Posted Oct 24th 2009 1:29PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Video, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
(S01E01) USA Network likes to remind us that characters are welcome. Thankfully, that's not just a slogan, as all of their shows actually do have great lead characters. And this holds true for the latest light comedy-action drama
White Collar.
Sure, there's similar DNA that runs though a lot of the USA shows.
Burn Notice,
Royal Pains, and
White Collar all have a similar setup and feel to them, but when the shows are actually good (like all of these shows are) that's not a problem. I don't know if there's anything "deep" about this show, but it's entertaining as
hell.
Continue reading Review: White Collar - Pilot (series premiere)
Posted Oct 24th 2009 12:25PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Industry, OpEd, Pickups and Renewals, Reality-Free, Parks and Recreation, Community
Earlier this week, one of the big honchos at
NBC was kvetching to the media about how the company hates being in fourth place. Well, the only way out of the bottom is better programming. I don't know if the network will succeed with this news, but at least it's committing to its programs.
Three shows got full season pickups, Community, Parks and Recreation and Mercy. That means nine episodes more each.
Continue reading NBC commits to more Community, Parks and Mercy
Posted Oct 24th 2009 11:31AM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Daytime, Celebrities, Reality-Free
Actually, I'm not sure he even had time to pack up his stuff at CBS and leave the building, but
Eric Braeden is returning to The Young and the Restless.
Allison told you that
contract negotiations between Braeden and Sony had come to a standstill. Braeden has been on the show for 30 years and knew that he had to take a pay cut (like everyone in the industry is doing these days), but they couldn't come to terms on what that pay should be, and Braeden felt that Sony had reneged on what they had promised. But it's all in the past now. Braeden will stay with the show.
Continue reading Update: Eric Braeden coming back to Young and the Restless
Posted Oct 22nd 2009 1:31PM by Jane Boursaw
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Programming, OpEd, Video, Reality-Free
There's so much cool stuff on
SlashControl, it's hard to choose what to feature. But since I get to do this every day, that'll make it easier. Today, I'm featuring a clip from one of my favorite new shows,
Mercy. It's not like we don't have enough hospital/doctor/nurse shows on right now, but there's something about
Mercy that's different.
Maybe it's the actors, which include Taylor Schilling, James Tupper, and Michelle Trachtenberg. Maybe it's the fact that the main character, Veronica, has just come home from Iraq and is still wounded from that experience. And yet she keeps moving forward, despite issues like smashing a windshield with a cinder block when she's angry.
Continue reading What's Hot on SlashControl: Veronica clashes with Dr. Harris on Mercy
Posted Oct 22nd 2009 11:10AM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Daytime, Video, Casting, Reality-Free
When you want to up the ante on a drama, create a great villain. To this day, the best James Bond movies have always been the ones with great villains. Fox's sci-fi drama
Fringe is buying into that theory, because they've gone out and hired an actor who excels at playing evil.
Fringe has cast Sebastian Roche in a recurring role as a new nemesis.If you saw Roche on
General Hospital, you know he's brilliant.
His
Fringe character doesn't have a name yet -- and least not one that they've released -- but the storyline is that he's from another dimension, not entirely human or android, and he's on a mission. He's a soldier who's supposed to collect data to open a "stable door to the other side."
Could it be an alternate universe? A parallel dimension? Some kind of time warp? The possibilities are wide open when it comes to
Fringe.
Continue reading Fringe casts General Hospital villain Sebastian Roche
Posted Oct 21st 2009 2:03PM by Jane Boursaw
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Programming, TV on DVD, OpEd, Video, Music and Variety, Reality-Free, Jane After Dark
I'm watching season one of
Ally McBeal for
Jane After Dark this week, and will give a full review this weekend. But I have to say, I'm just a few episodes in, and I'm already hooked. It's a weird blend of
The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd and
My World and Welcome To It.
And it's very weird seeing Calista Flockhart, whom I mainly know from
Brothers & Sisters, and all of her co-stars, whom I know from other current shows, on
Ally McBeal. What's even more amazing is all of the musicians featured on this show: Elton John, Tina Turner, Mariah Carey, Al Green, and many more.
Continue reading Jane After Dark preview: Hooked on Ally McBeal
Posted Oct 20th 2009 9:12AM by Kona Gallagher
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
(S02E05) I'm really glad this episode ended the way it did, because I was about to be
pissed. Obviously Castle isn't going to stop writing the Nikki Heat books and leave Beckett, so I was expecting him to make some asinine excuse to his book agent about why he couldn't take over the James Bo-- er, a "British secret agent with lots of gadgets" series.
But in the end, the excuse of, "hey, my publishing house is going to just dump sacks with dollar signs printed on the front of them on my doorstep so I can make a Scrooge McDuck-like swimming pool out of gold, so screw that British agent and his gadgets," kind of works for me. However, all things being equal, if Castle had gotten the same offer and he had been following around, say, Esposito instead of Beckett, I feel like maybe the prestige of writing the British spy series
may have won out over more gold doubloons for an already-rich Castle.
Continue reading Review: Castle - When the Bough Breaks
Posted Oct 19th 2009 2:29PM by Jason Hughes
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Cancellations, Pickups and Renewals, Reality-Free
Just when I'd added
Southland to my list of shows to spotlight in upcoming editions of "Gone Too Soon," now there are glimmers of hope for its future. After NBC unceremoniously dumped it
before it premiered this season, in favor of more
Dateline, fans and television pundits were stunned.
Executive producer John Wells has reportedly been in contact with the cast to tell them he has at least
two cable networks interested in picking up Southland. The good news comes in two ways. One, the series gets to come back. And two, a cable network is a lot less likely to tamper with the storytelling style
Southland was developing in its first season. NBC already had them de-emphasizing the larger cast and the serialized nature of their storytelling in the episodes they were filming for the new season.
Continue reading Southland may yet find new life on cable
Posted Oct 19th 2009 12:33PM by Bob Sassone
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Watercooler Talk, Reality-Free
I hate when football runs over. I want to watch
60 Minutes but two teams insist on ending the fourth quarter in a tie and have to go to overtime. Even when it's not OT the game often runs over, and for some reason CBS then goes to
another game instead of starting the prime time shows right away. Last night they went to another game and fans of
Cold Case were left in the dark because CBS didn't have enough time to show the episode.
But
Three Rivers fans got to see Alex O'Loughlin and his friends try to save lives. What did you think of the episode?
[Watch episodes and clips of
Three Rivers and other shows at
SlashControl.]
Posted Oct 16th 2009 2:04PM by Kona Gallagher
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Reality Shows, Other Sci-Fi/Supernatural Shows, Food/Home/DIY, Programming, The Simpsons, Children, Reality-Free
I visited the pumpkin patch last weekend and totally massacred a 30 lb. pumpkin and feasted on its flesh, so I am officially in the Halloween spirit. Luckily, there's a crapload of TV to help sustain my ghoulish mood. TV Tango has compiled a pretty comprehensive list of
Halloween-themed programming starting today and going through the rest of the month.
Some of the highlights include a
Moonlight marathon starting today on SyFy, as part of their "31 Days of Halloween" programming. On Sunday,
The Simpsons is airing their 20th "Treehouse of Horror" episode, while Monday has a some good kids' fare, with Halloween-themed
America's Funniest Home Videos on ABC Family, and
Pooh's Heffalump Halloween Movie on Disney.
Continue reading For the rest of the month, TV is all Halloween, all the time
Posted Oct 15th 2009 1:01PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Programming, OpEd, Reality-Free
It feels like forever since Bill Hendrickson announced that he and his family would form their own religion and live apart from Juniper Creek and LDS and the rest of the state of Utah. And we also know that Roman Grant is dead, and unless
Big Love is going in the direction of resurrecting the prophet like he's the real deal, that means Alby will be taking over for his father. Then there's all the business with the casinos, Nicki's teenaged daughter and her weird former husband, not to mention Margene's new business, Sarah getting married to Scott...
Continue reading Big Love season four premieres in January
Posted Oct 15th 2009 4:05AM by Jane Boursaw
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Episode Reviews, Reality-Free
(S01E04) "No, they're boob-iful." - Penny's response when Joanna asks if her boobs are weird.
I'm reluctant to get too invested in
Eastwick, because I have a feeling it might be canceled and then I'll just be ticked off. On the other hand, it's getting better, and once again, they twisted things just a little bit in the last 20 seconds of the episode.
But first, let's talk about what's going on with each of the witches:
Kat. Oy, it makes me so mad that she keeps going back to Raymond, even though he's an absolute ass. And I would NOT have fired Ivanka the tigress lawyer. Kat needs her, and I have a feeling her bird's nest plan to let the kids stay in the house and have her and Raymond take turns staying there won't work. He's too much of an ass. Why doesn't she just cast some horrible spell on him? I know ... the kids. On the flipside, it might be fun having her stay at Joanna's.
Continue reading Eastwick: Fleas and Casserole
Posted Oct 14th 2009 8:04PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Casting, Reality-Free
If I were an executive at CBS, I would never want to do business with actor
Mandy Patinkin again. Even though Mandy is a terrific actor and one of my personal favorites -- I loved him on Broadway in
Evita and
Sunday in the Park with George, not to mention on screen in
The Princess Bride and
Yentl -- his history with CBS is abominable.
He was an Emmy-winning star on
Chicago Hope, then left after a couple of seasons to be closer to his family in New York. Okay, that was understandable. Then after getting
Criminal Minds off to a great start, he walked out of that show, citing creative differences.
Apparently, someone has said let bygones be bygones because
Mandy Patinkin will be a guest star on Three Rivers. Maybe because this is a very personal issue with Mandy, he's convinced the powers that be to let him return to the network, albeit for just a guest appearance.
Continue reading Mandy Patinkin back to CBS... as guest on Three Rivers
Posted Oct 14th 2009 11:31AM by Isabelle Carreau
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, Other Reality Shows, Battlestar Galactica, Ask TV Squad, Reality-Free
The "Ask TV Squad" column, published every Wednesday, answers your questions about current and past TV shows, as well as about the celebrities appearing on TV. Every week, I will pick a question (or more) sent to us and provide answers in the column. If your question is not picked for a column, it may be answered in a subsequent column or in
TV Squad's APB Podcast. To submit questions to the "Ask TV Squad" column, you can post them below in comments or email them at
asktvsquad@gmail.com.
This week, I answer questions about Battlestar Galactica, 30 Days, Trauma and how to find titles of songs that played in episodes.
Continue reading Ask TV Squad: Battlestar Galactica, 30 Days and more!
Posted Oct 12th 2009 1:02PM by Allison Waldman
Filed under: Other Drama Shows, OpEd, Reality-Free, The Mentalist
After last season's success of
The Mentalist, I made a point of watching the show this season. I wanted to see if
vox populi was right and this was must-see TV. Well, now that I've tuned in for a few episodes, my opinion of the show remains the same as when I previewed the pilot in 2008. It's a star vehicle for
Simon Baker. He's wonderful in the role and commands the screen.
However, since watching this season, there's one major thing about
The Mentalist that's ticking me off. Aretha Franklin sang about it: R-E-S-P-E-C-T.
Continue reading What's ticking me off about The Mentalist
« Previous Page | Next Page »
The Prisoner -- An early look
Sesame Street's 40th: Five funniest characters
Sesame Street's 40th: Five biggest controversies
