes Neil Genzlinger in the New York Times. On Monday night, though, it goes for the touching rather than the tacky with Saved, a new series about people who were in need of some kind of spiritual boost and received it from an animal. Each episode features two real-life tales, and the ones in the premiere are certainly likely to tug a lot of heartstrings. Monday, Nov. 14, 2011 There's an inherent danger to reality shows, especially hit shows like History Channel's Pawn Stars, Ice Road Truckers and Bravo's Millionaire Matchmaker, where real people doing their jobs become hit shows. That danger, which has loomed large since reality TV burst onto the scene a decade ago, is that these shows seem too easy to produce. So, every sorta interesting person stomping their boots in the general vicinity of Hollywood becomes a candidate for a show. Such is the case with the terrible The Headhuntress (Bravo, 10pm), a one-time special the network couldn't do a better job of downplaying (not a good sign for it becoming a series). In the show, personnel recruiter Wendy Doulton, uh, finds people jobs and, erm, coaches job candidates. Now, I wasn't in any of the development meetings for the show. But I'd venture to guess that at least one of its producers, upon meeting Wendy, squealed, "Ooh, you're deliciously awful." And, true to Bravo's reality formula, she is at first awful (deliciously? Not so much). But, while I'm sure she's a wonderful person in real like, she's awful...and dull. So, at some point in the show, the producers have Wendy become a touchy-feely-huggy recruiter for a host of job candidates the casting director apparently pulled off a casting couch - at least one of those "job candidates" appears to be making a living by popping up on reality shows. Ultimately, the story arc in the The Headhuntress - the tension, the pay off - is meant to be dueling job candidates for a high-salary PR job. There's no tension - both job candidates look like they'd like to be anywhere but applying for that high paying job. And there's no payoff. Friday, Nov. 11, 2011 David Tutera, if you don't know, is a drama queen...with a heart of gold (and he's funny, too). He puts his, erm, nasty attitude on display in subtle ways, though - a puckered lip; squinting eyes; draaawn-out words; head turned just so. It's the perfect attitude, as it happens, for a wedding planner. David plans beautiful, meticulous and, generally speaking, not over-the-top weddings for mostly everyday people. On My Fair Wedding with David Tutera - the fifth season kicks off on WE tv on Sunday at 9pm - he also gives a bride to be the wedding of her dreams. The bride's story is this - some struggle or other, wedding in disarray, horrific dresses - when David swoops in and saves the day. The stories are heartwarming. David's work is truly impressive. And he is fun to watch - he keeps his attitude in check most of the time - but it's there, right under the surface. Friday, Nov. 11, 2011 As its title suggests, TLC’s engaging new series All-American Muslim [TLC - Sunday, 10pm] concerns what some in the United States may view as a controversial topic: the growing number of Muslims in American cities and towns, writes David Knowles in The Hollywood Reporter. Set in Dearborn, Michigan, a place with the largest concentration of Muslims outside of the Middle East, the show follows several members of the Lebanese community as they pray, eat, get married, play football, run businesses, and generally assimilate into life in the United States while continuing to practice Islam. Friday, Nov. 11, 2011 The documentary, The Last Play at Shea, which captures the end of an era: the tearing down of the old Shea Stadium in the Queens, debuts on Showtime this weekend (Friday, 9:30pm). Last Play, which had a limited run in theaters last year, focuses on the final concerts at Shea Stadium with Billy Joel, intertwined with stories about the New York Mets and New York City itself. Check out this review for the movie's original release: "Guaranteed to put lumps in the throats of longtime New York residents and suburbanites..." New York Times Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2011 Coast Guard Alaska, which premieres Wednesday at 9pm [on The Weather Channel], almost deliberately avoids the sort of manufactured dramas on which much of reality television thrives, writes David Hinckley in the New York Daily News.

The subjects here are treated with an almost tangible sense of respect. When there are setbacks or conflicts, it treats them as things that normal grownups assess and deal with.

Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2011 Art and science used to be treated as opposite and conflicting fields of study. Lately, both realms have shown more willingness to admit they're linked, writes Joanne Ostrow in the Denver Post. Now a wonderfully geeky TV series looks at that nexus in a way that should make both sides proud.

The Prophets of Science Fiction [Science, 10pm], co-produced by Ridley Scott ("Blade Runner​," "Alien"), charts the creative genius of science fiction authors alongside the believe-it-or-not breakthroughs of modern science.

Tuesday, Nov. 8, 2011 In the opening moments of History's incredible Vietnam in HD (tonight, tomorrow and Thursday at 9pm), it's clear that this is an extraordinarily graphic depiction of a war that has never felt so real or terrifying as it does in high definition. In those first few moments, too, Vietnam in HD explains the origins of the Vietnam War perhaps more succinctly and clearly than it has ever been in TV shows, documentaries and movies. Like its earlier WWII in HD, History's Vietnam in HD was created by its producers scouring the country for home movies taken by soldiers as they fought in Vietnam. These home movies are stitched together into the story of the war and, most significant, transferred to HD. The high-definition transports you into the center of the war, so much so that it's initially confusing how you are seeing familiar images look so unfamiliar. Visually, Vietnam in HD is stunning. The effect is magical, scary and intoxicating. Yet, Vietnam in HD stumbles a bit in its narration. Michael C. Hall (Showtime's Dexter) narrates. But so do actors speaking the words of the soldiers and journalists profiled in Vietnam in HD. But the real people also speak. This cobbling together of actors and the real people is annoying, especially at first. But, fortunately, the impact of the visuals pushes that narration into the background. Vietnam in HD is a six-hour doc that History is airing over three parts. Part I begins tonight at 9pm. Friday, Nov. 4, 2011 Like a runaway train plowing into a station, Hell on Wheels - AMC - Sunday, 10pm - (** out of four) is all noise and flash and blood and guts — and never mind surviving the ride, let alone enjoying it, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today. This is a series, after all, where the ad tag line is "Blood will be spilled; lives will be lost; men will be ruined." If that's the come-on, just imagine what joys they're keeping hidden. Thursday, Nov. 3, 2011 HBO scores again in the documentary category with Marathon Boy, the highly-decorated film by Gemma Atwal, which debuts on TV Thursday at 8 pm, Rick Chandler writes on NBCSports. I would strongly advise you to check it out. It tells the story of Budhia Singh, who was sold by his mother to a street hawker and was rescued by Biranchi Das, a larger-than-life judo coach and operator of an orphanage for slum children in the eastern Indian state of Orissa.

Trailer (Off-Channel)

Thursday, Nov. 3, 2011 In an incredibly affecting documentary, [Deaf Jam - PBS, 10pm] filmmaker Judy Lieff  explores the beauty and power of American Sign Language (ASL) poetry, writes Bob Etier on Technorati. Viewers meet deaf teen Aneta Brodski, an Israeli immigrant high school student who lives in New York and attends the Lexington School for the Deaf, in Deaf Jam, an exploration of the slam poetry scene as translated and transfigured by people who do not use the spoken word.

Watch ASL Poets in the Spotlight on PBS. See more from Independent Lens.

Brian Greene

Wednesday, Nov. 2, 2011 Brian Greene, a physicist and Columbia University professor, is an unlikely heartthrob. But when Greene burst onto the PBS scene nearly a decade ago with The Elegant Universe, based on his book of the same name, that's exactly what he became. And, with The Elegant Universe, in which he somehow made string theory interesting and understandable, his heartthrobiness, no doubt, helped lure in viewers and loads of fans who clamor for his attention at conventions and such. In The Fabric of the Cosmos, a four-part Nova special that kicks off tonight (PBS, 9pm - check local listings), Greene's appeal has dimmed a bit, and so too has his ability to make complex concepts interesting and understandable. This go around, he explains the universe, time and space. The structure of Fabric is familiar. Greene speaks enthusiastically about the universe, typically placing himself in graphics that help explain it all. More so than Elegant, Fabric requires a couple of things to fully enjoy it: A simple understanding of complex concepts and, second, an interest in those concepts. For the average viewer, Fabric will likely hold your attention for one, maybe two episodes of Fabric. For harder-core, scientifically-minded people, the whole series may hold enough appeal to keep you for four episodes. Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2011 Watching Rock Center with Brian Williams (Monday, 10pm), NBC's perfectly respectable new newsmagazine, you can't help but wonder if Williams isn't trying a bit too hard to be "the funny" news guy. Rock Center has all the familiar elements of a newsmagazine. Last night, its informative (if not earth-shattering) investigative segments included Harry Smith profiling an improbable boomtown in the northern-most reaches of North Dakota.

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Correspondent Kate Snow exposed a growing industry where pregnant Chinese women come to America to have their babies - ensuring those babies get American passports. Meantime, Brian Williams MCs the proceedings from his penthouse-like suite. That "in-my-living-room" feel gives Rock Center something of a daytime newsmagazine vibe. Meaning, it doens't take itself too seriously. Unto itself, that is not a bad thing - actually, it's probably a good thing. But Rock Center zoomed into troubled waters when Williams channeled his inner comedian to riff, uncomfortably (for viewers), with Comedy Central's genuinely funny Jon Stewart. Still, despite that fumble, Rock Center feels like a newsmagazine that'll be around for the long-haul - adapting and changing with the times and, presumably, as correspondents and hosts come and go. Tuesday, Nov. 1, 2011 Heroin and painkillers play a larger role than basketball in Unguarded, an ESPN documentary on Tuesday night (8pm), writes Mike Hale in the New York Times.

Chris Herren

“I come in here and tell you my nightmare,” the onetime star Chris Herren, long past his glory days, tells a gym full of high school students, and that’s the function of the film as well. Unlike the students, we don’t have to listen to him, but it’s a pretty good story; even if sports aren’t your thing, you might find it worth hanging around the gym for an hour and a half. Monday, Oct. 31, 2011 The city of Juarez, Mexico,which is profiled in the season premiere of Current TV's Vanguard (9pm), is just a few minutes from El Paso, Texas and, yet, it's another world. Dozens of people are murdered every day. Cops are corrupt. Politicians don't care and many are probably paid off by drug cartels. Kids grow up in one-room houses made from woods scraps. Storefronts and factories sit empty. Powerful drug kingpins live in mansions, drive around in cars that cost more than most Mexicans make in their lifetimes. And lenient gun laws in the United States make it easy for the drug cartels to terrorize the city's residents, police and politicians. Tonight on Vanguard, a documentary series where correspondents are embedded in the stories they tell, focuses on the Mexico's deadly drug cartels. But, rather than examine the many reasons that thousands of people are murdered in the city every year, correspondent Christof Putzel zeroes in on American gun laws. At gun shows, Christof reports, unlicensed gun owners can sell any type of weapon they want without conducting background checks on the people buying those guns. The result is that thousands of guns are easily bought on the American side of the border and carried into Mexico. While the point Christof focuses on - American gun laws - is illuminating, by zeroing in on only one issue, he makes it clear that there are countless other reasons that Juarez is the world's murder capital - lax Mexican law enforcement, exceedingly high unemployment in Juarez and surrounding areas, plus horrifically low education rates. Ultimately, Vanguard is a well-made documentary series that gets bogged down by its (and its network's) political agenda. Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 ...viewed from the direction of the current, mostly dismal new season, NBC's Grimm (* * 1/2 out of four; Friday, 9pm) looks — if not fresh — at least different enough to be worth a look, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today.

It's not as novel or as sumptuously produced as last week's romantic fantasy debut, ABC's Once Upon a Time, but for some viewers, the very predictability of its basic catch-the-weekly-monster procedural format is likely to add to its appeal. We tend to like series that look like series, and Grimm certainly does.

Friday, Oct. 28, 2011 Allen Gregory - Fox's new animated series from Jonah Hill (Sunday, 8:30pm) - is the best TV show, ever. It's also probably going to vanish after a few episodes, so catch it while you can. And, if Allen Gregory isn't the best TV show ever, there's another reason to watch it. It will go down in history for making the best use of Phil Collins' "In the Air Tonight" - twice. This remarkable show is about a seven-year-old kid, Allen Gregory (voiced by Hill), who, probably because he has a rich, gay dad, is beyond pretentious. When you are seven and have an Andy Warhol print of yourself hanging in your bedroom, and you drink wine at school, it's safe to say you're not one of the normal kids. But AG isn't merely a fish-out-of-water show. In the pilot, at least, Allen Gregory is a character study about a kid who is so out of touch with reality that his two dads (or, really, his dad and his dad's arm candy) throw a huge party to fool him into thinking he has been nominated for a Tony award. For reasons that don't really matter (money problems or something), Allen is told by his dad that he can no longer be home schooled. Instead, he is forced to attend public school with his adopted, rejected sister -- moody, glum. Let's just say he doesn't fit in. But his out-of-placeness is noticeable mostly to everyone else. He wears a suit, flirts with women ten times his age, he poops in his pants (accidentally) and he schedules lunch with his classmates on his smartphone. Allen Gregory is hysterical (although, it derails around two-thirds in then finds its way back). To think about the show's potential to become a fixture on Fox would be to miss the point entirely - if it survives, great. But to worry about it would mean missing out on the fun of Episode 1, and that would be a shame. Thursday, Oct. 27, 2011 [Good Vibes - MTV, 10:30pm] is about a nerdy, overweight kid from the East whose mom decides to relocate them both to the fictional West Coast beach community Playa del Toro (read: Venice Beach), writes David Wiegand in the San Francisco Chronicle. Mondo (Josh Gad) is really a whale out of water here, whining that even the boardwalk bums are buff. He soon finds a new best friend in Woodie (Adam Brody), and the two set out to impress girls, survive high school and drink without getting kicked off the beach. The writing is juvenile, hormonal and often pretty dang funny.

MTV Shows

Thursday, Oct. 27, 2011 For the most part, neither [Beavis and Butt-Head - MTV, 10pm] nor its two protagonists have changed much, writes Alan Sepinwall on HitFix. The boys are still wearing their AC/DC and Metallica t-shirts (and their friend Stuart still wears a Winger t-shirt, which seems even more out-of-date), they still spend lots of time snickering at and/or misunderstanding everything that's on TV, and they're still fundamentally clueless about pretty much everything. The most significant change between 1997 and 2011 is that MTV has given up any pretense of being a music video channel, and as a result, most of what the guys comment on are MTV reality shows like Jersey Shore and 16 & Pregnant.

MTV Shows

Wednesday, Oct. 26, 2011 Created and written by Ben Court and Caroline Ip, Whitechapel defies the odds against finding new material in the [Jack the] Ripper story through solid writing with careful attention to character nuance and realistic detail (notwithstanding a few moments when the writers fall back on a bit of convenient coincidence to maintain the link to the original killings) - David Wiegand in the San Francisco Chronicle. The series also benefits from taut direction by SJ Clarkson (David Evans directs the other three episodes this season) and great performances by the three leads as well as the supporting cast. Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2011 Watching G4's military-embedded series, Bomb Patrol: Afghanistan, you get the sense that you're watching a great show in the making. In its first episode, tonight on G4 at 10pm, it's not quite there. But, despite some creative missteps (notably, an over-reliance on narration), Bomb Patrol is a well-made and engaging show. (Click Read More below to see a clip). Bomb Patrol is shot as a reality show. Its camera angles will be familiar to anyone who has seen shows like MTV's The Hills. Its narration (actor Josh Duhamel) will be familiar to anyone who has seen History's Ice Road Truckers. In Bomb Patrol, more than a dozen cameras are embedded with two teams from the Navy's Explosive Ordinance Disposal (EOD) unit - on the ground in Afghanistan as they destroy live bombs scattered throughout the country. The embedded cameras make for an incredible experience. The war is no longer an abstract event you see on the news. Instead, it becomes a firsthand experience. The scenes of everyday life in Afghanistan are especially moving, just because it is so incredibly different from our own. The same is true of seeing American soldiers perform their everyday tasks - life in the military seems impossibly complex. You can't watch Bomb Patrol and not be amazed by the military. Where Bomb Patrol falls short in the premiere is that, despite the fact that cameras are embedded with eight soldiers - up close and personal, the story is removed from them. Viewers see these guys performing military operations. But, mostly because of too much narration, we don't get to know them, which, in reality TV, is vital to making us care about what happens. In its description of Bomb Patrol, G4, maybe sensing this flaw, promises that viewers will get to know these soldiers over the course of the 10-episode series. Maybe then, Bomb Patrol will become the fantastic show it appears to be on the verge of becoming.

Video Game - E3 2012

Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2011 Spike’s new series Flip Men (Spike TV, 10:30pm) is made for the post-boom era. It focuses on two regular Joes who run a seat-of-the-pants business buying foreclosed homes with little or no knowledge about their condition and then quickly renovating and selling them, writes Tom Conroy in Media Life Magazine. The show thankfully lacks some of the excesses of the workplace genre of reality TV, but it looks and feels so familiar that the recession angle isn’t enough to make it fresh.

Flip Men Opens The Door On Oct 25 Get More: Flip Men Opens The Door On Oct 25

Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2011 Prayer for a Perfect Season, which will debut at 9pm [on HBO], is about losses worse than anything St. Patrick players and coaches suffered on a basketball court - NorthJersey.com. The 90-minute film documents the death of former St. Patrick star Michael Kidd-Gilchrist's uncle, Darrin Kidd, during the University of Kentucky freshman's senior year. It also covers the departure of longtime St. Patrick coach Kevin Boyle, who left the program he built into a perennial national power after the St. Anthony loss for a lucrative coaching opportunity at Montverde (Fla.) Academy. St. Patrick didn't just lose a basketball coach. It lost someone whose program helped keep open the tiny parochial school in the impoverished Port section of Elizabeth.

Trailer

Tuesday, Oct. 25, 2011 Though the film considers evidence from both sides, The Real Rocky (ESPN, 8pm), Jeff Feuerzeig's sprightly account of the Wepner/Stallone grudge match, stands firmly in the corner of the palooka known as "The Bayonne Bleeder," writes Carrie Rickey in the Philadelphia Inquirer. (Wepner's propensity for geysering the red fluid from nose and mouth earned him the rep as "the man who swallowed more blood than Dracula.") Friday, Oct. 21, 2011 To the show's credit, it makes a complex premise reasonably understandable, David Hinckley in the New York Daily News writes about ABC's Once Upon a Time (Sunday, 8pm). The tougher challenge will be to keep the story compelling when it all must point, one way or another, to an ultimate showdown between good (the Snow White team) and evil (the Wicked Queen team). One of the charms of classic fairy tales, even the ones spun into full-length Disney movies, is that they set up and resolved things in a tidy and efficient fashion. Friday, Oct. 21, 2011

Fran Drescher and Rosie O'Donnell

Two weeks into OWN's new primetime lineup and one thing is crystal clear: The Rosie Show, with Rosie O'Donnell, is finding its groove. It's working out the kinks, as we hoped it would. And, yet, it's maintaining a not-too-polished vibe - just like Chicago, where it's produced. That realness makes it refreshingly different from TV's same-old, same-old talk shows. When The Rosie Show first came on, the format was bumpy - to say the least. The opening standup routine? Too long. The one-person interview? Awkward and too long. The game show segment? Too long and uncomfortable. The difference with show today is that Rosie, the person, has eased into her role as, well, herself. For the most part, she has ditched the Oprah-style let's-learn-an-important-lesson element that threatened to derail earlier episodes. Now, Rosie is Rosie - the fun, at-ease, genuinely curious host we remember from her old daytime talk show. Plus, Rosie shines when she's bantering with an old friend, like Fran Drescher (probably the best The Rosie Show guest so far). Now, most of her interviews with guests, like last night's Nancy Grace, are easy-breezy. None of that's to say The Rosie Show is perfect. It hasn't worked out every kink. Segments like the game show are still too long. And, worse, that segment has lost any sense of surprise because it's on every ding-dong day. But the kinks that have been worked out, coupled with the show's increasingly comfy-cozy style, make it good enough to check out at least a few times each week. Friday, Oct. 21, 2011 Hip hop documentaries are nothing new, but the Smithsonian Channel's got one coming up that's both beautifully shot and wide-ranging in scope, writes Maxine Shen in the New York Post. Hip Hop: The Furious Force of Rhyme - part of the channel's Inside the Music series - debuts [Friday], Oct. 21 at 8pm and aims to take you around the world to explore hip hop as "trans-national protest music." Friday, Oct. 21, 2011

Martin Mull

Martin Mull? Rhea Perlman and a kid who can see ghosts? Yeah, we're in. No doubt, Oliver's Ghost (Hallmark Channel - Saturday, 9pm) isn't going to be great. But who cares? It's Hallmark Channel - it's a sorta scary movie - and it's Saturday night! From Hallmark Channel: Eleven-year-old Oliver (Nicholas Stargel) has a unique ability to see "full-bodied apparitions," otherwise known as ghosts. When his family moves from the bustling city to an older home in the suburbs, only Oliver is able to see the spirit of Clive Rutledge (Martin Mull), the previous owner. Clive causes every manner of destruction to force Oliver and his family to leave. But perhaps Oliver's special talent, along with the help of a kind neighbor (Rhea Perlman), will show Clive how to release his earthly regrets so he can leave the house and the family in peace. Friday, Oct. 21, 2011

Kelsey Grammer

With Boss, the new Starz drama that debuts Friday night at 10, no one will be having the "Frasier is the mayor of Chicago!" reaction, writes Alan Sepinwall on HitFix. Same man, same familiar face and stentorian voice, but the performance and show are worlds removed from the role that made him rich, famous and a four-time Emmy winner. And in this case, that's a very good thing. Grammer plays Tom Kane, the doubly-buttressed man in charge of the Chicago political machine. He's been mayor forever, and his wife Meredith (Connie Nielsen) is daughter of one of his most celebrated predecessors. He controls the necessary votes on the city council. He gets to more or less handpick who will win the gubernatorial primary. He is a gifted orator (as you would expect any Kelsey Grammer character to be), a smooth deal maker and, when he needs to be, a terrifying bully. Thursday, Oct. 20, 2011 CBS's Rules of Engagement is one of those sitcoms you'll watch in repeats in a few years and think, "Hey, this isn't as terrible as I remember." The show, which kicks off a new season tonight at 8:30pm, is essentially The Big Bang Theory if The Big Bang Theory was less funny and about married couples, instead of pre-married nerds. It stars Patrick Warburton and Megyn Price (great, under appreciated) as a married couple who are a bit jaded on the whole idea of marital bliss. Then there's the younger, bright-eyed couple (Oliver Hudson and Bianca Kajlich) and the odd-ball couple/friends (David Spade - good, but on autopilot - and Adhir Kalyan). The premise is that the older couple can teach the younger couple a thing or two - but, aww, the opposite often happens. But, really, Rules is ultimately just a series of sorta-funny setups, and for that, it's good enough. Thursday, Oct. 20, 2011 Miss Representation, the Jennifer Siebel Newsom documentary premiering at 9pm tonight on OWN, is a good-intentioned mucky mess. It's kind of like a college thesis where a student comes up with a compelling (and probably accurate) conclusion - in this case, that the media's portrayal of women is harmful to girls. But then it just repeats that conclusion over and over, rather than presents evidence to support it. Miss Representation's biggest problem is an easy trap to fall into - blaming "society" and "the media" for portraying women as nothing but sexual objects. But, aren't women part of society and the media? Plus, the women who speak about how terrible the media and society are are the very women who have shattered the idea that women only succeed by being sexy - Hillary Clinton, Condoleezza Rice, Margaret Cho and plenty of others. Of course, in Miss Representation, men are to blame, mostly, for the sexed up depiction of women in the media. But men are kind of the ghost in the room. They're not often blamed outright. And, the obvious question to ask, "How are men depicted in the media, and is it good for boys?," just hangs in the air. In Miss Representation, young girls are angry and upset by how women are objectified in the media. But because Miss Representation only cites a theory, without any clear evidence that it's true, their tears trickle down their cheeks in vain.

Tuesday, Oct. 18, 2011 Should you decide to squander 30 minutes on what may be the worst of a bad bunch of fall sitcoms, divert yourself from the tedium by asking why our Man, Will,  [in Man Up! - ABC, 8:30pm] is so unhappy, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today. He has a beautiful wife, two healthy children, an expensive-looking house, a job and two devoted friends.

Yet instead of celebrating, Will spends the night boo-hooing because he can't find his son a birthday gift and because his wife reminds him he and his buddies didn't fight in Vietnam or World War II— as if the men who risked their lives in those conflicts thought of them as some jolly, male-bonding, sweat-lodge retreat.

Monday, Oct, 17, 2011 One measure of a great biography is that you start into it thinking you know the subject and by the end of it, you admit to yourself that you knew only the tip of the iceberg, writes David Zurawik in The Baltimore Sun. Sing Your Song, an HBO documentary film on the life and word of Harry Belafonte premiering at 10pm Monday is a great biography in just that way. Yes, he's the guy who sang "Banana Boat (Day-O) in the 1950s, and has a huge seller of an album (back when people still knew what record album and LP meant) in "Calypso." But he is also a Tony-Award-winning actor, an Emmy-Award-winning TV performer and producer and a blacklisted performer who was a target of the infamous House Un-American Activities Committee.

Trailer (Off-Channel)

Monday, Oct. 17, 2011 Investigation Discovery's Sin by Silence (tonight, 8pm) isn't a new or unfamiliar story - or an especially engaging documengtary about domestic violence. But, sometimes, the true power of television is simply to expose an uncomfortable truth. Sin by Silence focuses on women who were physically abused by their spouses and they, in turn, killed those spouses. These are prisoners in California Institution for Women who have fought for, and one, the rights of victim-killers to, at least, get their side of their story presented in court cases. The abuse these women suffered is horrific, and for some, still visible in their icy eyes years or decades after the violence has ended. The saddest story in Sin by Silence is a woman who'd rather spend her life in prison than put herself at risk for being assaulted again. Ultimately, Sin by Silence delivers a sincere, important message. But, like many domestic violence stories, that sincerity is also mixed up with frustration in wondering why someone would endure violence, and expose their kids to it, for their entire lives. Friday, Oct. 14, 2011 The off-season, off-camera drama that swirled around AMC's cult zombie hit The Walking Dead does not, at least in the first couple of episodes, appear to have compromised the quality of the show - David Hinckley in the New York Daily News. Frank Darabont, show runner for the six-episode first season, was replaced this summer amid considerable consternation in the zombie blogosphere that this could drain some of the show's lifeblood. Thursday, Oct. 13, 2011 [Five] officers, all Mexican-American, seem to approach the job like volunteer doctors in famine-stricken and war-torn countries. They can't solve the big problem. Perhaps they can save the child in front of them, writes David Hinckley in the New York Daily News. So Bordertown: Laredo (A&E, 10pm) gets us to focus not on some spectacular Hollywood-style bust, but on something relatively small, at least in the larger drug-smuggling picture. There's something appealing about life-sized good guys. Watch a preview of Bordertown: Laredo here. Thursday, Oct. 13, 2011 When The Rosie Show debuted on OWN (7pm) earlier this week, we said it was "terrible." That's true but harsh. And, in our defense, we noted that we felt confident that Rosie and her team would fix the show - which is, sorry, a clunker (and we're fans of Rosie O'Donnell). Still, we heard from readers who said they liked The Rosie Show. And the fine folks at OWN noted that not all the reviews of The Rosie Show, like ours, suggested that it was a bomb! While we were fast to note that our review for Oprah's Lifeclass (also on OWN) was much, much worse - we conceded that we should probably give voice to those critics who like (or, don't hate) The Rosie Show. So, here goes - and, we'll re-review the show next week. "...curiously flat and understated..." - Variety "It had a not-bad, pretty good, kinda funny, sort of smart debut." - Los Angeles Times "When Rosie’s on, she actually is hilarious. Welcome back." - New York Post

Bravo's Work of Art

Wednesday, Oct. 12, 2011 The question is whether 14 aspiring artists and a half-dozen hosts, judges and mentors can create enough drama to keep us entertained once a week, writes David Hinckley in the New York Daily News. This Work of Art (Bravo, 9/8c) season holds out some reasonable promise this can happen. The artists aren't a particularly loud, melodramatic or flamboyant crowd, and that's good, because once in a while even reality TV can benefit from understatement and focus on the task. Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2011 You know, with Jersey Shore luring in millions of viewers each week with icky sex, drunkenness and craziness, it's easy to forget that MTV has aired some of the best documentary series ever for young people - like Made. Its returning series, I Used to Be Fat (10pm), is in the Made mold - definitely not Jersey Shore.

Get More: I Used To Be Fat, MTV Shows, Full Episodes

On I Used to Be Fat, a recent high school grad spends the summer before college transforming their overweight body with the help of a trainer. It's not easy-sneezy. These kids work hard to lose weight by exercising, eating right and, most important, getting their family and friends to do the same, or at least support them. That usually doesn't come easy. I Used to Be Fat isn't as emotionally moving as Made - but it's a worthwhile, inspirational documentary series for young (and old) people. Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2011 Give credit to BET for making an effort. They've even brought in a bit of Cosby flavor, embodied by Malcolm-Jamal Warner, who played easygoing teen Theo Huxtable in the beloved classic, writes Chuck Barney in the Contra Costa Times. Here he's cast as Alex Reed, a college English professor blissfully married to Carla (Tracee Ellis Ross), a successful psychologist and mother of three. Together, they juggle their busy professional lives with their parental duties, while also making a valiant effort to keep the sexual fires burning. Cliff and Clair would approve. Abstaining from edgy and overly broad humor, Reed Between the Lines instead takes a gentle, gimmick-free approach as it explores the dynamics of this household. Based on first impressions, it's certainly not fall-down funny, but the cast is appealing and the premise promising. Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2011 [Last Man Standing - ABC, 8pm is a] predictable sitcom with a stupid premise and bad acting, writes Tim Goodman in The Hollywood Reporter. Credit Tim Allen for being able to keep it afloat (and maybe even make it a hit). Shudder. Tuesday, Oct. 11, 2011 You know, with Jersey Shore luring in millions of viewers each week with icky sex, drunkenness and craziness, it's easy to forget that MTV has aired some of the best documentary series for young people that have aired on TV - like Made. Its returning series, I Used to Be Fat (10pm), is in the Made mold - definitely not Jersey Shore.

Get More: I Used To Be Fat, MTV Shows, Full Episodes

On I Used to Be Fat, a recent high school grad spends the summer before college transforming their overweight body with the help of a trainer. It's not easy-sneezy. These kids work hard to lose weight by exercising, eating right and, most important, getting their family and friends to do the same, or at least support them. That usually doesn't come easy. I Used to Be Fat isn't as emotionally moving as Made - but it's a worthwhile, inspirational documentary series for young (and old) people. Monday, Oct. 10, 2011 Enlightenment isn't easy. It's hard to achieve, hard to maintain and hard to share, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today. And the sharing is particularly tough when no one believes you've become enlightened in the first place — the problem facing Laura Dern's Amy in HBO's latest not-quite-comedy, not-quite-drama, not-quite-entertaining offering.

Still, as not-quite-there as it may sometimes be, Enlightened (HBO, 9:30pm) is interesting enough to avoid the increasingly common HBO curse of egregious self-indulgence.

Season 1 Trailer - Agent of Change

Monday, Oct. 10, 2011 Take some celebrity directors, the Lifetime network and Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and what do you get? A teary, perfectly tolerable collection of interlocking stories featuring lots of recognizable actors and two particularly well-etched segments, writes Neil Genzlinger in the New York Times. The film, called Five (Lifetime, 9/8c) is being broadcast on Monday night and features vignettes directed by Jennifer Aniston, Alicia Keys, Demi Moore, Patty Jenkins and Penelope Spheeris Ms. Jenkins (“Monster”) and Ms. Spheeris (“Wayne’s World”) actually are directors, but, surprisingly, the pieces directed by Ms. Keys and Ms. Aniston are the strongest and most subtle.

Todd Wilbur

Friday, Oct. 7, 2011 On Friday night on CMT, [Todd Wilbur] begins doing so on a weekly series, Top Secret Recipe - Friday, 9/8c, writes Neil Genzlinger in the New York Times. The decidedly not a highbrow cooking show, as you can tell from the fact that Mr. Wilbur spends part of the premiere in a Dumpster. The gimmick, delivered with a refreshing silliness, is that each week Mr. Wilbur takes some famous but well-guarded marquee recipe and tries to duplicate it, through a combination of stealth, science and educated guesswork. In the opening episode the target is original Kentucky Fried Chicken — you know, the 11 herbs and spices thing. (Cinnabon gets its turn in Episode 2.) by Shari Anne Brill Friday, Oct. 7, 2011 The two-part Martin Scorsese documentary on the life of George Harrison, George Harrison: Living in the Material World (rebroadcasting on HBO, 2:30pm Saturday and Sunday) will be instantly recognized by anyone who grew up with the Beatles music as a true labor of love. If you are a fellow Beatles-phile like me, you will find yourself alternating between waxing nostalgic, singing along to the soundtrack and shifting between profound feelings of joy and sadness. You may even cry. I did.

The story of George's early years, his early days with the Beatles and subsequent spiritual journey throughout his adulthood is told from George's perspective -- from a trove of archival footage -- but it's interspersed with recollections from family, surviving bandmates, Paul and Ringo, photographer Astrid Kirschnerr, Patty Boyd, musicians Klause Voorman and Eric Clapton and producer, George Martin.

While listening to the collective anecdotes about their relationships with George, a common thread emerges: George expressed two very distinct personalities: one of grace and humor; the other, anger, bitterness about certain aspects of life, especially taxes, materialism and greedy leaders.

For someone who was known as the "Quiet Beatle", George Harrison had many profound things to say about the state of the world and the importance of connecting to one's spirituality.

Ironically, for someone who grew up in poverty, The Beatles' worldwide fame, success and and the riches ultimately left him cold and empty. He became profoundly dissatisfied with the direction of his life and felt it needed more meaning.

We learn about the sequence of different events that unfolded that led to his path to enlightenment through his experiences with musician Ravi Shankar, Maharishi Yogi and meditation practice.

George warned us to "Beware of Darkness," but he also believed that "peace of mind is waiting there, and the time will come when we see we are one." In these turbulent times, we need to live by those words more than ever.

Thursday, Oct. 6, 2011 Dream and reality meet on Thursday night on History in History of the World in Two Hours (History, 9pm), a spunky recap of what’s been going on since the Big Bang that really does, by the end, feel like everything you need to know about history, writes Neil Genzlinger in the New York Times. No analysis of troop movements in century-old battles here. No who cut off which wife’s head in what European monarchy. Just the very-big-picture stuff: creation of complex elements; continental drift; fire; human migration; industrialization. And — here’s the important part — how they all fit together.

Thursday, Oct. 6, 2011 The beauty of [The League - FX, 10:30pm] from husband/wife team Jeff Schaffer and Jackie Marcus Schaffer is its surprises. You just never know what to expect, except to laugh out loud at all the inappropriate humor, writes Curt Wagner in the Chicago Tribune. The season opens with reigning league champion Ruxin (Nick Kroll) choosing to hold the new season’s draft at Andre’s (Paul Scheer) apartment, but with a twist that involves the gang meeting Rafi’s (Jason Mantzoukas) porn-making pal Dirty Randy (guest star Seth Rogen). Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2011 Las Vegas comedian-magicians Penn & Teller have made a career out of exposing the secrets behind magic tricks and revealing sometimes uncomfortable truths that most of us don't want to hear, notably in their brilliant Showtime show, Penn & Teller: Bulls***! Their brand of comedy hinges in large part on the talking half of the duo, Penn, screaming, shouting, cursing and being always on the verge of busting a blood vessel. The non-talking Teller is usually enduring some type of epically painful experience, like sticking his hand into a candle's flame. So, it is comforting (if not particularly funny) that in Penn & Teller Tell a Lie, premiering tonight on Discovery Channel (10pm), they acknowledge a few times that, yes, they are on a basic cable TV channel, so, no, they won't be screaming, cursing or busting any blood vessels. The point? Penn & Teller Tell a Lie is a diluted version of the duo's comedy. And, while at times that makes the show a tiny bit uncomfortable to watch, it doesn't kill the funny. In fact, as the show progresses, the guys loosen up (a bit) -- enough, anyway, for Penn to launch into a cursing rage and Teller to say, "bleep." In the show, Penn & Teller introduce several stories that sound true, possibly - like, an animal trainer fending off a tiger attack by triggering its gag reflex. They ask viewers to vote online for which story is untrue, which they reveal at the end by slamming sledgehammers into glass. Penn & Teller Tell a Lie isn't Penn & Teller: Bulls***!, meaning it's not great. But it is good and, as Penn & Teller get into their groove, it's likely to get better and funnier. Hope so.

Dylon McDermott

Wednesday, Oct. 5, 2011 The loopiness of the script, combined with unsettlingly jerky camera work, especially in Wednesday's premiere episode (the camera calms down a bit in Episodes 2 and 3), make the actual horror aspects of [American Horror Story - FX, 10pm) passably effective, writes David Wiegand in the Houston Chronicle. But what's lacking in the premiere episode is the kind of "don't open that door!" and "someone's behind you!" suspense that Hitchcock, most notably, built into his best films. Tuesday, Oct. 4, 2011 In the absence of a whole lot of actual dramatic tension, executive producers Matt Westmore (Beauty and the Geek, The Biggest Loser) and Noah Scheinmann (Hired) rightly bet Chris March’s fertile imagination and snide sense of humor will keep viewers entertained [on Bravo's Mad Fashion 10pm], writes David Knowles in The Hollywood Reporter. When one of March’s assistants complains about developing a blister on his finger while cutting strips of tough fabric, March quips, “Do you know how many homeless gay people would be happy to cut up glitter canvass?” And in a hilarious aside squeezed in during a commercial break, March pulls out a blue Sharpie for a solemn moment. “I’ve been fascinated with Stevie Nicks for a long, long time,” he explains with his staff assembled behind him.

Stephen King

Monday, Oct. 3, 2011 Stephen King may be the most famous author of scary novels, and those books have certainly spawned great (and not-so-great) scary movies, like "Carrie" and "The Shining." But, who knew that Stephen King is something of an expert on the horror movie genre? In fact, as a boy, watching horror movies in dark theaters informed much of his work, and his life. Turns out, in Turner Classic Movies' A Night at the Movies: The Horrors of Stephen King (Monday, 8pm Eestern), he's also a likeable, interesting person to spend an hour listening to. (Click Read More below to watch a preview.) King kicks off TCM's month of Classic Horror, on five Mondays that culminates on Halloween. He discusses the origins of the scary movie genre, which stretches back to the 1920s ("Nosferatu") and examines the subgenres that continue to scare (and disgust moviegoers), and even movies made from his stories. It's a fascinating hour. It's timely, with Halloween coming. And TCM's Monday scary movie blocks are chock full of classics, though they lean toward old-old movies with some of the genre's best ("The Exorcist") noticeably missing. TCM Classic Horror lineup for Monday, Oct. 3 8pm - TCM Night at the Movies: The Horrors of Stephen King 9pm - "Frankenstein" - 1931 10:15pm - "Freaks" - 1932 11:30pm - TCM Night at the Movies: The Horrors of Stephen King 12:30am - "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" - 1932 2:15am - "Mark of the Vampire" - 1935 3:30am - "The Cabinets of Dr. Caligari" - 1919 4:45am - "Nosferatu" - 1922 6:15am - "Phantom of the Opera" - 1925 Friday, Sept. 30, 2011 Showtime's Homeland, which premieres Sunday (10pm), is not just the best new drama of the season (and would be, no doubt, even if the bar had been set higher than it has been this year), it's the first telling of a post-9/11 story that is all the things it should be: politically resonant, emotionally wrenching and plain old thrilling to watch - Mary McNamara in the Los Angeles Times. Thursday, Sept. 29, 2011 In a spooky case of life imitating art, Kevin Dillon shows up as the bully who used to pummel Andrew in high school (though they are clearly a decade apart in age) and is now Andrew’s surest path to American male zeitgeist [in CBS's How To Be a Gentleman - premiering tonight at 8:30/7:30c) - Hank Stuever in the Washington Post. It’s as if we’re watching an Entourage episode where Dillon’s Johnny Drama gets cast in a stinker sitcom; you keep waiting for a meta-reveal that never comes. Instead, you get this year’s “$#!* My Dad Says.” Grade: F Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011 I'll say this much about Suburgatory (premiering tonight on ABC at 8:30pm - click Read More below to watch a preview). It's well made. The single-camera comedy is beautiful to look at -- every scene is bright, sunny and easy on the eyes.

Jane Levy and Jeremy Sisto

That doesn't mean it's any good. Suburgatory's two main offenses - the offenses that'll do it in in a few weeks -- is that its writers don't have the confidence in themselves to let the story unfold naturally and, worse, they use shorthand in the form of an overload of cliches to explain why the suburbs are to be hated (didn't hating the suburbs fade away in the 1980s?). In Suburgatory, 16-year-old Tessa (Jane Levy) is a "Juno-" like teen who's awkward and out of place, but - naturally - has a heart of gold and knows more about life than anyone around her, including the adults. Her dad, George (Jeremy Sisto) moves her from a studio-lot version of Manhattan, when he discovers condoms in her bedroom, to a Pasadena-version of the suburbs in Connecticut (or thereabouts). The people who live in the suburbs in Suburgatory are superficial, overly tanned, short-short wearing, egotistical, mean, hateful people (with hearts of gold), led by Curb Your Enthusiasm's Cheryl Hines. Ugh. While Suburgatory is well made and nice to look, and induces a chuckle or two, it's an endurance test as much as it's a comedy. Wednesday, Sept. 28, 2011 I'll say this much about Suburgatory (premiering tonight on ABC at 8:30pm - click Read More below to watch a preview). It's well made. The single-camera comedy is beautiful to look at -- every scene is bright, sunny and easy on the eyes.

Jane Levy and Jeremy Sisto

That doesn't mean it's any good. Suburgatory's two main offenses - the offenses that'll do it in in a few weeks -- is that its writers don't have the confidence in themselves to let the story unfold naturally and, worse, they use shorthand in the form of an overload of cliches to explain why the suburbs are to be hated (didn't hating the suburbs fade away in the 1980s?). In Suburgatory, 16-year-old Tessa (Jane Levy) is a "Juno-" like teen who's awkward and out of place, but - naturally - has a heart of gold and knows more about life than anyone around her, including the adults. Her dad, George (Jeremy Sisto) moves her from a studio-lot version of Manhattan, when he discovers condoms in her bedroom, to a Pasadena-version of the suburbs in Connecticut (or thereabouts). The people who live in the suburbs in Suburgatory are superficial, overly tanned, short-short wearing, egotistical, mean, hateful people (with hearts of gold), led by Curb Your Enthusiasm's Cheryl Hines. Ugh. While Suburgatory is well made and nice to look, and induces a chuckle or two, it's an endurance test as much as it's a comedy. Monday, Sept. 26, 2011 Hart of Dixie’s writers clearly have never been to a hospital, writes Lori Rackl in the Chicago Sun-Times. A heartbroken Zoe (Rachel Bilson, The O.C.) leaves Manhattan to accept an elderly physician’s offer to take over his medical practice so she can work on that rusty bedside manner in the backwater town of Bluebell, Ala.

What follows is a silly, youth-oriented CW drama packaged as a fish-out-of-water yarn.

Jason O'Mara

Monday, Sept. 26, 2011 Take away the time traveling, the dinosaurs and the jaw-dropping computer-generated special effects, and Fox's mega-budget Terra Nova might remind you of those good-hearted family dramas that used to air on the WB, writes Mark Dawidziak in the Cleveland Plain Dealer. Think 7th Heaven and Everwood. Keep that thought, because behind all the considerable fantasy sizzle and science-fiction dazzle, what we have here are loving parents, troubled-but-deep-down-decent teens, and family bonds stronger than the forces threatening to tear them apart. Friday, Sept. 23, 2011 Pan Am takes place in New York, Paris and London, and practically every scene is shot in lush, golden light, writes Alessandra Stanley in the New York Times. The series is a paean to a more prosperous and confident era; even an airline terminal looks like a movie dream sequence about 1960s heaven. Friday, Sept. 23, 2011 In the wrong hands, this premise could turn laughable and mawkish, writes Rob Owen in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. But series writer/creator Susannah Grant and director Jonathan Demme ("The Silence of the Lambs") manage to ground the show in a way that makes it both believable and heartfelt. A Gifted Man is the most romantic, emotionally resonant fall TV series pilot.

Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011 Now Flower Films has teamed up with “Smallville” creators Alfred Goughz and Miles Millarz to launch the latest incarnation of Charlie's Angels on the 35th anniversary of its original debut, so says Matt Movieman in ChicagoHollywood.com. Too bad the ladies’ clipped wings already appear primed for cancellation. Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011 Developed by Alexandra Cunningham and Lynda La Plante, [Prime Suspect - NBC, 10pm] doesn’t reach the heights of the British original, which doubled as a dark character study and an anatomy of criminal intent, writes Matthew Gilbert in the Boston Globe. To do that, the Prime Suspect remake would probably need to be on cable. But it is a solid weekly procedural, with a bevy of strong performers in addition to [Maria] http://www.boston.com/ae/tv/articles/2011/09/22/mathew_gilbert_says_maria_bello_is_the_prime_reason_that_suspect_remake_works/Bello.

Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011 Whitney Cummings already has scored with viewers this fall as co-creator of one of the year's most promising sitcoms, CBS' 2 Broke Girls, which had a blockbuster (albeit Two and a Half Men return-inflated) opening on Monday, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today.

What a shame she felt the need to lessen our affection with Whitney.

Thursday, Sept. 22, 2011 Person of Interest, the new thriller from Jonathan Nolan and J.J. Abrams that premieres Thursday on CBS, proves, once again, that a great idea for a television show is not at all the same thing as a great television show, writes Mary McNamara in the Los Angeles Times. The central conceit of Person of Interest, which smartly mines post-9/11 anxieties, is that crimes can now be detected before they are committed, as in 2002's "Minority Report," only without the damp and distressing pre-cogs. In their place is a computer program, designed by the mysterious Mr. Finch (Michael Emerson), a billionaire genius.

Revenge

Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2011 Intriguing and genuinely fun – though you worry about its long-term appeal – is ABC’s Revenge, starring Emily VanCamp (Everwood, Brothers & Sisters) as a young girl who returns to the Hamptons to exact – you guessed it – revenge on all the people who wronged her father when she was growing up there -- Tim Goodman from The Hollywood Reporter. Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011 Comedy Central's Workaholics is one of those shows that you stumble upon, in a happy accident, on your way to, well, something else.

Workaholics

To appreciate Workaholics, it helps to have been a 20-ish-old guy at some point. But it's not a deal-breaker if you weren't. It also helps if, at some point, you lived in L.A. and realized that getting motivated to go to work when it's sunny and 78 degrees is sometimes a futile effort. Sitting on your roof drinking beer with friends can very easily sound like a better idea. In Workaholics, Blake Anderson, Anders Holm and Adam Devine are three friends who work together--as telemarketers--and live together. At work, they do remarkably little, except annoy their boss. And, like in tonight's second season premiere (Comedy Central, 10:30pm), they leave work in pursuit of some high school kids who stole their dragon. What follows is a serious power play, where the guys end up paying the guy who pooped in their pool $5 bucks to go a party in their own house. The show, at times strained by thin storylines, is witty, funny and a whole lot of fun. Click Read More to watch a preview.

Workaholics

Raising Hope

Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011 If you didn't watch Fox's Raising Hope last season -- and you really should have as it was one of the few bright spots in the otherwise disappointing 2010-11 TV season -- by all means get on board when the show returns for its second season at 9:30 p.m. Tuesday, writes Rob Owen in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Not only does the season premiere offer a recap that restates the show's premise, it also serves as an homage to a sitcom titan.

Zooey Deschanel

Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011 From its infancy, TV has had funny ladies to help power its sitcoms, from Lucille Ball through such diverse talents as Mary Tyler Moore, Bea Arthur and Roseanne, all the way up to Patricia Heaton, Tina Fey and Julie Bowen, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today. If tonight's New Girl debut is a fair indication, that list may add a name: Zooey Deschanel. Tuesday, Sept. 20, 2011 [Unforgettable], which has its premiere on Tuesday on CBS, is called “Unforgettable,” and because the structure and plot points are so familiar, whether it succeeds will depend largely on the appeal of its star, Poppy Montgomery, writes Neil Genzlinger in the New York Times. And she’s reasonably appealing, at least in the pilot. Monday, Sept. 19, 2011 If CBS isn't breaking the mold with 2 Broke Girls, which gets a special preview Monday night at 9:30 before slipping back into its regular 8:30 slot next week — well, who really thought it would, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today. This isn't a show designed, or a network inclined, to push envelopes. It's built to fit into an already solid lineup, and with some qualifications, that's pretty much what it does. Monday, Sept. 19, 2011 There is, no doubt, a tantalizing drama to be made about the early years of the Playboy Club, about the women who worked there and the men who patronized it, about Playboy's influence on the sexual revolution and the often very fine line between sexual liberation and sexual exploitation, writes Mary McNamara in the Los Angeles Times. But NBC's The Playboy Club ain't it. Monday, Sept. 19, 2011 A new documentary about the serpentine history of the [Don't Ask, Don't Tell] policy, airing at 12 midnight Monday and [8pm] on Tuesday on HBO, is valuable, writes David Wiegand in the San Francisco Chronicle.

The Strange History of Don't Ask, Don't Tell details not only how the policy was implemented but also how much harm it caused individual lives and careers, and perhaps the military itself. Although filmmakers Fenton Bailey and Randy Barbato (The Eyes of Tammy Faye, Wishful Drinking) present both sides of the debate over gays in the military, theirs is not an unbiased film - those who think gays have no business serving openly will probably remained unconvinced by Strange History.

Danny DeVito

Thursday, Sept. 15, 2011 There's a moment in tonight's 7th season premiere of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia when Frank (Danny DeVito) says, about his girlfriend, "Tomorrow night, I'm proposing to that dirty whore." The contrasting background music goes something like this, ding ding ding ding dingy...happy music. That kind of contrast is the bread of butter of It's Always Sunny, a show about blue-collar friends in a Philadelphia bar. The show gets a lot of press coverage for its liberal use of words like, well stuff I won't print here. Sunny does sometimes try too hard to contrast the nutty with the cute. Still, Sunny pulls the nutty back enough that the characters' conversations and their unlikely situations (Frank and his girl going at it as the gang listens) zip by in a fun swirl that makes you think, "What did I just watch?" It's funny and Danny DeVito is rocking Emmy territory here. Thursday, Sept. 15, 2011 It may seem ridiculous to complain that The Secret Circle, Kevin Williamson's new teen-witch show on the CW, isn't very believable, especially considering that Williamson is also the creator of the network's enduringly addictive The Vampire Diaries, writes David Wiegand in the San Francisco Chronicle. But there are moments in The Secret Circle, premiering at 9 tonight, when you're likely to fall into mini fits of giggling at the show's implausibility. Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2011

Christina Applegate and Will Arnett

NBC’s new Wednesday night comedy, Up All Night (NBC, 10pm), demonstrates how the Diaper Genie springs eternal. Neither smashingly hilarious nor overly redundant, it is instead tolerable and occasionally LOL (as the mommy blogs would say), writes Hank Stuever in the Washington Post. Up All Night comes from Saturday Night Live producer Lorne Michaels and was created by Emily Spivey, an SNL writer who also worked on Parks and Recreation, but what the show really has going for it is Will Arnett and Christina Applegate as its stars. Click Read More to watch a clip. Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2011 Talented people will gather, hard work will be done (and even the worst shows almost always involve hard work), expectations will rise — and when the show finally arrives, it will all come crashing down in an unwatchable heap, writes Robert Bianco in USA Today. Leaving you with Free Agents, one of those dispiriting series where you'd rather think about what the actors and writers have done and forget what they're doing now.

Sarah Michelle Gellar

Tuesday, Sept. 13, 2011 Fans of Buffy the Vampire Slayer are advised to temper their expectations when approaching the new CW series Ringer, which stars Buffy alum Sarah Michelle Gellar, writes Rob Owen in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Where Buffy was smart and sophisticated, Ringer (The CW, 9pm) is lame and hokey. Click Read More to watch a preview. Friday, Sept. 9, 2011 There are many more laughs here (Mel Brooks and Dick Cavett Together Again - HBO, Friday at 9pm). One of the deepest roars arises out of the audience after Mr. Brooks has been telling a story and Mr. Cavett interjects, "I hate to bring the subject back to me...," writes Nancy Dewolf Smith in the Wall Street Journal. And so it goes. The younger you are, the less likely all this is to fully resonate. But watch anyway. So much of show business as it once was is now dead and gone, replaced by something very different and not so good. Messrs. Brooks and Cavett are offering us a slender link to that past. We undoubtedly will be grateful one day that we grabbed it.

Trailer

Friday, Sept. 9, 2011 As a one-time Beatle, Paul McCartney has always been cool. But he exudes a different kind of cool in The Love We Make (Showtime, Saturday at 9pm), a documentary focusing on McCartney's role in organizing the post-Sept. 11 Concert for New York, writes David Hinckley in the New York Daily News. The occasion hardly lends itself to a "Hard Day's Night" zaniness, and there's no hint of frivolity in this film, recently assembled from footage shot a decade ago by Albert Maysles.

Denis Leary

Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2011 Rescue Me finishes its run, by design, just as we mark the anniversary of the real-life tragedy that inspired it, writes David Hinckley in the New York Daily News. Maybe at the end, it will get the respect it has always deserved and rarely received. Even if you weren't a regular fan of the show, you might want to consider tuning in Wednesday night, because finales don't get much better than this. Wednesday, Sept. 7, 2011 Have you been wondering where Adam Carolla has been? You do remember him, right? He's the guy who, for a while, replaced radio shockjock Howard Stern. He also once hosted the radio show Loveline, with Dr. Drew.

Adam Carolla

And since earlier this summer, Adam Carolla has been hosting The Car Show on Speed Channel. It's essentially a knockoff of BBC America's Top Gear. But, who cares? It's really good. Adam Carolla is a likeable guy who's incredibly entertaining, and easy to listen to (despite his gravely, loud voice). On the show, Carolla and co-hosts John Salley, Dan Neil and Matt Farah talk about cars, drive cars and hang out with people who love cars. I don't like cars, particularly. But The Car Show is an addictive piece of TV. Click Read More to see a clip.

Charlie Hunnam

Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2011 There is a moment a few minutes before the conclusion of tonight's 4th season premiere of Sons of Anarchy (FX, 10pm) when Charlie Hunnam (as Jackson "Jax" Teller) quietly reveals his plans to his girlfriend--the mother of his newborn child. It's a reminder of how great Sons of Anarchy can be, and why many viewers return to the often-inconsistent show. When he speaks in that scene, Jax reveals a pile of emotions that mounted in the previous 14 months, when he and most of the Sons of Anarchy motorcycle gang were in prison. Charlie Hunnam's quiet display, unfortunately, underscores some of the over-acting (not, bad acting--over-acting) that can instantly remind you that you're watching a TV show. In Sons, the motorcycle club rules the small town of Charming, California--tall pine trees, quiet roads. In tonight's premiere, the club finds out that a few things have changed while they were locked up. For one, cops on their payroll are no longer the town's legal law enforcement agency. And,worse, developers have moved into town. Tensions run high and one of these situations will continue to be a major factor in Sons this season.

Friday, Sept. 2, 2011 Discovery channel’s Dinosaur Revolution, a four-hour event airing over two weekends beginning Sept. 4, combines state-of-the-art science, terrific CGI and imaginative storytelling that might even make viewers forget Discovery’s previously awesome effort in this field, Walking With Dinosaurs, writes Aaron Barnhart in the Kansas City Star. Tuesday, Aug. 30, 2011 Plainly shot and largely drama-free, Quirky (Sundance Channel, 10pm) is little more than an infomercial for the company, write Jon Caramanica in the New York Times. This means scenes of industrious young people in semi-fashionable clothing taking to sketchpads, which are less exciting than the scenes in which an inventor tells those same people that their sketches aren’t good enough.        Monday, Aug. 29, 2011 MTV’s new comedy Death Valley is purportedly a mockumentary, but it forgoes the fake interviews and is shot like a standard single-camera comedy, with only occasional bits of documentary-style footage, writes Tom Conroy in Media Life Magazine. But it uses the presence of a documentary crew to satirize the way we all try to shape our public personas. The show also benefits from smart, funny scripts and a cast that’s far more talented than MTV’s usual collections of beginners.

Get More: Death Valley, MTV Shows

Thursday, Aug. 25, 2011 Filmmakers and documentarians have made a conscious effort to accentuate the positive in their 10th anniversary reflections on Sept. 11, and none pushes harder toward that goal than this Steven Spielberg production, writes David Hinckely in the New York Daily News. Rebuilding Ground Zero, a six-hour series that's beautifully filmed and scored, delivers exactly what it promises: an extensive though still compressed account of how the World Trade Center site was first cleared and then reconstructed.

Roseanne Barr

Wednesday, Aug. 24, 2011 There's something about Roseanne Barr that makes her fascinating to watch. You know the old expression, kind of like slowing down to watch a car wreck. Roseanne, and her Lifetime reality show, Roseanne's Nuts (tonight at 9pm and 9:30pm), isn't a car wreck. But, I guess its her past craziness, when watching her, there's always a sense that something is going to go terribly wrong Roseanne's Nuts isn't a great reality show. And I suspect it's not long for the world, since Roseanne is actively developing a sitcom. But it's a reality show that, because of Roseanne herself (and, to some degree, her family), is utterly captivating. In the show, Roseanne is living on her nut farm on The Big Island in Hawaii. She's got a simple life, with a simple mission (make food to eat). There are loads of only-on-reality TV moments, which drags down the show from time to time. Yet, provided you don't expect too much, in terms of laughs, Roseanne's Nuts is a good, sorta addictive reality show that I hope sticks around.

Jimmy Ruocco

Thursday, Aug. 18, 2011 Science's new reality show JUNKies illustrates once again the thin line between a genuinely intellectual exercise in creativity and Jackass, writes the brilliant David Hinckley in the New York Daily News. JUNKies is filmed at the Freeport, L.I., junkyard of Jimmy (the Junk Genius) Ruocco, who oversees a full acre of discarded stuff. Mostly, it seems to be used parts and metal this-and-that, with an occasional pile of something recognizable, like authentic fire hydrants. There's a joke in there somewhere about junkyard dogs.

Dominic West, Ben Whishaw, Romola Garia

Wednesday, Aug. 17, 2011 The Hour, a BBC America series starting on Wednesday, is among the best of the genre, writes Alessandra Stanley in the New York Times. It’s a six-part thriller that blends the Suez crisis, one of Britain’s sharpest intimations of loss, with a more intimate look at sex, ambition and espionage in the workplace.

Miles Quon

Tuesday, Aug. 16, 2011 Family Restaurant is the General Tso’s chicken of reality shows: deep fried and suspiciously sweet, concocted in North America to satisfy Western tastes, writes Mike Hale in the New York Times. Which means it can be pretty satisfying, in half-hour portions, though the MSG (multi-stereotype glutamate) may leave you with a headache.       

WE TV, where the series makes its debut with two episodes on Tuesday night, is hoping that it has a dish that also reheats well: the show first appeared on Food Network Canada in 2009.

Monday, Aug. 15, 2011 Millionaire Matchmaker is one of those shows that requires the viewer to be in precisely the right mood. The 5th season premiere of Matchmaker is on Bravo tonight at 9pm. That mood means being ready to hear a screechy voice screeching, and a bunch of people (matchmakers), who are just OK looking (though extensive amounts of plastic surgery have been implemented), being demeaning and belittling to potential match-ees who are a whole lot better looking, a whole lot richer and a whole lot less, um, it rhymes with witchy. Provided that much-needed frame of mind is in place--and I find it's in place much more often than I care to admit--this is a reality show that works. Its star, Patti Stanger, is loud, rude and too much--too much in the way women in L.A., for whatever reason, always think their geographic location, unto itself, positions them significantly higher up on the societal ladder than virtually every other woman on the planet. Still, Patti is reality TV gold. She's too much, and she knows it. Her matchmaking staffers are annoying, but dispensible, as reality TV b-players should be. And, most important, the millionaires in search of love and the women (and men) who want their money, er, love are almost always intriguing, or at least fun to watch. Millionaire Matchmaker isn't great. But, if you're in the right mood, a daylong marathon can be a little bit of reality TV nirvana.

Charles Osgood

Friday, Aug. 12, 2011 CBS Sunday Morning CBS' Sunday Morning won't do any of that, which is fine. In fact, it's better than fine, writes Richard Huff in the NY Daily News. Sunday Morning is the most engaging, refreshing, enlightening and rewarding news-division program on any network. Don't believe it? Watch it. 60 Minutes is great, no doubt. Dateline, 20/20 and Primetime are good, too. And 48 Hours is always watchable. None of them is as mentally stimulating on a consistent basis as Sunday Morning. Friday, Aug. 12, 2011 Strike Back is more methadone than madness; where 24 was the archetypal tale of the lone gunslinger operating within the grim realities of newly revamped military protocol (i.e., torture), Strike Back is, at its heart, a buddy movie, writes Mary McNamara in the Los Angeles Times. It's a simmering life-or-death bromance between its two male leads: the upright and gorgeously clenched Sgt. Michael Stonebridge (Philip Winchester), who is British, and the morally cavalier Damien Scott (Sullivan Stapleton), who is American. Friday, Aug. 12, 2011 Karaoke Battle USA Imagine taking current hits -- Idol, Talent, Voice -- and stripping them to the basics. That's what you have in this cheapie, six-episode series (Reno Gazette-Journal). Visiting various House of Blues spots, it watches people sing to karaoke tracks, in front of cheery crowds. Check out host Joey Fatone talking about the show. Thursaday, Aug. 11, 2011 Near the end of the first episode of Lifetime's new series Russian Dolls, Marina, one of the show's stars, is fed up with being at a long grandmother pageant, writes the NY Daily News' Richard Huff. "It's like a never-ending torture," she says. That's the feeling one gets watching "Russian Dolls," too. The show, launching Thursday night at 10:30 is pure torture. Worse yet, it's not even so bad it can be good in a kitschy way. Watch a preview of Russian Dolls here, if you must. A few years back, when we were still wondering when reality TV would come to its logical end, it appeared that each new premise was a premise stretched too thin. Case in point: History Channel's Top Shot--a reality competition where two teams of marksmen compete with all sorts of firearms, notably guns, rifles and, often, bow and arrow. While the premise is thin, and it is, the show itself is addictive, fun and, the contestants' skill, impressive. The skill on display never fails to impress. And while Top Shot tries too hard to create tension between the contestants, the show delivers on its seemingly too-thin premise. And then some. The third season of Top Shot premieres tonight at 10/9c on History. Oh, boy, I wanted to hate Ice Loves Coco. It literally has everything that makes reality TV too often too trite, too predictable and too, well, phony. There's the celebrity who no one really cares about. In this case, Ice-T. And, woo boy, there's Coco. A blond bombshell. Her hair is some interplanetary color that should not appear on Earth. Her voice is amped up to a high pitch that I'd guess could cut glass. Yet, I surrender, I love Ice Loves Coco. Coco, as it turns out, is an emotional, loving, kind person whose vampy appearance is perhaps cover for something in her past. Who knows? But, Coco just wants what most of us want--kids, a family and love. Meantime, Ice-T pretty much sits around, not doing much but loving Coco, as he clearly does. (Plus, his obvious over-supply of cash points to his Law & Order gig and his music career). E! is airing the Ice Loves Coco finale on Saturday at 10:30pm. It's worth checking out. And, you never know, you may just find that you love Coco, too. Sunday Best Friday, Aug. 5, 2011 Yes, it's like American Idol but with gospel singers. And that's a good thing. Hosted by gospel singer Kirk Franklin, Sunday Best shines when it focuses on the most talented amateur gospel singers. Sunday Best airs on BET on Sundays at 8pm. Check out this click from last week's episode. Like The Running Man but with lower stakes and (sadly) fewer murderous one-liners, this new reality competition has a duo of contestants playing the part of fugitives. The team — tonight, a pair of brothers — has an hour to hide a suitcase of money before being taken into custody and placed in real jails (away from the gen-pop, of course), and investigators are given two days to track down the dough. The literary leviathan known as Moby-Dick swims once again into the dangerous waters of dramatic adaptation Monday night (Encore 8pm; Pt 2 on Tuesday at 8pm).

Ethan Hawke and William Hurt

The last sighting, some 13 years ago, found Patrick Stewart donning the peg leg to play crazy Capt. Ahab for the USA Network; this time William Hurt steers the Pequod in search of the white whale, under the flag of the premium movie-rerun channel Encore, which is edging into original programming. Looking for a good new cop show on Lifetime may seem like looking for the next great chick flick on Spike. But sometimes when you actually see a show, the darndest things happen, and the darndest thing here is that Lifetime's new Against the Wall turns out to be first-rate drama. In fact, it's one of the best new shows of the year. Entourage Entourage (10:30/9:30c) feels awfully washed-out and washed-up, kind of like Vince Chase's dormant career, as the show counts down to the end. Vince emerges from rehab a sadder but wiser man, but does anyone really care?

Extended Trailer

Same Name As so often happens with reality shows, Same Name is a cute idea lacking the heft to sustain its premise. A celebrity and some ordinary person with the same name trade places (think Life Swap, not Wife Swap), trying to walk a mile in each other's Gucci loafers and muddy work boots, respectively. Once situated, though, there's not much for either of them to do. The Captains In “The Captains,” which Mr. Shatner wrote and directed, he interviews the five performers who have succeeded him as “Star Trek” leaders, on starships or space stations: Patrick Stewart, Avery Brooks, Kate Mulgrew, Scott Bakula and Chris Pine. The film will make its debut on Friday on the Epix premium-cable channel and epixhd . com as part of Shatnerpalooza, a conglomeration of television marathon, film screenings and live appearances. The Lisa Kudrow-starring Web series moves to a half-hour format on Showtime with funny but uneven results. Awkward Aside from the gratuitous sexual stuff, "Awkward" is a really good, funny, fun show. Jenna (Ashley Rickards) is a teen who chokes on a couple of aspirins, which causes her to lose her balance and fall on the floor, while her hairdryer goes flying into the full tub. Added to the confusion is the fact that she had written minutes before that she just wanted to die.

Get More: MTV Shows

Zen: Stylish Murder Mystery

Michael Dibdin, the British crime novelist and professional Italophile, died four years ago, having left behind 11 novels centered on Aurelio Zen, the stylish Venetian detective whom he dispatched throughout Italy to solve murders typically executed against the backdrop of political corruption, Mafia wrongdoing and aristocratic entitlement. < < <