yay!

Based on Nielsen's Live+7 ratings over multi-telecasts, FX's Sons of Anarchy series delivered a weekly average audience of 3.9 million A18-49 and 5.83 million total viewers. FX renewed the series starring Charlie Hunnam, Katey Sagal and Ron Perlman for a second season set to debut next spring.

the best of 08 battle begins

according to time magazine. i can't say i agree completely.

Top 10 TV Series of 2008
1. The Shield (FX)
2. Mad Men (AMC)
3. The Presidential Election (Various outlets)
4. Dr. Horrible’s Sing-Along (Website, iTunes, etc.)
5. The Wire (HBO)
6. Breaking Bad (AMC)
7. Lost (ABC)
8. Battlestar Galactica (Sci Fi Network)
9. Architecture School (Sundance Channel)
10. Chuck (NBC)
Top 10 TV Episodes of 2008
1. Lost, "The Constant" (ABC)
2. The Shield, "Family Meeting" (FX)
3. The Wire, "Late Editions" (HBO)
4. In Treatment, "Alex-Week Eight" (HBO)
5. Breaking Bad, Pilot (AMC)
6. Battlestar Galactica, "Revelations" (Sci Fi Network)
7. The Colbert Report, Jan. 22 episode w/Andrew Young (Comedy Central)
8. 30 Rock, "Cooter" (NBC)
9. Mad Men, "A Night To Remember" (AMC)
10. You Suck at Photoshop "Distort, Warp and Layer Effects" (My Damn Channel)
Source: Time Magazine

it was only a matter of time

sing it with me kids: "so long, farewell blah blah blah and good night!" bye bye pushing daisies, au revoir eli stone, adios dirtysexymoney.

inevitable decision from the disney network. i remain donald sutherland's loyal servant and already anxiously await his next project. after all, anyone who could make the spine-shudderingly bad commander-in-chief with geena davis worth watching will come back to the small screen again and again.

jericho jr.... sort of

per THR: "FX is looking at a drama project called AR2, focused on a group of college aged kids in the midwest who begin a second American Revolution. The project is from a couple of notables: Prison Break's Paul Scheuring, and West Wing's Tommy Schlamme."

well, we all know that i just LOVE tommy schlamme. i love his name. i find myself including it in otherwise unrelated sentences just to hear it said out loud. i also love his work - the whole wide breadth of it from chicago hope to studio 60. i do NOT like his prediliction for shoving his wife into every drama he has in some manner or another. however, i think this show definitely skews too young for her to show up unless she is someone's mom. the verdict is obviously out until i see how the casting lines up, but if they can get a fairly decent group of sort of knowns, i see good things.

FX is definitely the network where a show like this belongs because timeslot shuffling isn't an issue and any ratings in the 1.xx arena are considered decent. this is the network that hung in there with The Riches and Dirt, after all.

bunker hill

The upcoming Bunker Hill on TNT is sounding better and better with every new casting addition I read - Veteran actor Brian Dennehy was just added to costar with Donnie Wahlberg and Bridget Moynahan, per THR. The pilot is set in the Bunker Hill area of Boston and explores crime corruption and deceit with Wahlberg as a cop who returns to his childhood home, Moynahan as his sister-in-law and Dennehy playing a former mobster who now runs a flower shop. I think this show is starting in spring 2009, when Raising the Bar and Damages return... I think TNT used to be the poor man's FX, but now TNT is the new FX for me.

the iconoclasts indulgence

season 4 begins tonight on the sundance channel and includes a few surprises:
desmond tutu + richard branson
stella mccartney + edward ruscha
the overwhelming number of hollywood types throughout the series has me wondering though, has iconoclasts missed its mark??? season 1 was solid and set the show up to be at the very least, an interesting diversion. i am not sure they've been able to capture my attention quite as much since.
season 1 pairings:
brian grazer + sumner redstone
mario batali + michael stipe (they cooked and sang together!)
robert redford + paul newman (this one was AMAZING)
samuel l jackson + bill russell
tom ford + jeff koons
renee zellwegger + christine amanpour
season 2 was entirely forgettable. even the pairing that had the most potential, alice waters + mikhail baryshnikov was fairly mundane.
season 3 reads like a guest list to a movie premiere. i'll keep it up for at least the 2 episodes mentioned above, but may skip those like mike myers + deepak chopra.

save the cheerleader, save the world. when did heroes get so bad?

this show started out so well. underrated concept (what was the last live action comic book show on tv? wonderwoman or incredible hulk?), interesting story arcs, a myriad of characters to relate to.. season 2 sort of lost me a little, but i was still committed. now i find myself 5 or 6 episodes into the 22 episodes of season 3 and i am wondering what happened. why is this one of the last shows i gravitate to on my weekly tivo list? too many characters, especially too much of the brother/sister where the sister cries black tears and kills everyone. too much arcing and rearcing and time travelling. too little repetition of the original cheerleader saves the world overarching theme. in short, it moved so far away from where it started.
it was an interesting mystery you honestly felt you could figure out - who were the heroes?, how did they get their powers?, was claire's dad really bad? was the company working for or against the heroes? how would the cheerleader save the world?. the good vs evil themes do make for successful tv ratings. other viewers must have been finding themselves in the same place because ratings have dropped (aka plummeted). from daily cynopsis - "Jesse Alexander and Jeph Loeb, co-executive producers on NBC's Heroes were laid off Sunday. Both had been with the show since its inception and led the daily production operation reporting to Tim Kring, creator/executive producer. In its third season, Heroes, produced by Universal Media Studios, has posted lower than expected ratings and the show is dealing with budget overruns this season. Alexander and Loeb were apparently cut because NBC's executives are concerned about the creative direction of the show. "

i fully expected the peacock to look for a fall guy (or guys) when their 'can't miss' show starts missing. but am surprised they didn't pick Tim Kring - the guy has 54 writing credits under his belt while the other 2 have total combined writing creds of 7 episodes. ultimately, Kring holds the creative direction as the shows creator, exec producer and overwhelmingly primary writer and would have been the better choice if they were looking to revamp. my guess is contractually they couldn't get rid of him. perhaps they should change the tagline to fire the producer, save the show....

additional episode requests and cancellations

ABC: 7 new episodes of Samantha Who?. This order takes the total number of episodes this season to 20. Normally, a full-season order consists of 22 episodes, however ABC indicated it has enough episodes in the pipeline from other sitcoms, such as Scrubs and According to Jim and does not need as many episodes of Samantha Who?. imo, a great move by ABC - this show rocks and is one of the last funny shows on tv. samantha is sort of a modern day mary tyler moore.
NBC: 9 new episodes of Kath & Kim, giving it a full-season order. To date, Kath & Kim, starring Molly Shannon and Selma Blair has averaged a 2.6/6 among A18-49 and 6.0 million viewers. i can't be the only person thinking WTF right now... this show is just not that good.
CW: Media Rights Capital is pulling the plug on its Sunday night shows - Valentine and Easy Money. MRC programs Sunday nights on The CW this season, and to continue to fill these two slots, will clearly have to come up with two new shows... per recommendation of my brother, i tried watching easy money, but i just couldn't get into it. as a result, i also caught an episode of valentine and it was so weekday afternoon bad scifi romance crossover from WPIX channel 11 i couldn't believe that MRC paid for it. or that the chick from The OC ended up there!!!

ex-list exits

not that this news is a surprise (http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117994775.html?categoryId=14&cs=1) because....

1. the timeslot was a huge mistake - Friday nights at 9 pm? when the key demographic ex-list would appeal to (age 18-35 women) is out on the town prowling for men? disaster. (like moonlight, miss match, men in trees, etc)
2. the show wasn't getting any help being bookended between two shows that decidedly skew towards older males - boob whisperer and numb3rs. it was obvious audience retention was going to be difficult if not impossible.
3. CBS' baileywick= old white people. they are barely making that work with the numerous acronym shows. attempting to stretch and contort doesn't work for them. didn't they learn anything from the katie couric debacle?
4. ex-list was too old for its content. the characters weren't yet established in life, none were married, or had kids, or had seen real career success. but they were in their mid-30s!! we've already learned from every other show on television that by the time you are in your 30s you are 'all set'.
5. the premise of the show was growing tired after just the 4 aired episodes, i don't think that it could have sustained more than a season, even with creative writers.
6. this show belonged on ABC, following grey's anatomy or private practice. and not just because elizabeth reaser used to be crazy rebecca/ava on the shonda rhimes franchise. a quirky skinny woman who runs a flower shop, has over 100 ex-boyfriends and nothing better to do than surf and go out with guys all the time that her psychic recommends, can only be thought of as a legitimate form of entertainment to the same audience who finds the premise that a group of glowingly beautiful people all decide to live, work and date each other while becoming doctors in seattle and listening to really super trendy never heard of indie rock bands, although not a single one of them seems intelligent enough to actually have passed the MCATs, entirely plausible and worthy of suspension of disbelief.

what is surprising however is how quickly and thoroughly they axed it, like someone over at the Eye was trying to get rid of any evidence that the show ever did exist within the confines of CBS. they even took the supporting pages and episodes off of their website. this is a network that still has jericho episodes available online for christ sake! i wonder if they realized it was a colossal misstep, or if the cancellation is just the fallout after diane ruggiero left the show (also produced veronica mars and dirty sexy money).

the only thing i am now left wondering is - who was the ex that she ends up marrying? was it the guy whose cat she had rescued or the ex-boyfriend who she shared custody of the dog with? actually, i am not sure i am really wondering that at all... but if you have any guesses, comment.

adding insult to injury

Some network execs never learn to quit while they are ahead: The CW and CBS Paramount Network Television are developing a remake of the 1990s FOX hit Melrose Place. The storyline has not been hashed out and a writer is being sought. This news comes after the pair collaborated on the current 90210, a spinoff of Beverly Hills, 90210 which also originally spawned Melrose Place. CBS Paramount owns the rights to Beverly Hills, 90210 and Melrose Place when it purchased Spelling TV.
It certainly won't have the cameos of previous castmates to tempt an older audience (30-45 yr olds) the way 90210 did with Garth, Dougherty and Nat the Peach Pit owner. Rob Estes is already on the new 90210, Marcia Cross and Doug Savant are on Desperate Housewives, Kelly Rutherford is on Gossip Girl, Grant Show is on Swingtown (which got picked up by Bravo or A&E for a second season), Courtney Thorne-Smith is on According to Jim, which still has a pick-up order for this season, Andrew Shue has given up acting for non-profits, Jack Wagner has been on the Bold and the Beautiful for years now, even Josie Bissett is on ABC Family's Secret Life of the American Teenager.



I hear Daphne Zuniga is free - she got dumped off of her role as Brook's evil mom on the CW "hit" One Tree Hill earlier this year. Perhaps she can reprise her role as Jo, the skulky photographer obsessed with Jake in the early seasons. And they might be able to get Heather Locklear straight out of rehab, but that would be tough for the producers to insure....
I didn't actually think this show had a strong enough premise the first go-round: a bunch of attractive young struggling 20 somethings live in an apartment building together. And there was too much fiction for me to suspend my disbelief and enjoy the drama - why was Heather Locklear living in a walk-up apartment on Melrose when she was the VP of a highly successful advertising company? Why did Dr Micheal live at the same shoddy apartment building? He was a surgeon for gods sake.
My suggestion to the CW: Leave well enough alone and be happy you actually got some traction on 90210.

30 rock early look

NBC has posted the season premiere of 30 Rock online one week early. Visit NBC.com.

sons of anarchy... surprise surprise

the best show no one is watching, or at least the best new show no one in this forum is blogging about. apparently, people somewhere agree with me:

FX has picked up a full second season of 13 episodes of Sons of Anarchy. So far, this new dramatic series is being touted by the network as the most successful launch among A18-49 since the debut of Rescue Me.

i watch this show for every reason under the sun, namely - it's about a small marginalized demographic in the US and it has the potential to be as culturally broadening as the sopranos was re: jersey mafia while still being entertaining and offensive. the character development is complicated and subtle, and we're only 7 episodes in... it is obvious that it is following Shakespeare's Hamlet, but i have no idea how long they will stick to the Bard's script. set in a small fictional town in california, ironically or poetically called charming, it has crept its way onto my list of favorite shows. i'd love to write an ode to katey sagal, (for the uneducated out there, she's peg bundy) who plays a sympathetic yet domineering queen of the gang - Gemma Morrow - who is both a mega bitch and a hooker with a heart of gold.... last week she slammed Taryn Manning's character in the face with a skateboard for screwing her husband at a patch over party and then later was a cooing mother figure towards her as she tried to leave the hangaround caste and join the ranks of old ladies of Sam Crow (Sons of Anarchy Motorcycle Club, Redwood Original Charter). and ron perlman is just amazing as clay. i haven't ever really considered him to be worthwhile, until now.

in short, go here, http://vod.fxnetworks.com/fod/play.php?sh=soa, and start watching, if you haven't already added this as new and repeats to your series recording list.

Worst Week Ever

Is this show a poor man's Arrested Development?

I think you'll find that it is. It's funny, but with the paterfamilias role resting on the shoulders of Eric's dad (Kurtwood Smith) from That 70's Show, there is a lot of re-tread going on. The dad is kind of a one hit wonder, but funny nevertheless.

The part of the son-in-law-to-be (Kyle Bornheimer) is acted like a SNL skit; tons of stammering and elongated vowels. Can't you see your queue? Aren't you memorizing your lines? It feels like AD in that it seems like they are filming with less than one script read through. Note that he had a cameo in Breaking Bad!

Also I don't quite get the premise. Do they live together in that house forever? Is that just a week long? Will the show end after 7 episodes? Enlighten me!

Well, this article states that there are 13 episodes planned.

Final note. The girlfriend/fiance is hot.

Mid-Fall Review

Interesting review of many shows. Picks winners & losers.

The Contender

AGO just informed me that "The Contender" is coming back in December on VERSUS (never heard of it). It will be hosted by Tony Danza, YUCK!!!!! Despite their choice of host, I am very excited about this show returning!!! I hate boxing but I LOVE this show!!!! CHEERS!!!!

The Best Burger in NYC... HIMYM last night was classic

I think we all have one of these - I ate a tuna melt somewhere in my early 20s that was perhaps the most delicious sandwich I have ever consumed, but I cannot remember where I actually ate that tuna melt, and try as I might, I cannot recreate it at home. Marshall's search for his lost burger was dead-on; the best spoken line during last night's HIMYM episode was Barney (of course) saying "This burger is so good, I want to sew my ass shut." I think that EVERY SINGLE TIME I eat my brother's BBQ chicken.

So, without further ado - Marshall's ode to the burger speech - I wish I could find a video of him actually saying this - if anyone finds it online, please email me so I can add to the post, as it deserves a special place in our hearts and our blog.

Marshall: "Just a burger! Robin it is so much more than just a burger.I mean that first bite. Oh, what heaven that first bite is.The bun like a sesame freckled breast of an angel resting gently on ketchup and mustard below- flavors mingling in a seductive pudduah (?) And then a pickle. The most playful little pickle. And then a slice of tomato. a leaf of lettuce, and a...patty of ground beef so exquisite: Swirling in your mouth- breaking apart and combining again in a fugue of sweet, savory. So...delightful. This was no mere sandwich of grilled meat, toasted bread, Robin. This was God speaking to us through food."

Two And A Half Men: The Worst Show Everyone Else Is Watching

Gawker pretty much sums it up in their post.

"The Beginner's Guide to 'Two And A Half Men'"

Celebrating John Noble

I think this is a good time to look at the character that might be this year's break out role for an actor in any kind of television show. Of course I'm talking about John Noble, who plays Dr. Walter Bishop on Fringe. On the show, he's Pacey's dad!

You may not have seen his earlier work in The Nostradamus Kid (1993) where he played General Booth (and neither have I) but he does have an interesting background. He played Denethor in a few of the Lord of the Rings movies. He was a regular on 24 and a few other series. He was on Italian TV! He's Australian! He was a regular on an Aussie soap! This is the kind of solid actor we need in our TV shows. Between this guy and the guy that plays House, Australia is making a great showing on US television.

Top Model

Have to say I was very disappointed last night with the judges choice to get rid of Isis from ANTM. So what if she is transgender and was a little nervous that her penis might pop out during the water shoot...........she still looked amazing. Samantha should have gotten the stiletto for her disrespect of the designer in her runway fiasco and for her hideous bow legs.

On the flip side, I was so glad to see Hannah and her sickly sweet "I'm for Alaska" routine go back to the frozen tundra. I'm no super model but I could have strutted my stuff on the catwalk with a blindfold on a zillion time better her feeble attempt. Go home and build igloos with Sarah Paulin!!

Ok McKey, I'm routing for ya!!!!

the mcginley curse

all knowledgeable television watchers acknowledge that ted is the patron saint of jumping the shark. his recent stint on DWTS makes me wonder - is DWTS now close to cancellation just for daring to add ted to the dance card, even if it was just for 2 nights??? (not that i would really mind terribly if DWTS gets cancelled, it is not as terribly amusing to watch Carrie-Ann, Len and Bruno spar with each other as it once was... and the stars who sign up are getting less and less interesting every nanosecond).

and for those of you gentle readers who do not believe in the curse, i cite just a few examples: happy days, the love boat, dynasty, the john laroquette show, married with children... the list goes on.

Relates to TV

http://gawker.com/5053486/chris-rock-to-bill-clinton-hillary-lost

I don't know how to make links look good using this software, but this is FUNNY.

I love Criminal Minds

I might have to write a post called I Love Criminal Minds at least once a week all season. The reasons are so varied, but start with Mandy Patinkin.

On an unrelated note, I wish that David Blaine stopped his foolish Dive of Death. What a fraud that loser is.

bets on the 1st new show to be cancelled?

Since we already know that 90210 and Raising the Bar have gotten picked up for full seasons (to some of our disdain)... the question becomes which one will be the first to go? Without even having seen it, my bets are on Crusoe on NBC. They cancel everything.

Question: Is the lead actor in the Mentalist a poor man's Hugh Jackman?

from cmarv.

how is the new tv show the mentalist any different than 'psych'?

per BGH:
Two differences:
1. Not funny.
2. It will be cancelled in a month.