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

 
 
2017
Aug
27
 
 
SEASON FINALE: Last week’s impressively staged battle, between Jon Snow’s small band of explorers and the endless White Walkers or whatever they’re called, was exciting – and even a bit sad, as one of Daenerys’ dragons was killed by the undead Night King. What’s worse, at least in terms of the escalating arms race against the no-longer-living winter warriors, is that the episode ended with the vanquished dragon rising from the dead, with those telltale bright
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
27
 
 
The dual time line explored this season by Ray Donovan continues to resonate strongly. There’s the present, where Ray is dealing with a new set of problems and headaches caused by clients and family members – and the past, where his wife’s escalating mental illness, brought on by a head injury in a car accident, is beginning to lead to more and more alarming behaviors.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
27
 
 
Last week, Matt LeBlanc, as the host of a tacky reality show in which people are confined in glass boxes, was caught on camera doing some very rude things with one of the female contestants, with only a pane of glass between them. This week, that footage is released, which leads this fictionalized Matt, once again, desperate to team with his old British scriptwriting mates… despite what they still think of him.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
26
 
 
With Hurricane Harvey making landfall in Texas Friday night as a Category 4 hurricane, the biggest storm to hit the U.S in a decade, there already are plenty of reasons to root for Texas in the coming days. But here’s one more. Today at 3:30 p.m. ET, the Lufkin Little League All-Stars, a small team from a small town in Texas, advances to the U.S. Championship Game in the 2017 Little League World Series. The All-Stars face the dominating team from Greenville, NC, in a game televised live on
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
26
 
 
It’s a day of James Cagney movies on TCM –and while a handful of Cagney films could have qualified for presentation on tonight’s installment of “The Essentials,” the prime-time showcase honor is given to one of Cagney’s best and most influential: 1949’s White Heat. This was a gangster movie from Cagney’s second, later wave of moviemaking, but it’s no less classic. What a character. What a portrayal. And what an ending. When James Cameron won
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
26
 
 
This three-part series, from some of the makers of Planet Earth II, continues its look at the American West tonight with a look at “The High Country” – at the Rockies and the Sierra Nevada, where grizzly bears roam and giant trees loom.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
26
 
 
PAY-PER-VIEW SPECIAL: The last time I paid for a pay-per-view boxing event was 20 years ago, in 1997. That’s when Mike Tyson, in a WBA Heavyweight Championship rematch against Evander Holyfield, bit Holyfield’s ear in the third round and was disqualified – but only after biting Holyfield’s other ear. At a $50 fee to watch then, that worked out to more than $15 per round. Tonight’s bout between Floyd Mayweather and Conor McGregor, by contrast, is going for a steep, u
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
26
 
 
Tonight’s Saturday Night Live is a repeat from January of this year – specifically, Jan. 21, 2017, the day after the presidential inauguration of Donald Trump. The guest host that night was Aziz Ansari, and he delivers an appropriately topical and memorable opening monologue. Also very, very memorable on this show: a cold open featuring Beck Bennett killing it as a shirtless Vladimir Putin, crowing “Hooray, we did it,” and an apolitical sketch in which Ansari is in bed wi
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
25
 
 
Don’t go looking for a hero in Can I Be Me, a new documentary on the too-short life of Whitney Houston...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
Aug
25
 
 
SERIES PREMIERE: For a goofy, spoofy comic-book superhero, the Tick is surprisingly persistent. First there was an animated TV show based on the comic book in 1994, then a very funny live-action version of The Tick, starring Patrick Warburton in the title role, in 2001. And now, on Amazon, comes a new live-action version, in 2017. That’s one TV series version of The Tick per decade, for three consecutive decades. Which begs the question: Huh? Regardless, this version – six episodes o