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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Chef Academy - "Coming to America"
November 17, 2009 - 02:11a.m.
I'm pretty sure Bravo's new show, Chef Academy, just blends elements of every other show they have on their network until it ends up with something that feels vaguely like a television show. There's one of the ...
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Other Shows: season 1
The Prisoner
November 15, 2009 - 06:11p.m.
There's a desert. A man wakes up in it. Another man has a grenade. "Be seeing you." He's scared. Someone orders a wrap, because that's all there is. Ian McKellen is interesting, and well dressed. "There is ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Lopez Tonight
November 10, 2009 - 04:11a.m.
It's almost impossible to do anything new with the late-night talk show. Many have talked about doing something different with the format, but most have just abandoned innovation in favor of shows that don't really change up the ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Sex Rehab With Dr. Drew
November 1, 2009 - 10:11p.m.
I’m a little bit torn about Dr. Drew. On the one hand, if you listen to Loveline, the guy tends to give people—especially kids—some pretty solid, no-nonsense advice. (Yes, I’m aware of the criticisms—particularly that ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The League: "The Draft"
October 29, 2009 - 12:10p.m.
The League premieres tonight at 10:30 p.m. ET/9:30 p.m. CT on FX, after It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia.
When it comes to comedy programming, FX is leagues ahead of networks twice its size, including ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Monsters vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins from Outer Space
October 28, 2009 - 04:10p.m.
Monsters vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins from Outer Space premieres tonight on NBC at 8 p.m. EDT.
Fully a sixth of the running time on the Monsters vs. Aliens: Mutant Pumpkins from Outer Space screener DVD is devoted to the ...
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Other Shows: season 2, episode 6
Castle - "Vampire Weekend"
October 27, 2009 - 02:10a.m.
For the past couple of weeks, a couple of you have been clamoring for Castle coverage in the comments section of any post for a show that airs on Mondays (or, at least, the shows I’ve been covering on ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
White Collar: "Pilot"
October 23, 2009 - 11:10a.m.
It’s too bad that USA won’t be bringing Burn Notice back until January, because it now has a BN timeslot partner far more suitable than Royal Pains ever was. The pilot for the network’s new series White ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Jeff Dunham Show: "Episode 101"
October 22, 2009 - 01:10p.m.
The Jeff Dunham Show airs tonight at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT, Comedy Central.
For every Important Things With Demetri Martin, there is The Jeff Dunham Show. The yin to the yang. The concepts of both shows ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Lock 'n Load - "The Widowmaker"
October 21, 2009 - 12:10p.m.
Lock ‘n Load premieres tonight at 8 p.m. on Showtime.
Showtime’s Lock ‘n Load is delightfully non-partisan about America’s gun obsession, so much so that you almost want it to take a point of view at some ...
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Other Shows
Tell Them Anything You Want: A Portrait Of Maurice Sendak
October 19, 2009 - 08:10a.m.
Spike Jonze’s big-screen adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s classic children’s book Where The Wild Things Are has rekindled a debate that’s raged around Sendak’s work for decades: What’s appropriate for children? And at what age ...
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Other Shows: season 6, episode 1
Nip/Tuck - "Don Hoberman"
October 15, 2009 - 04:10a.m.
Nip/Tuck starts out so promisingly and then wanders so far afield that you wonder why you bothered with it in the first place. While that’s a rough summary of the series so far, it could also describe just ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1-4
Let's Make A Deal
October 9, 2009 - 12:10p.m.
Though I’m a game show fanatic through-and-through, I’ve never had much of a connection to Let’s Make A Deal. When I was a boy I found grown-ups in costumes a little creepy—it’s the same reason ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Secret Girlfriend, "Episode 101"
October 7, 2009 - 02:10p.m.
[Secret Girlfriend debuts tonight on Comedy Central, 10:30 p.m. EST/9:30 p.m. CST]
What's the deal, Comedy Central? Are things really so bad that you desperately need this ratings-bating something-or-other?
Those without much time, here ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Sherri - "Pilot"
October 5, 2009 - 11:10p.m.
Lifetime’s Sherri is one of the strangest shows on TV right now. I mean, yeah, there are stranger, but Sherri seems to take place in the America that existed only in Barack Obama’s speech to the 2004 Democratic ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Three Rivers - "Place Of Life"
October 4, 2009 - 12:10p.m.
Note: Three Rivers airs tonight at 9 p.m. eastern. This review discusses plot details in tonight's episode, including the outcome of one of the cases. Those would prefer to remain unspoiled should skip the fifth and sixth paragraphs ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Stargate Universe - "Pilot"
October 2, 2009 - 12:10p.m.
Stargate Universe debuts tonight at 9 p.m. EDT on SyFy.
I have an almost boundless appetite for science fiction. If there’s a spaceship or a time machine show or something like that, I’ve probably at least sampled ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Middle - "Pilot"
September 30, 2009 - 04:09p.m.
The Middle debuts at 8:30 p.m. EDT tonight on ABC.
The Middle may be the most boring show to debut that fall. That’s not actually a detriment, either. It’s just that when you hear that ABC ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Hank - "Pilot"
September 30, 2009 - 01:09p.m.
Hank debuts at 8 p.m. EDT tonight on ABC.
I’ve been putting off writing a review of Hank because while it’s easily the worst new show of this fall season, I kind of have no idea why ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Trauma - "Pilot"
September 28, 2009 - 05:09p.m.
Trauma debuts at 9 p.m. EDT tonight on NBC.
Trauma is easily the most boring show you’ll ever see about things blowing up. It’s competently done, fairly well-directed and fast-paced, but something about it feels almost perfunctory ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Cleveland Show
September 27, 2009 - 05:09p.m.
The Cleveland Show debuts at 8:30 p.m. EDT tonight on Fox.
Spinoffs need to justify their existence in a way a regular show just doesn’t. When Family Guy debuted, it was only really judged for its own ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1-2
Brothers - "Pilot"/"House Rules/Anniversary"
September 25, 2009 - 04:09p.m.
Brothers debuts at 8 p.m. EDT tonight on Fox.
Brothers is yet another sitcom where you’ll see all of the jokes coming, where you’ll be able to exactly predict everything from the story points to the tone ...
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Other Shows: season 2, episode 1
The Mentalist - "Redemption"
September 25, 2009 - 02:09a.m.
Almost in spite of myself, I kinda like The Mentalist. It’s sunnier and more predisposed toward jollity than your usual CBS crime procedural (which can often feel as though someone took a standard episode of CSI and put it ...
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Other Shows
The New Adventures of Old Christine, "Bahamian Rhapsody"
September 23, 2009 - 08:09p.m.
Primetime broadcast television has been in limbo for almost a decade. Scripted shows are on the decline; reality, talk, and news are on the rise; and networks are desperate to keep up with the times. So to some people, the ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Mercy - "Can We Get That Drink Now?"
September 23, 2009 - 08:09p.m.
Just a few short months ago, the Showtime series Nurse Jackie proved that it’s possible to create a dramatic, funny, thematically complex TV show about the daily grind of hospital nursing. And right on the heels of Nurse Jackie ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Cougar Town: "Pilot"
September 23, 2009 - 01:09p.m.
Cougar Town premieres tonight on ABC, 9:30pm/8:30pm Central
Let's get one thing out there right away: The title of ABC's new comedy Cougar Town is terrible. But I'm willing to bet creator Bill Lawrence ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Eastwick - "Pilot"
September 23, 2009 - 12:09p.m.
Eastwick debuts at 10 p.m. EDT tonight on ABC.
I’m kind of a sucker for small town shows. I like the idea of losing myself once a week in a little hamlet where everyone cares for each other ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Forgotten - "Pilot"
September 22, 2009 - 08:09p.m.
The Forgotten debuts at 10 p.m. EDT tonight on ABC.
I like everything about The Forgotten except for the actual show. The cast assembled here is a pretty solid one for a crime procedural (i.e. any show where ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
NCIS: Los Angeles - "Identity"
September 22, 2009 - 01:09p.m.
Quick: How many TV shows can you name that are spin-offs of spin-offs? The classic example of course is Good Times, which came from Maude, which came from All In The Family. And if you count Happy Days as a ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Good Wife - "Pilot"
September 22, 2009 - 12:09p.m.
The Good Wife debuts at 10 p.m. EDT tonight on CBS.
In an otherwise deeply disappointing fall season for network-based scripted drama, The Good Wife is one of exactly two drama pilots that made me sit up and say ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Accidentally on Purpose - "Pilot"
September 21, 2009 - 06:09p.m.
Accidentally on Purpose debuts at 8:30 p.m. EDT tonight on CBS.
Hey, do you like Jenna Elfman? Do you like her a lot? Because CBS has the latest in its series of attempts to win you over to ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 2-5
The Jay Leno Show - Week 1
September 20, 2009 - 03:09a.m.
These are angry days in America, in the world, really. It’s a time when everything feels out of control. With every passing day, every single one of us is realizing even more just how powerless we are within our ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Beautiful Life - "Pilot"
September 17, 2009 - 02:09a.m.
When The CW, your network for women who increasingly resemble barn owls, sent out its pilots, it only sent out a little less than a half hour’s worth of footage from The Beautiful Life. Like a good sport, I ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Jay Leno Show
September 15, 2009 - 02:09a.m.
This may sound naïve and hopelessly optimistic of me, but I really thought maybe The Jay Leno Show could be something interesting. When he first started hyping the show by saying that he and his staff had rethought what ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Vampire Diaries - "Pilot"
September 10, 2009 - 12:09p.m.
The Vampire Diaries debuts at 8 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. CDT tonight on The CW.
At what point did vampires become one of the steps along the continuum of the sexual development of America’s young women? If ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Melrose Place - "Pilot"
September 8, 2009 - 12:09p.m.
Melrose Place debuts tonight at 9 p.m. EDT/8 p.m. CDT on The CW.
It’s hard to say anything substantive about a show that seems to have as a major goal being awful. And the new Melrose ...
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Other Shows: season 24, episode 1
At The Movies
September 6, 2009 - 12:09a.m.
Without speaking ill of the dead at too much length, it’s pretty safe to say that most fans of serious (or at least semi-serious) film criticism were overjoyed to learn that the experiment in dumbing down At The Movies ...
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Other Shows: season 3, episode 1
Greek - "The Day After"
August 31, 2009 - 07:08p.m.
Greek's third season begins tonight on ABC Family at 9 p.m. EDT/8 p.m. CDT.
Before this summer, I had never seen an episode of ABC Family’s Greek, a show that had a reputation among some ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Crash Course - "Episode 1"
August 27, 2009 - 12:08a.m.
I don’t know exactly when it happened, but at some point, ABC decided its summer programming strategy was just going to be ripped off entirely from Nickelodeon circa 1991. Every show on the network this summer feels like it ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Shaq Vs. - "Shaq vs. Ben"
August 19, 2009 - 01:08a.m.
ABC’s new sports reality show, Shaq Vs., is an hourlong show that really cries out to be a half hour long. For the first 35 minutes or so, the series is a fun little goof on your typical reality ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Glenn Martin, DDS - "Amish Anguish"
August 18, 2009 - 01:08a.m.
Glenn Martin, DDS, airs new episodes every night this week at 8 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. CDT on Nickelodeon.
Ever since the network got its start, Nickelodeon has struggled with how to blend its kid-friendly programming of the ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Hoarders - "Jennifer and Ron; Jill"
August 17, 2009 - 10:08p.m.
I’m not a fan of reality TV in general, but I love a good documentary, and there’s a whole subset of TV shows that get tarred with the reality brush because they straddle the line between exploitive and ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1-2
Into the Pride - "Episodes 1 and 2"
August 13, 2009 - 06:08p.m.
Into the Pride debuts tonight at 8 p.m. EDT/7 p.m. CDT on Animal Planet.
Dave Salmoni has two passions: big cats and good television. He blends them in Animal Planet’s new series, Into the Pride, which ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Comedy Central Roast of Joan Rivers
August 9, 2009 - 11:08p.m.
Roasts have long been a guilty pleasure of mine. As a comedy geek, I love that they keep alive a dying comedy world redolent of the borscht belt and vaudeville and The Catskills. I love the weird sense of community ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Shark Tank - "Pilot"
August 9, 2009 - 12:08p.m.
Shark Tank debuts tonight at 9 p.m. EDT/8 p.m. CDT on ABC.
Shark Tank is just proof that reality TV impresario Mark Burnett never met a successful overseas reality show he couldn’t Americanize somehow. After a ...
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Other Shows: season 4, episode 1
Psych - "Extradition: British Columbia"
August 8, 2009 - 03:08a.m.
I’m not a huge fan of Psych, but I can see why so many people are. Every time I watch the show, it’s like being shaken by a 500-pound man with sugary breath who keeps slapping you about ...
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Other Shows
Make My Day
August 6, 2009 - 08:08a.m.
Take Queen For A Day, that vintage radio and TV game show where someone with a hard-luck story got the royal treatment, and sprinkle in Candid Camera so that the person being feted doesn't know he's on TV ... -
Other Shows
Addicted To Beauty
August 5, 2009 - 09:08a.m.
Forget politics. It's plastic surgery that divides our once-great nation. Television (pandering to middle America since 1950!) wags its glowing finger at those who dare indulge in elective beautification through endless freak parades on the daytime talk shows and ... -
Other Shows: season 5, episode 8-9
Jon & Kate Plus 8 - "Renovations and Vacations"/"Camping Out"
August 4, 2009 - 03:08a.m.
I realize that we’ve all pretty much moved on to gossiping about Jon and Kate Gosselin or making fun of how Kate emasculates Jon while Jon went from husband to douchebag in, like, a millisecond once that separation was ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1-2
Defying Gravity - "Pilot"/"Natural Selection"
August 2, 2009 - 07:08p.m.
Defying Gravity debuts at 9 p.m. EDT/8 p.m. CDT tonight on ABC.
There’s a pretty good, quite interesting show buried somewhere within Defying Gravity, whose two first episodes debut tonight, but the producers, chief among them ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
More to Love - "Pilot"
July 28, 2009 - 10:07p.m.
The folks at FOX knew it could generate a lot of hubbub about its new show More to Love, AKA "The Fatchelor" and thus promoted the hell out of it way before it aired. Predictably, people started talking. Would it ...
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Other Shows
Samantha Who?
July 23, 2009 - 10:07p.m.
I'm a sucker for actors. Give me a TV show with a strong lead who's given interesting things to do, punchy dialogue, and maybe a quirky trait or too -- as long as it doesn't detract from that ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Ruby and the Rockits - "Pilot"
July 21, 2009 - 12:07p.m.
Ruby and the Rockits debuts tonight on ABC Family at 8:30 p.m. EDT/7:30 p.m. CDT.
I’ve gotta say that when I asked myself how cult show creator (and former teen idol) Shaun Cassidy would ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Dating in the Dark - "Pilot"
July 20, 2009 - 12:07p.m.
Dating in the Dark premieres at 10:02 EDT/9:02 CDT tonight on ABC.
Dating in the Dark pretty much plays like someone at Endemol (your reality TV overlords) sat back, furrowed their brows and wondered how they could ...
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Other Shows
Labor Pains
July 19, 2009 - 10:07p.m.
I am pissed at Lindsay Lohan. If she hadn't so epically screwed up her life/career, the fact that her latest movie went straight to TV wouldn't be newsworthy and I wouldn't have had to watch crappy ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Dark Blue
July 15, 2009 - 10:07p.m.
I’m starting to think that when the marketing folks at TNT say “We Know Drama,” what they really mean is “We Have Analyzed The Fundamental Principals Governing The Hourlong Television Shows Of The Past Three Decades And We Have ...
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Other Shows: season 2, episode 1
Leverage - "The Beantown Bailout Job"
July 15, 2009 - 09:07p.m.
It’s hard to do light and frothy TV well. In the past year or so, both Chuck and Burn Notice have managed to figure out the formula for fun action hours, trying out things that did and didn’t ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
10 Things I Hate About You - "Pilot"
July 8, 2009 - 03:07a.m.
Just how long have we been doing the social castes in high school thing now? I’d peg the earliest example of this on TV, at least, as probably Square Pegs, but it’s grown into such an all-consuming thing ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Warehouse 13: "Pilot"
July 7, 2009 - 09:07p.m.
As someone who is sort of in geek culture but not really of geek culture, I've always been interested in how to make shows with what seem to be a pretty limited appeal work for a mass audience. Of ...
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Other Shows
The Great American Road Trip
July 7, 2009 - 08:07p.m.
Have you been wanting to relive your family's summer vacations? Adults and kids wedged in an RV, getting lost, trying to find the campground that has a pool, stopping to read historic markers, showering in shifts? Competing against seven ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Dance Your Ass Off: "Shake and Rattle Those Rolls"
June 29, 2009 - 11:06p.m.
It's not too hard to figure out how Dance Your Ass Off came to exist: dance shows and inspirational transformation programs both seem to be big reality TV payoffs, so it could be a natural, if not cheesy, fit ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Virtuality
June 27, 2009 - 01:06a.m.
I wasn’t terribly looking forward to Virtuality, a little side project Battlestar Galactica superhero Ron Moore and BSG producer Michael Taylor have been futzing around with for what seems like seven years now. The whole premise of it sounded ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Philanthropist - "Pilot"
June 25, 2009 - 02:06a.m.
Listen, I’m not the world’s most politically correct guy, but when I heard that NBC’s new series The Philanthropist would focus on a billionaire playboy white guy traveling the world and helping disadvantaged minorities and poor people ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
NYC Prep
June 23, 2009 - 11:06p.m.
The new Bravo series NYC Prep has been touted as the real-life Gossip Girl, an intimate look into the lives of privileged Upper East Side snobs with absentee parents, fake IDs, and limitless credit card accounts. But based on the ...
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Other Shows
The Superstars
June 23, 2009 - 09:06p.m.
I may be showing my age here, but I grew up watching The Superstars on Sunday afternoons on ABC. It was appointment television at my house. Kyle Rote Jr. may have been the ultimate Superstars competitor, but as an Oakland ...
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Other Shows
Make It Or Break It, "Pilot"
June 22, 2009 - 09:06p.m.
Back in 2006 I was addicted to Cheerleader Nation, a reality show on Lifetime that followed an elite high school cheer squad working toward a national championship. Just as interesting as the injuries, rivalries, and routines were the relationships between ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1-2
Merlin: "The Dragon's Call"/"Valiant"
June 21, 2009 - 03:06p.m.
Merlin airs two episodes tonight at 7pm CST, NBC
Before we get into it, a few props are in order. Kudos to NBC for not succumbing to the reality show siren's song, and instead loading its Sunday summer schedule ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
HawthoRNe
June 16, 2009 - 10:06p.m.
Apparently, now that ER is off the air (with Scrubs perhaps not far behind), the TV Gods have decreed that the box needs more medical shows. Royal Pains just debuted on USA Network; and Nurse Jackie on Showtime. This fall ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1 & 2
Hammertime
June 15, 2009 - 12:06p.m.
And so, inevitably, MC Hammer gets a reality show. And why not? Those who were around when Hammer stormed the charts in 1990 remember him well, if not fondly. For those who weren’t he’s a living symbol of ...
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Other Shows: season 5, episode 1
Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List, "Place Your Bette"
June 8, 2009 - 10:06p.m.
Last summer, when the AV Club editors sent out an email listing what shows were on the summer schedule, they mentioned Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List, along with a note that read "ignore," which means "not worth anyone ...
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Other Shows: season 63, episode 1
The 63rd Tony Awards
June 7, 2009 - 11:06p.m.
As I’ve written before on this site, The Tony Awards are my absolute favorite televised awards show. Due largely the inherent showmanship of theater-folk, nearly every aspect of The Tonys—the presenters, the speeches, the musical numbers—outshine other ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Listener
June 4, 2009 - 10:06p.m.
In the all-around classic How I Met Your Mother episode “Slap Bet,” Robin postulates that the ‘80s didn’t get to Canada until the ‘90s. While at the time, this just seemed like a way for the show’s producers ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Royal Pains
June 4, 2009 - 12:06p.m.
Royal Pains debuts tonight at 9 p.m. CDT on the USA Network.
Royal Pains, at first, seems like it might be a fun summer time waster, a goofy riff on the small-town doctor drama, not seen on TV in ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Tonight Show With Conan O'Brien
June 2, 2009 - 12:06a.m.
For the past three months I have missed Conan O’Brien like a phantom limb. Time and time again, I’ve caught myself thinking, “Hey, eleven thirty. Conan’s on!” only to realize that Jimmy Fallon now ruled the eleven-thirty ...
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Other Shows: season 2, episode 1
I'm A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here: "Pilot"
June 1, 2009 - 10:06p.m.
I should start off by saying that I’m probably the wrong person to write about I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out Of Here! It was only by some strange twist of fate (I volunteered while very drunk) that ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Goode Family: "Pilot"
May 27, 2009 - 09:05p.m.
I've always been precariously on the fence about Mike Judge. I thought Office Space was half of a brilliantly subversive satire that degenerated, in in its second half, into a predictable caper movie with a strangely reactionary message; Idiocracy ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Mental "Pilot"
May 26, 2009 - 11:05p.m.
Unconventionality sells: The success of procedural franchises like House and Life are banking on that fact—it's not enough that the main characters are good at their jobs, but they have to be honest-to-God savants. And one or seven ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 10
Party Down
May 24, 2009 - 05:05p.m.
Party Down started its first season as a mostly episodic endeavor, with only a couple of ongoing narratives tying together the social events that the scrappy Party Down caterers half-ass their way through each week. The ongoing flirtation of washed-up ...
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Other Shows
Sit Down, Shut Up: "Pilot"
April 19, 2009 - 05:04p.m.
Sit Down, Shut Up premieres tonight at 7:30pm Central timeIn this week’s A.V. Talk, Steve Heisler and I defended Sit Down, Shut Up against Keith and Nathan, neither of whom much cared for the new animated ... -
Other Shows
Grey Gardens
April 18, 2009 - 05:04p.m.
Grey Gardens premières on HBO tonight at 7pm Central time.Has any story, truth or fiction, ever taken a more ass-backward journey into the public consciousness than Grey Gardens? The Maysles’ little-seen 1975 documentary about Jacqueline Bouvier’s eccentric ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Southland: "Pilot"
April 9, 2009 - 02:04p.m.
Gritty police procedurals may seem completely overdone, but think of how many shows that fit the genre made for truly superior television: From Police Story to Hill Street Blues to Homicide to The Wire to The Shield, it’s clearly ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Harper's Island
April 9, 2009 - 08:04a.m.
Premieres tonight on CBS, 10 p.m. ETHold onto your dentures, CBS faithful! Your standard-issue Agatha Christie-style mystery serial just got a whole lot stabbier.Scheduled to roll out in a 13-episode run from now until July 2nd ... -
Other Shows
The Unusuals: "Pilot"
April 8, 2009 - 04:04p.m.
The commercials for The Unusuals, ABC's new light-hearted(ish) cop drama, are a bit misleading. For one thing, the show comes off as a wacky collection of kooky characters, doing zany things: Michael from Lost always wears a bulletproof ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Surviving Suburbia, "Hero"
April 7, 2009 - 11:04a.m.
There are good family sitcoms (Roseanne, Malcom In The Middle), middling family sitcoms (Growing Pains, King Of Queens), and family sitcoms so terrible they call the entire idea of related human beings living together in these small groups called "families ...
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Other Shows: season 15, episode 22
ER
April 2, 2009 - 09:04p.m.
I gave up watching ER in the fall of 2002, the season after Anthony Edwards left the show. I hadn’t really enjoyed Edwards’ last season—or the torturously slow death of his character, Mark Greene—nor had I gotten ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Cupid
March 31, 2009 - 10:03p.m.
I was as much in thrall to NBC’s “Must-See TV” blocks in the mid-’90s as anyone else, but by the end of the decade, my wife and I were watching ABC about as much as we were watching ... -
Other Shows
The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency, "Pilot"
March 29, 2009 - 04:03p.m.
It's taken a long time for Alexander McCall Smith's beloved heroine (and Botswana's only lady detective) Precious Ramotswe to make it to television. Two years ago, the late Anthony Minghella took American chanteuse Jill Scott to Botswana ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Chopping Block: "Opening Night"
March 11, 2009 - 04:03p.m.
For a brief stretch a few weeks back, my weekly TiVo queue contained Top Chef, Hell’s Kitchen, The Amazing Race and Survivor: four shows that pretty much run the gamut of reality competition, at least in terms of how ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Castle: "Flowers For Your Grave"
March 9, 2009 - 05:03p.m.
Anyone who’s seen Nathan Fillion before, particularly in one of his collaborations with Joss Whedon, knows he’s a major star waiting to happen. Fillion has off-the-scale charisma and the matinee idol looks to back them up. But his ... -
Other Shows: season 6, episode 70
The L Word: "Last Word"
March 8, 2009 - 10:03a.m.
If a tree falls in the forest and no one is around does it make a sound? More importantly, if The L Word finally pulls the last fistful of dirt on itself, burying the long-dead show for all eternity, and ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Ashes To Ashes
March 7, 2009 - 09:03a.m.
NOTE: Ashes To Ashes premieres stateside tonight at 8 pm EST on BBC America. I've avoided getting too spoiler-heavy about the first episode, but I did get a little into the end of the Life On Mars in the ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Late Night With Jimmy Fallon
March 3, 2009 - 05:03a.m.
I have a confession to make: I don’t hate Jimmy Fallon.I know the conventional wisdom holds that Fallon presided over some of the weakest seasons of Saturday Night Live, dominating skit after skit with his frat-boy humor and ... -
Other Shows: season 2, episode 1
Celebrity Apprentice
February 28, 2009 - 01:02p.m.
Though I am not too proud to concede that I have watched an episode or two of The Two Coreys I generally am not a big fan of Celebreality fodder. Incidentally, thanks, VH-1, for introducing yet another noxious, dispiriting yet ... -
Other Shows: season 16, episode The Last One
"Late Night With Conan O'Brien"
February 20, 2009 - 07:02p.m.
I will never forget what Keith said when I asked him how he felt about the news that Conan O’Brien said would be taking over The Tonight Show. He said it reminded him of the scene in Goodfellas where ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Important Things With Demetri Martin: "Timing"
February 11, 2009 - 04:02p.m.
If you're a humongous Demetri Martin fan already—if you can't get enough of the awkward flip charts, the forced inflection, the smirkiness—then you'll probably find his new half-hour comedy series, Important Things, a delightful exercise ...
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Other Shows: season 43, episode 1
Super Bowl XLIII
February 1, 2009 - 06:02a.m.
There are two possible scenarios for what we're about to see today: Either the Cardinals continue their impossible rise and end their long championship drought, or the Steelers win their record sixth ring ... "one for the thumb," on this ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Trust Me: “Before And After”
January 26, 2009 - 07:01a.m.
Give TNT credit for venturing beyond the realm of cops, docs and lawyers for its latest original series Trust Me. Then immediately take some of that credit back for TNT having the bad luck—one assumes—to launch a comedy-drama ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Lie To Me
January 21, 2009 - 03:01p.m.
It seems every new cop show these days needs a gimmick, and here we are, watching "The blah Mentalist-type one where the guy is really good at reading people's body language, and kind of a dick." Tim Roth ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Beast
January 15, 2009 - 05:01p.m.
Based on the ads I saw before tonight’s premiere of The Beast, I assumed Patrick Swayze’s undercover cop show was going to be a big departure from the man’s usual dirty dancing and point breaking roles. This ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Howie Do It, "Pilot"
January 9, 2009 - 09:01p.m.
"You've seen other prank shows, other hidden camera shows. Wait till you see Howie Do It!" Better yet, wait till you hear the same bad, groan-worthy pun at least 25 times within the span of 60 minutes. Wait until ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
13 Fear Is Real: "13"
January 7, 2009 - 05:01p.m.
Premieres tonight at 8 p.m. ET on the CW
That *beep*, *beep*, *beep* sound you’re hearing is the dumptruck full of money backing into Sam Raimi’s driveway. Raimi is the most prominent of a host of producers ...
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Other Shows: season 8, episode 1 & 2
Scrubs: "My Jerks" & "My Last Words"
January 6, 2009 - 10:01p.m.
Look, I know a lot of you really don’t like Scrubs–including our number one Scrubs-hater, The Hater–and I can certainly sympathize. The show is terminally cutesy with an incongruous streak of emo, just like its floppy ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Homeland Security USA: "This Is Your Car On Drugs"
January 6, 2009 - 02:01p.m.
ABC's new docu-series Homeland Security USA follows the day-to-day adventures of border patrolmen, customs agents and the like, and you could easily–and not entirely inaccurately–think of it as a shameless sop to the anti-immigration crowd, feeding their ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
True Beauty
January 5, 2009 - 11:01p.m.
The thing that you should know about True Beauty, well, the thing that ABC really, really wants you to know about it judging by the commercials, is that it is the brainchild of executive producers Ashton Kutcher and Tyra Banks ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 3 and 4
House of Saddam
December 14, 2008 - 10:12p.m.
Hello, House of Saddam fans! As all six of you who actually watched this four-part HBO/BBC mini-series recall, the last time we left our hero, he was standing on the corpses of a large percentage of his army, thumbing ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Leverage: "The Nigerian Job"
December 8, 2008 - 12:12a.m.
Can TNT make a success of the heist genre in '08, after TV shows sublime (FX's Thief), ridiculous (NBC's Heist) and in between (CBS' Smith) all tanked in '06? Hey, if TNT could make a hit out of ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1 and 2
House of Saddam
December 7, 2008 - 11:12p.m.
During the glorious decade lasting from 1992 to 2002, there were few occupations more lucrative for an Iraqi male of a certain age than professional Saddam Hussein impersonator. While children scrounged for food under the weight of the U.S ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Spectacle: Elvis Costello With...: "Elton John"
December 3, 2008 - 07:12a.m.
I've been a fan of Elvis Costello ever since I found a copy of This Year's Model in the "Nice Price" bin when I was 14. My first three years of Costello fandom happened in a big rush ... -
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24: "Redemption"
November 23, 2008 - 09:11p.m.
There are a lot of ways in which 24 is pretty inde-fucking-fensible. The fascist subtext; the casual use of torture (the series comes with a lot of potential drinking games built in, but few offer greater chances for alcohol poisoning ...
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Other Shows
TRL - Total Finale Live
November 16, 2008 - 10:11p.m.
"Wait, Total Request Live got cancelled? Wait, Total Request Live is still on?" Har har, how droll!
Okay, now that that perfunctory bit of snark–which I've read some iteration of a few dozen times this week–is out ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Summer Heights High: Premiere
November 9, 2008 - 11:11p.m.
Summer Heights High is a perfectly entertaining, well-made and sharp-witted comedy made for fans of shows like The Office and films such as Waiting for Guffman. The only downside (based on the pilot) is that it still needs to demonstrate ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
"50 Cent: The Money and The Power"
November 6, 2008 - 06:11p.m.
There was a time, not so long ago, when a 50 Cent TV show would be an instant smash. Unfortunately for 50 and MTV, that time was 2003. Since then the bullet-scarred rapper has gone from red-hot to medium-warm to ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 3
"Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday"
October 23, 2008 - 10:10p.m.
Do you guys even remember how exciting Satuday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday was at the very beginning of its run? It was appointment TV at its finest. Hip young people would stay at home on a Thursday night just ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Stylista Pilot
October 22, 2008 - 10:10p.m.
Here are some elevator pitches of what Stylista is about: "It's The Rachel Zoe Project but with a winner!" "It's Survivor Meets The Devil Wore Prada!. Or as the people of the CW boast, it's "From the ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Crash: "Episode One"
October 17, 2008 - 06:10p.m.
Talking over the upcoming T.V. Club assignments during this week's A.V. Club editorial conference call, we started speculating on what the TV spin-off of Paul Haggis' Oscar-winning movie Crash would be like. Would each episode feature a ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Crusoe: "Rum And Gunpowder "
October 17, 2008 - 11:10a.m.
Premieres tonight on NBC, 8:00 p.m. ET77:00 p.m. CT
Everyone's got a reason for being drawn to the Robinson Crusoe story in its varied iterations, whether it be for the philosophical considerations of man's ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 2
Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday
October 16, 2008 - 10:10p.m.
In the comments for last week's write up of Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday, a reader complained that I should not be writing about Saturday Night Live, since I obviously didn't care about the show. I have ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
My Own Worst Enemy: "Breakdown"
October 13, 2008 - 04:10p.m.
Before getting into Christian Slater’s new TV show, I offer this note: NBC’s Chuck, currently airing on Monday nights at 8 p.m. ET, has experienced a major creative resurgence in its second season after getting off to ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Kath & Kim: "Pilot"
October 10, 2008 - 10:10a.m.
On paper, Kath & Kim sounds like a good idea, or at least one that has the potential to be funny: It stars two capable comic actresses, Molly Shannon and Selma Blair, as a hopelessly tacky, thoroughly empty-headed mother and daughter ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Testees: "Pilot"
October 10, 2008 - 12:10a.m.
In theory, Testees should a perfect timeslot companion for FX's cult hit sitcom It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia. It's similarly gamy, following two grubby, too-old-for-this-shit urban slackers–played by Steve Markle and Jeff Kassel–as they scrounge ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Saturday Night Live: Weekend Update Thursday
October 9, 2008 - 10:10p.m.
Over the past few weeks something incredibly strange and unexpected has happened: people are actually talking about Saturday Night Live. Why, you can't pass the A.V Club water cooler without hearing someone say something along the lines of ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Eleventh Hour: "Resurrection"
October 9, 2008 - 05:10p.m.
The debut episode of Eleventh Hour, a new CBS procedural produced by Jerry Bruckheimer, is about cloning. It comes out strongly against it. This is what we in the word-slinging business call “irony.”
Based on a four-part British TV series ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Ex List: "Pilot"
October 3, 2008 - 09:10p.m.
Before we get into it, there are two things I wanted to say up front:
1) This show is pretty good.
2) That news couldn't have come at a worse time.
Adapted from Israeli sitcom Mythological X, The Ex ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Opportunity Knocks: "The Lauts"
September 30, 2008 - 10:09p.m.
Game shows always bring out the communist in me. Watching Opportunity Knocks tonight, as host J.D. Roth threw stacks of cash at a financially comfortable family of five, I tried to have fun with it. Really I did. But ...
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Other Shows: season 2, episode 1
Life: "Find Your Happy Place"
September 29, 2008 - 10:09p.m.
I left Life out of my Primer on TV Detectives last week, in part because, hey, I couldn't cover everything, and in part because I've never known quite what to make of Life. I liked the premise at ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Little Britain USA
September 28, 2008 - 08:09p.m.
Britain, Britain, Britain. For years now, the Matt Lucas and David Walliams' BBC program Little Britain has been wildly popular in their native UK, beginning as a radio show, then morphing into a TV series, and finally, a highly successful ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Knight Rider: "A Knight In Shining Armor"
September 25, 2008 - 02:09a.m.
As an editor at a website I'd like you to visit and enjoy as often as possible, I probably shouldn't say this, but here goes: Why are you here? It can only be one of two reasons. Either ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Gary Unmarried: "Pilot"
September 24, 2008 - 10:09p.m.
As far as I know, Jay Mohr is a perfectly nice guy. But when he plays a perfectly nice guy, I just don't believe him. I believed him as Tom Cruise's sleazy rival in Jerry Maguire. And I ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Mentalist, "Pilot"
September 23, 2008 - 10:09p.m.
CBS is bound and determined to make a breakout TV star out of Simon Baker. He was the Guardian a few years ago, in a show that hovered in the middle of the Nielsen ratings for three seasons. Then he ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Worst Week: "Pilot"
September 22, 2008 - 10:09p.m.
The comedy of humiliation and the comedy of miscommunication are both very tricky to pull off, and judging by the first episode, the U.S. version of the BBC series The Worst Week Of My Life–here just called Worst ... -
Other Shows: season 60, episode 1
The 60th Primetime Emmy Awards
September 21, 2008 - 12:09p.m.
Earlier this year, while attempting to liveblog the Oscars, I got tripped up by the 30-40 minute lag-time between my pushing "submit" and the updated content going live on the site. In the meantime, you guys were staying much more ... -
Other Shows: season 4, episode 1
Supernatural: "Lazarus Rising"
September 18, 2008 - 11:09p.m.
You want cliffhangers? How about: Dean Winchester sold his soul to a demon to save his brother Sam. The deal was, Sam would come back from the dead whole and unzombied, and Dean would get one more year on planet ...
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Other Shows: season 8, episode 1
Smallville: "Odyssey"
September 18, 2008 - 09:09p.m.
So I've got this friend–let's call him Mike, because that's his name and I have a terrible memory. I blame him for this. See, Mark is the only person I know who watches Smallville. In fact ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Privileged: Pilot
September 9, 2008 - 03:09p.m.
Do we really need another television show or movie that presents a "real" girl's view of the secret world of rich, awful people? Well, if it's well-written, spunky and pretty to look at, why not? The pilot of ... -
Other Shows: season 1 , episode 1 and 2
90210: "We're Not in Kansas Anymore" and "The Jet Set"
September 3, 2008 - 08:09a.m.
I tried to get into Beverly Hills 90210 when it debuted in 1990. It seemed like the cool thing to do, and why not? It was about teens in California and I was not quite a teen in the Midwest ... -
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TV Club Fall 2008: The Year KITT Came Back
September 2, 2008 - 02:09p.m.
Hey, it's time for the new fall TV season again, which means it's also time to dust off the summer cobwebs here at TV Club headquarters, shut down (or at least scale back) TV Club Classic, and get ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Raising The Bar: "Pilot"
September 1, 2008 - 08:09a.m.
(Debuts tonight at 10 p.m. EST on TNT)
So there's this city, and there's this tall building, and there's this well-appointed office populated by public defenders with funky haircuts and casual business clothes. And that's ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
America's Toughest Jobs: "Crab Fishing"
August 25, 2008 - 11:08p.m.
"This is not a game show. This is life or death." –Eric Waterhouse.
Actually dude, if you were on one of producer Thom Beers' other shows, like Ice Road Truckers or Deadliest Catch or Ax Men, then yeah, you'd ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1,2&3
Z Rock
August 22, 2008 - 04:08p.m.
(Premieres Sunday, 11:30 p.m. ET on IFC)
One of the things I love about Flight Of The Conchords is the way it subverts and comments cheekily on rock and roll mythology, particularly in the episode where the boys ...
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Other Shows: season 4/2, episode 1/1
The Closer/Saving Grace
July 14, 2008 - 11:07p.m.
Though The Closer has a well-deserved reputation as one of the best police procedurals on TV–and one of the rare modern examples of the genre that's as character-driven as mystery-driven–it's also snuck in a few subtle ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Flashpoint
July 11, 2008 - 02:07p.m.
(Premieres tonight on CBS, 10 pm ET/ 9 pm CT)
It would seem that generic hour-long cop dramas will always have a place on television. Specifically on CBS. And in the case of Flashpoint, late on Friday nights in the ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
America's Greatest Dog
July 11, 2008 - 12:07p.m.
Dogs are awesome. The United States is awesome (USA! USA! USA!). Television is sometimes awesome. So a television show combining dogs and America is a sure thing, right? So why is America's Greatest Dog, which debuted last night, so ...
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Other Shows: season 4, episode 14, pt. 2
Hell's Kitchen: "The Final Two Chefs Compete"
July 8, 2008 - 10:07p.m.
When Hell's Kitchen debuted in May of 2005, it introduced two concepts that American TV viewers ate up: a cooking competition with real stakes, and a host/coach/judge with a propensity for foul-mouthed abuse. Pitched as the ultimate ... -
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The Secret Life Of The American Teenager
July 1, 2008 - 09:07p.m.
ABC Family is rebranding itself with a vengeance, folks. "A new kind of family," promises the ad campaign. How's the target demo going to feel about an original series with a parental discretion advisory up front? A show on ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Factory: "Pilot"
June 29, 2008 - 10:06a.m.
Spike TV's first original sitcom Factory is about four working-class guys who talk a lot about sex, but otherwise there's not much about the show that marks it as especially Spike-ish. It's a very low-key kind of ... -
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Hopkins
June 26, 2008 - 10:06p.m.
Sure, cancer and car accidents are a relatively grim way to celebrate the return of docureality to the summer TV lineup. But some of us have missed the genre, which has been overwhelmed in the past few years by reality ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Baby Borrowers
June 26, 2008 - 11:06a.m.
At the start of last night's premiere episode of The Baby Borrowers, long before the fleet of new Hondas simultaneously pulled into the driveways on some cul-du-sac in Fakeland, USA, a voice reminded the audience that this was a ... -
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Camp Rock
June 20, 2008 - 09:06p.m.
When I was a tweenager -- and when I was a teenager, for that matter -- the entertainment targeted to my demographic was largely forbidden to me. Of course I became obsessed with it. Years of furtively devouring Tiger Beat at friends ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Secret Diary of a Call Girl
June 17, 2008 - 01:06a.m.
The thing that Belle Du Jour, aka Hannah Baxter, the toothy, oft-bouffant blonde London hooker who is the titular call girl in Showtime's UK import comedy series The Secret Diary Of A Call Girl really wants to get across ... -
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Roman Polanski: Wanted And Desired
June 9, 2008 - 04:06p.m.
Premieres tonight on HBO, 9 p.m. ET
I saw Marina Zenovich's documentary Roman Polanski: Wanted And Desired at this year's Sundance, where it was such a hot ticket that I had to stand in line for about ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Swingtown: "Pilot"
June 5, 2008 - 08:06a.m.
What says July of 1976 to you? A hot pink Tab can with a pull tab? Stone fireplaces, shag carpeting and rounded TVs on posts? Feathered hair and shaggy moustaches? Slimline phones, Chicago 8-tracks, The Omen and late night jogging ... -
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TV Club Classic Summer Schedule: Buffy and more!
June 4, 2008 - 03:06p.m.
It's summer, which means that, if you're like The A.V. Club, it's time to shut off the TV and resume your traditional summer regimen of hiking, rock climbing, and training for the coming Labor Day half-marathon ... -
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The Mole: "3.0 Premiere"
June 2, 2008 - 10:06p.m.
Back when reality shows were only beginning to take over television ... back before Anderson Cooper reported live from the New Orleans Superdome and harangued Bush administration officials on live television ... there was The Mole. And in case you needed another ... -
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Recount
May 26, 2008 - 04:05p.m.
After years as a jaded critic and cinephile, I pride myself—if “pride” is the right word—for my ability to watch just about anything. Last year, I saw Tony Kaye’s explicit, B&W, 152-minute abortion documentary three times ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Tracey Ullman's State Of The Union: "Episode One"
March 30, 2008 - 12:03p.m.
Anyone who's ever watched one of Frank Caliendo's limp routines--or the average 2008 Saturday Night Live sketch--can tell you that there's more to a great impression that just getting the accent right. There has to be a ... -
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The Riches: "The Last Temptation Of Wayne"
March 18, 2008 - 10:03p.m.
Last year FX added a show about grifters trying to maintain their confidence lifestyle in a suburban McMansion to their lineup of crooked cops, alcoholic firemen, and oversexed plastic surgeons. The Riches had its ups and downs, but when it ... -
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Miss Guided: "Homecoming"
March 18, 2008 - 10:03p.m.
Over the past several Mondays, I've grown more and more impressed with The New Adventures Of Old Christine, the post-Seinfeld Julia Louis-Dreyfuss sitcom that CBS has kept on the air despite middling ratings and little buzz. Yes, it ... -
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The Return Of Jezebel James: "Pilot"
March 14, 2008 - 10:03a.m.
When I interviewed Parker Posey last week, I asked her about the future of The Return Of Jezebel James, the sitcom she shot seven episodes of prior to the writers' strike. She said she wasn't sure, but that she ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1&2
Lewis Black's Root Of All Evil
March 12, 2008 - 07:03p.m.
Lewis Black can come off a little shrill and one note on The Daily Show. In his "Back In Black" segments he's all deafening volume and comically over-the-top rage but he is an absolutely brilliant stand-up comedian, as evidenced ...
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Other Shows: season 32, episode 1
Saturday Night Live: "Tina Fey/Carrie Underwood"
February 25, 2008 - 11:02a.m.
As a frothing-at-the-mouth 30 Rock super-fan I have an embarrassing confession to make. Until 30 Rock's second episode I was a Tina Fey doubter, a skeptic, a semi-hater, an incorrigible, dyed-in-the-wool inveterate scoffer. When magazines expounded on Fey's ...
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Knight Rider
February 18, 2008 - 12:02p.m.
Let me burst your nostalgic bubbles immediately, dear readers. There was absolutely nothing redeeming about the two-hour TV-movie attempt to relaunch the Knight Rider franchise. It was horrible on pretty much every level, from the acting to the plot to ... -
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Super Bowl XLII
February 3, 2008 - 09:02p.m.
When I was a kid, I got so amped about Super Bowl Sunday that I'd watch every minute of pregame coverage–though back then, the pregame show rarely topped two hours, and almost every minute of it was filled ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Eli Stone
February 1, 2008 - 12:02a.m.
So let's talk about quirky television shows. In minute one of Eli Stone, when our hero (Jonny Lee Miller, aka Trainspotting's Sickboy) shows up in a small mountain village in India, in a suit, and takes a pratfall ...
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In Treatment
January 28, 2008 - 04:01p.m.
A man and a woman sit across a coffee table from one another in the opening episode of In Treatment, a new 5-times-a-week, 9-week series on HBO. He's the therapist. She's the patient. But be careful in making ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
The Moment Of Truth
January 24, 2008 - 01:01a.m.
It's only the first episode and already The Moment Of Truth has its own catchphrase: "But at what cost?" It's an apt question for a show that asks contestants to answer increasingly uncomfortable personal questions in exchange for ... -
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Terminator, The Sarah Connor Chronicles
January 14, 2008 - 07:01a.m.
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles has a strong command of tone, filling scenes of everyday existence with a sense of looming apocalypse and the uncomfortable feeling that violence could break out at any moment. It features a memorably tough female ... -
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The Daily Show/The Colbert Report
January 7, 2008 - 11:01p.m.
Well now, this is interesting. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert, the two late night talk show hosts arguably the most reliant on writers–including their most important WGA-affiliated staffers, themselves–returned to the air tonight, in order to get their ... -
Other Shows: season 3, episode 1
Anthony Bourdain: No Reservations
January 7, 2008 - 10:01a.m.
To be perfectly upfront, I know next to nothing about Anthony Bourdain. Other than the (exhaustive! professional!) research I did before interviewing him for a feature debuting this week–and the resultant, excessively fun hour and a half I spent ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
American Gladiators
January 7, 2008 - 12:01a.m.
Flawed as it might be, I find myself thinking more about Mike Judge’s Idiocracy than just about any other movie in last few years. The film transports an average guy 500 years into the future, where society has devolved ...
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Other Shows: season 16, episode 1
Late Night With Conan O'Brien
January 3, 2008 - 10:01a.m.
On his first show back Conan O'Brien seemed intent on usurping Seinfeld's position as the preeminent show about nothing. Where Leno lazily lapsed back into a deadeningly familiar rhythm O'Brien spent much of the show impishly goofing ...
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Other Shows: season 16, episode 1
The Tonight Show With Jay Leno
January 3, 2008 - 01:01a.m.
I guess I should begin this piece with a confession: I have never, in my adult life, watched a single episode of Jay Leno's The Tonight Show from start to finish. Oh sure, I've caught bits and pieces ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Make Me A Supermodel Casting Special
January 3, 2008 - 12:01a.m.
You might be asking yourself, why exactly does America need another reality competition seeking its next top model when Tyra Banks and her bumbling brigade of Fierceness continue to trounce across our television sets every few months or so, and ...
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The Late Show With David Letterman/The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson
January 2, 2008 - 10:01p.m.
While my compatriot Nathan Rabin handles the NBC late night line-up and its writer-less hosts, I stayed up late to see what the writer-assisted CBS crew would do after a two-month layoff.
First off, I know other TV critics have ... -
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Extras: "The Extra Special Series Finale"
December 16, 2007 - 05:12p.m.
Those looking for a conclusive epilogue to Extras won't find it with the Christmas special, but then again, unlike with The Office, one wasn't really necessary. The Office ended its series on a depressing downbeat, and then returned ... -
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Life On Mars: Episodes 2.1 & 2.2
December 12, 2007 - 12:12a.m.
When last we left Manchester policeman Sam Tyler (played by John Simm), he was still stuck in 1973, after allowing his father to elude arrest, thereby keeping the timeline more or less intact, and ensuring that he'd remain in ... -
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Anthony Bourdain's No Reservations: "Holiday Special"
December 10, 2007 - 10:12p.m.
So how different is the Anthony Bourdain Christmas show from the Larry The Cable Guy Christmas show, really? Both are riffing on classic '70s TV specials, though Bourdain is more overt, sitting suited in front of a fire and saying ... -
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Snoop Dogg's Father Hood: Series Premiere
December 10, 2007 - 01:12p.m.
As a character, Snoop Dogg is extremely likeable–funny, laid-back, unapologetic, but ultimately sweet. (He might be a horrible person in real life, I'm talking about his public persona here.) A reality show for him seems like a slam ... -
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Top Chef, "Holiday Special"
December 6, 2007 - 10:12p.m.
Nothing says Christmas dinner in my house like quince and bacon! Actually, the holidays are all about food and one-upmanship, so a one-off cooking competition for the season isn't all that far-fetched. A mixed bag of colorful contestants from ... -
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Larry The Cable Guy's Christmas Spectacular
December 5, 2007 - 09:12p.m.
As a southerner born and bred, I often get more insulted by non-southerners' sensitivity to redneck stereotypes than I do by the stereotypes themselves. It's just so condescending, as though these cultural guardians are trying to protect me and ... -
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Radio City Christmas Spectacular
December 1, 2007 - 10:12p.m.
There's something charmingly old-fashioned about The Rockettes of Radio City Music Hall, and the idea that even now, 80 years after the heyday of vaudeville, our hearts are expected to beat faster at the sight of 36 pairs of ... -
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TV Club update: Announcing TV Club Classic
November 20, 2007 - 01:11p.m.
We're a couple of months into this TV Club thing and we hope you're enjoying it as much as we are. (And in the case of a few shows, maybe more than we are.) We also hope you ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Frank TV: "Franksgiving" (series premiere)
November 20, 2007 - 01:11p.m.
(Premieres tonight at 11 p.m. ET)
Frank Caliendo seems like a nice guy. A nice guy who has paid his dues in the sketch-comedy world. A nice guy who can do decent impressions of a large stock of characters ...
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Other Shows: season 1, episode 1-3
Quarterlife
November 15, 2007 - 10:11a.m.
In the future, people will watch television on the Internet. Every show will be eight minutes long and feature good-looking, long-faced white people who say things like, "It's my curse that I can see what people are thinking" and ... -
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T.V. Club makes a few changes
November 7, 2007 - 02:11p.m.
We're a few weeks into this T.V. Club experiment of ours and so far it's been a lot of fun. But television is a cruel world and television coverage has to mirror that world. There are a ... -
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South Park: Imaginationland
November 1, 2007 - 10:11a.m.
Ambition can be friend and enemy to South Park, and sometimes both. The three-part "Imaginationland," which concluded last night, did an excellent job of highlighting some of the show's hugest weaknesses and greatest strengths. Overall, though–even if you ... -
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Viva Laughlin: "Pilot"
October 18, 2007 - 09:10a.m.
Premieres tonight on CBS, 10:00 pm ET/9:00 pm CT
Oh, rock and roll musicals. When will you stop breaking my heart? I have a guitar case full of hopes and dreams invested in Viva Laughlin, the Hugh ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 3
Five Days: "Day 28"
October 16, 2007 - 08:10p.m.
After last week’s episode, “Kovacs” said the following in the comments section:
I'm not buying the Crash-like interweaving of characters: the cop media rep working out next to the kidnapper who happens to meet the kids wandering away ...
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Samantha Who?: "Pilot"
October 15, 2007 - 04:10p.m.
It's a credit Christina Applegate's talent that she's been able to shake off her role on Married… With Children–where she played the same, sexually promiscuous daughter part for what seemed like 17 years–and segue into ... -
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The Price Is Right, "36th Season Premiere"
October 15, 2007 - 01:10p.m.
As the last remaining daytime network game show, The Price Is Right isn't just a CBS staple, it's practically a public trust. So when host Bob Barker announced he was stepping down after 35 years on the job ... -
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Women's Murder Club: "Welcome To The Club"
October 13, 2007 - 10:10a.m.
As my pal Scott Tobias is quick to point out, Women's Murder Club is, sadly, not about women who murder. Nor is it, thankfully, about a club full of people who murder women. Nevertheless, the series' first victim is ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 2
Five Days: "Day Three"
October 9, 2007 - 08:10p.m.
So it’s Day Three in the investigation and the abduction case is still top priority for the South Hertfordshire police and the national press, which is positively foaming at the mouth. That will no doubt change in interesting ways ...
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The Boondocks: "...Or Die Tryin'"
October 9, 2007 - 10:10a.m.
Adult Swim has a habit of fattening its lineup with joyfully goofy, if often moronic, tidbits like Squidbillies, Assy McGee, and Frisky Dingo, and The Boondocks seems determined to wall off its own voice from all that. Even during its ...
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Rock Of Love: Reunion
October 8, 2007 - 02:10p.m.
Reality TV is filled with hapless characters, none with less hap than Bret Michaels, lead singer of Poison, a solo artist, a playa by any definition, and an all-around rich, not-that-smart dude. The greatest question surrounding his reality show, Rock ... -
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Life Is Wild: "Pilot"
October 7, 2007 - 11:10a.m.
Premieres tonight on The CW, 8:00 p.m. ET/ 7:00 p.m. CT
So far this TV season we've been flooded with action-adventure and soaps, but The CW's Life Is Wild is the first old-fashioned family-friendly ... -
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South Park: "Le Petit Tourette"
October 4, 2007 - 09:10a.m.
South Park has unquestionably lost some of its cultural relevance in recent years, but the past few seasons have featured plenty of truly funny, often pointed (though admittedly sometimes dull) moments. Season 11 has been pretty meaty already, with funny ... -
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Cavemen and Carpoolers
October 2, 2007 - 09:10p.m.
The vultures started circling the moment ABC announced Cavemen last spring. That it was a sitcom starring intelligent, modern-day cavemen was enough to stir memories of Mr. Smith. That the characters were taken from a series of GEICO commercials didn ... -
Other Shows: season 1, episode 1
Five Days: "Day One"
October 2, 2007 - 10:10a.m.
(Premieres tonight on HBO, 8 p.m. ET)
(Note: Five Days is a miniseries that unfolds over the next five weeks on HBO. I intend to cover all five episodes on this blog and see how it evolves. Since it ...
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Aliens In America: "Pilot"
October 1, 2007 - 12:10p.m.
Premieres tonight on The CW, 8:30 p.m. ET/ 7:30 p.m. CT
So much could've gone wrong with Aliens In America. For starters, it's a CW sitcom that pairs a small town Wisconsin high school ... -
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Moonlight
September 28, 2007 - 07:09p.m.
Moonlight borrows from a lot of things: the opening scene is like Interview With The Vampire played for weak comedy ("Being a vampire sucks. I know that's a bad joke, but it's true."), the set up–a vampire ... -
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Big Shots: "Pilot"
September 27, 2007 - 10:09p.m.
While NBC is emphasizing geek-friendly action-adventure this season, ABC has apparently decided to follow the lead of their hits Ugly Betty, Desperate Housewives and Grey's Anatomy, by whipping up frothy melodramas set among the rich and beautiful. The network ... -
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Private Practice: "In Which We Meet Addison, A Nice Girl From Somewhere Else"
September 26, 2007 - 09:09p.m.
I stuck with Grey's Anatomy long after it had become the butt of late-night jokes, a chickfest drowning in emo-scored montages and voiceovers that improbably connect every single character to some treacly moral. The last episode I watched was ... -
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Life: "Pilot"
September 26, 2007 - 03:09p.m.
Premieres tonight on NBC, 10 p.m. ET/ 9 p.m. CT
The title of Life has a double meaning. It's both the sentence the show's hero Charlie Crews (Damian Lewis) received when he was falsely convicted of ...
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Prison Break: "Orientacion" + "Fire/Water"
September 25, 2007 - 10:09a.m.
I don't know anybody else that watches Prison Break, or maybe the ridiculous drama just isn't something that comes up in casual conversation. Maybe it's a guilty pleasure, but I didn't feel any guilt watching the ... -
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Cane
September 25, 2007 - 12:09a.m.
(Premieres tonight on CBS, 10 p.m. ET/ 9 p.m. CT)
“In America, first you get da sugar, then you get da power, then you get da women.” That line, from Homer Simpson (with a hat tip to Scarface ...
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Journeyman
September 24, 2007 - 07:09a.m.
(Premieres tonight on NBC, 10 p.m. ET/ 9 p.m. CT)
Owing more than a little to Quantum Leap, the new time-traveling series Journeyman promises a compelling sense of disorder: When Dan Vassar (Rome’s Kevin McKidd) goes back ...
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The Big Bang Theory
September 24, 2007 - 07:09a.m.
(Premieres tonight on CBS, 8:30 pm ET/ 7:30 pm CT)
Really bad television shows tend to pander to the mean: In affirming the superiority of Joe and Jane Average, they mock both the egregiously stupid (e.g. Kellie ...
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Back To You: "Pilot"
September 19, 2007 - 01:09p.m.
(Premieres on Fox tonight, 8pm ET / 7pm CT)
The traditional three-camera/filmed-before-a-live-audience sitcom has died more false deaths than Dracula but it's undeniably in the middle of a moment where only the innovative and the shameless survive. (For a ...
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Gossip Girl: "Pilot"
September 19, 2007 - 12:09a.m.
(Premieres on The CW tonight, 9pm ET / 8pm CT)
OMG! Josh Schwartz has a new show! And it’s just like The O.C., except the duplicitous rich kids are from the Upper East Side instead of the California coast ...
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K-Ville, "Pilot"
September 17, 2007 - 07:09p.m.
As a New Orleanian, I really wanted to like K-Ville. A show set in post-Katrina New Orleans draws much-needed attention to my still recovering hometown, not to mention the fact that since K-Ville is shot in New Orleans, it's ... -
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T.V. Club: The Season Premiere
September 17, 2007 - 03:09p.m.
Hi everyone and welcome to T.V. Club, the part of The A.V. Club where we talk about television. Actually, we hope "talk" isn't strong enough a word. This is the place for obsessive, unsparing coverage of the ...
