DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Contributors

ALEX STRACHAN

MIKE HUGHES

KIM AKASS

MONIQUE NAZARETH

ROGER CATLIN

GARY EDGERTON

TOM BRINKMOELLER

GERALD JORDAN

NOEL HOLSTON

 
 
2011
Jul
15
 
 
What a weekend for quality TV. I don't know whether it's coming or going -- and this weekend, with Friday Night Lights leaving NBC and Breaking Bad returning to AMC, it's doing both...In both cases, I'll end up referring you elsewhere...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
15
 
 
The 2011 critics' preview DVDs for AMC's Breaking Bad, which launches Season 4 Sunday night at 10 ET, are subtitled: "Warning: Extremely Volatile." And, as usual with this sly show, it's an understatement...our journey with Walter, at this point, puts him approximately at Dante's seventh circle of hell (out of nine) --the circle known as "Violence," with its unhappy occupants of tyrants, murderers and squanderers...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
14
 
 
It hasn't been a year to brag about for the Public Broadcasting Service. Four television stations so far this year have dropped their PBS memberships, three at the start of this month...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
14
 
 
Many of the nominations I most wanted to see this year, acknowledging such superb work as Margo Martindale's sinister Mags in FX's Justified and Kelly Macdonald in HBO's Boardwalk Empire, ended up making the cut. But others, as usual, did not, starting with egregious snubs in the Outstanding Drama category for FX's Rescue Me and Justified, and HBO's Treme and True Blood...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
12
 
 
Wednesday night at 10 ET, FX's Rescue Me returns with the first of its final nine episodes about New York firefighters, in a run culminating with a finale scheduled, fittingly, the week of the 10th anniversary of 9/11. Damages, the Glenn Close legal drama formerly seen on FX, returns for a new season, its fourth, Wednesday night at 10 ET as well -- but in a new location, on DirecTV's exclusive Audience network. Both series are great, and both should, must, be seen...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
12
 
 
Larry Hagman took more nasty spills as J.R. Ewing Monday night, informing viewers that younger brother Bobby "was always a fool" before vowing to take another turn as Texas' oiliest oil baron. "I'm the one who belongs on Southfork. It's mine. And only mine," he said at the close of TNT's one-minute promos for its new Dallas series, scheduled to premiere next summer...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
11
 
 
It's almost laughable that September still is considered the start of the TV season -- because if you think of seasons in terms of a bountiful harvest, now is the season of our contentment. This month, in particular, brings back fresh episodes of more great shows than we have a reason to expect at any one time. Put it this way: How many series you're watching each week right now are likely to end up on your end-of-year Top 10 TV list? For me, it's a lot...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
11
 
 
Curt Flood started in center field for the St. Louis Cardinals of my childhood and adolescence. He was an alcoholic. He abandoned his family. He ran away from a team in the middle of a season and never came back...He helped the Cardinals win World Series titles in 1964 and 1967, but in the '68 Series, he missed a fly ball in the seventh inning of the seventh game that arguably made the Detroit Tigers that year's champions.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
8
 
 
Wonder how much they paid for this one? It's become a back-of-the-mind question whenever ABC News in particular touts an "exclusive" interview. The network did it again Wednesday night with a Primetime Nightline edition built around co-anchor Terry Moran's one-on-one sitdown with Casey Anthony trial juror Jennifer Ford...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2011
Jul
8
 
 
Two more delightfully different TV shows return this weekend to brighten up the summer: HBO's Curb Your Enthusiasm sitcom, returning Sunday at 10 p.m. ET, and the sci-fi drama series Torchwood, returning Friday at 10 p.m. ET on Starz, its new home. Both shows are daring, playful, and far more intelligent than the norm in their respective genres...