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DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

Bianculli's Blog

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

The Cold Light Reader

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Dateline Donovan
Contributors

DAVID HINCKLEY

All Along the Watchtower

ED BARK

Uncle Barky's Bytes

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TV That Matters

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Open Mike

ED MARTIN

Ed Martin's TV Mix

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Aerial View

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MNtv

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TV Feeds My Family

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TV Eye

GARY EDGERTON

Must-Click TV

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Raised On MTM

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Crossing Jordan

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TVWW ARCHIVE

Contributors Archive
 
 
2020
May
19
FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS: ‘PBS FRONTLINE’ TAKES A STIRRING LOOK AT THE MEDICAL FRONT LINES AGAINST COVID-19 IN NORTHERN ITALY By Alex Strachan
 
 
Inside Italy’s COVID War isn’t just about the numbers. Far from. This is a deeply moving and personal story about life and death...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
PATTON OSWALT: I LOVE EVERYTHING By David Bianculli
 
 
SPECIAL PREMIERE: Patton Oswalt has gone through a lot since his previous standup special – he’s married again, for one thing. But in this solo standup act, recorded at Charlotte before the coronavirus began to spread, he doesn’t devote much time to that topic, or even to politics. “I don’t have any Trump material, that’s what I’m saying,” he says. Instead, he spends a few minutes on why he doesn’t joke about President Trump: &ldquo
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
THE STORY OF SOAP By David Bianculli
 
 
Right now, television has every reason to look back fondly upon its past – because the present is not so bright, and the future is bleak. At this moment, though, ABC is doubling down on nostalgia, with a Garry Marshall salute last week and this salute to the soap opera tonight. The soaps began on radio, so this special actually is mourning a pair of formerly popular media enterprises. When the soaps migrated to television, the first generation of daily dramas was staid and somber – b
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
THE SHAWSHANK REDEMPTION By David Bianculli
 
 
Last year, to mark the silver anniversary of this inspirational film based on the Stephen King novella, Mark Dawidziak wrote a well-researched book titled The Shawshank Redemption Revealed: How One Story Keeps Hope Alive. It explains how director and screenwriter Frank Darabont, and actors Tim Robbins and Morgan Freeman, absolutely nailed their respective attempts to bring King’s story and characters to the screen. Have you seen The Shawshank Redemption before? If you&r
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
AMERICAN EXPERIENCE: "MR. TORNADO" By David Bianculli
 
 
Does the name Tetsuya Theodore Fujita ring a bell? It didn’t to me. But he’s the scientist who, more than anyone else, established the science behind severe storms. The measure of tornado damage intensity, the F-scale, is named after him. But his interest in the extent of the damage of cataclysmic events is not at all limited to weather patterns: He began by analyzing the reach and devastation of the nuclear explosions at Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Check local listings.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
FRONTLINE: "INSIDE ITALY'S COVID WAR" By David Bianculli
 
 
Filmmaker Sasha Achilli got rare access to the spreading pandemic crisis by getting permission to embed at an Italian hospital and follow an emergency room doctor, Francesca Mangiatordi, who is shown both at work and at home, where her family is understandably very worried about her. Check local listings. For a full review, see Alex Strachan's TV That Matters. 
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
AN APPRECIATION: KEN OSMOND 1943 - 2020 By David Hinckley
 
 
I have a friend, Joe, who argued years ago that the most important character on television for a kid growing up in the late 1950s and early 1960s was...Eddie Haskell from Leave It To Beaver...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
19
1994: 'L.A. LAW' ENDS AFTER EIGHT SEASONS By David Bianculli
 
 
L.A. Law ended its eight-season run on this day in 1994...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
18
2006: 'WILL & GRACE' ENDS ITS EIGHT-SEASON RUN By TV WW
 
 
This day in 2006 marked the final telecast of NBC's Will & Grace, the late-nineties equivalent of The Odd Couple...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
May
18
MONDAYS WITH MICHELLE OBAMA By David Bianculli
 
 
For a while, this has become a weekly thing – something on which parents can depend, in which former First Lady Michelle Obama invites special guests to join her in reading children’s books to young viewers. This week, in a program also shown online on the Facebook and YouTube Mondays with Michelle Obama pages or channels, the books featured are Giraffe Problems (choosing the right necklace, perhaps?) and The Bear Ate My Sandwich. (My advice, in response
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
New From TVWW

PBS' 'Frontline’ Examines Pension Promises and — Spoiler Alert — Finds the Math Doesn’t Add Up
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
The Decadence of ‘Versailles’ Comes to Ovation
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
Prescribing Mamie Gummer in 'Emily Owens, M.D.'
By Ed Bark
 
 
 
 
Looking for a Free Ride? HBO Can Deliver
By Christy Slewinski
 
 
 
 
'Pass the Biscuits' Part of the Hatfield-McCoy Pop-Culture Legacy
By Noel Holston
 
 
 
 

Dispatches From TVWW

'Extinction: The Facts' is a Sobering Call to Action
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
How 'Mayans' Has Been Influenced by the Show's Creator Elgin James
By Mike Hughes
 
 
 
 
For Whom the Bell Tolls: Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Take on Ernest Hemingway, the Man and the Myth
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
In the Final Season, Sutton Foster's Liza is Now the Genuine Version of Her 'Younger' Self
By Monique Nazareth
 
 
 
 
Season 2 of 'City on a Hill' Returns with Kevin Bacon, Aldis Hodge, and Boston Corruption
By David Hinckley