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

 
 
2009
Apr
24
 
 
Cain vs. Abel. Frasier vs. Ali. And now, in this corner, another duel for the ages: Joan Rivers vs. Annie Duke. NBC's "Celebrity Apprentice" has been providing some of the most jaw-dropping television of the season. And, I'm happy to say, it's not over yet...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
23
 
 
Last year at about this time, ABC renewed "Pushing Daisies," one of the best shows in its entire lineup -- then yanked it prematurely once the new season began. This year, with the announcements of next year's prime-time schedules only weeks away, there's still time for the networks to make some smart moves -- and some TV-improving renewals -- and, this time, stick with them. But will they?...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
22
 
 
Since most broadcast networks seem to be abandoning quality, the field is wide open for a competing network to embrace it. Satellite's DirecTV is doing just that, and has just added two more champion thoroughbreds to its stable: the first off-HBO telecasts of Tom Fontana's "Oz" and David Milch's "Deadwood."
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
14
 
 
TV Land presents the premiere of a new reality dating show called "The Cougar," starring a 40-year-old single mother of four who works her way through a gaggle of guys in their 20s, searching for true love. On TV Land? As Seth Meyers might ask, "Really?!?"...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
14
 
 
While working on the book, I've had several professional TV critics and reporters as guest writers. Today, as an experiment, I'm presenting an amateur. But an informed one...Since I'm now teaching TV full-time at Rowan University, I thought I'd give a student or two a chance each term to write a review from his or her perspective...The first of these is a subject that always claims one or two passionate students per term: TV wrestling...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
13
 
 
Today, instead of writing, I'm linking -- to an impressively well-reported essay on Comedy Central Daily Show anchor Jon Stewart, and his place in history. Not just cable history, or TV history... but history. (Yes, Virginia, there was history before television.) And I'd love the article, published in Sunday's Cleveland Plain Dealer by TV critic Mark Dawidziak, even if I weren't one of the people quoted...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
8
 
 
Three new shows premiere tonight, with little cause for celebration. NBC's "Parks and Recreation," with Amy Poehler, may develop into something worthwhile, but it's disappointingly derivative. NBC's "Southland" is even more disappointing, and even more derivative -- and "Harper's Island," on CBS, is a bloody mess...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
7
 
 
The FX drama series "Rescue Me," has been gone from TV so long, it makes "The Sopranos" look like a poster boy for prime-time promptness. FX even presented five-minute "mini-sodes" in the interim, just to remind viewers of what they were missing...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
5
 
 
HBO's "In Treatment" begins its second season just as Showtime's "United States of Tara" concludes its first. Both series are so engrossing, they prove that, in the right hands, TV isn't just good therapy. It's great therapy...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2009
Apr
3
 
 
Today, in 1969, CBS fired the Smothers Brothers...