Author Archive
 

 

THE SHOWBUZZDAILY REVIEW: “Hyde Park on Hudson”

  To address the very specific elephant in HYDE PARK ON HUDSON‘s room:  it’s no King’s Speech.  It’s hard to avoid the comparison, because the two movies have a clear overlap, Hyde Park being t...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED: CBS Midseason Schedule

  CBS, in keeping with its CBS-ness, announced a minimal set of tweaks to its schedule for midseason.  The network doesn’t have a lot of needs or vacancies, so it basically just filled those holes it has. To replace...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

THE SKED THURSDAY NETWORK SCORECARD – 12/6/12

Scandal shows some heat. ABC:  A dynamite episode of SCANDAL (written by creator Shonda Rhimes) that managed to propel the story both backwards and forwards via flashbacks and a startling episode-ending revelation had by far i...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED’S WEDNESDAY NETWORK SCORECARD – 12/5/12

Thanks to Nielsen delays, Chicago Fire had to wait to get some unaccustomed good news. NBC:  CHICAGO FIRE benefits by not airing against a new CSI on CBS, because their audiences, while overlapping, prefer the latter when they...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

THE SHOWBUZZDAILY REVIEW: “Quartet”

  QUARTET:  Watch It At Home – AARP’s Version of a Rock Concert Reunion Movie It may come as a surprise to some of the directors who’ve tangled with Dustin Hoffman to hear that QUARTET is supposed to mar...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED FALL FINALE REVIEW: “Nashville”

  ABC’s NASHVILLE has reached the midpoint of its season as one of the better dramas on network television, and also one of the more frustrating.  Particularly galling is that it seems to falter worst at the things ...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

CRITICS AWARDS: The National Board of Review’s Day

  The National Board of Review is an organization whose members are largely unknown (and the opinions of whom are of zero interest), with an existence that gets noticed on exactly one day of the year, like that one groundh...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED’S TUESDAY NETWORK SCORECARD – 12/4/12

Lingerie beats larynxes. CBS:  The VICTORIA’S SECRET FASHION SHOW, while down almost a ratings point from last year’s installment, still scored as the highest-rated show of the night (doubling recent numbers for Ve...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

THE SKED: ABC Midseason Schedule

  ABC announced its midseason premieres and timeslots today, and while most of them were predictable (a pair of shortform reality series to fill in for the Dancing With the Stars results show between cycles on Tuesdays, re...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED’S SUNDAY CABLE SCORECARD – 12/2/12

  SHOWTIME:  HOMELAND has flirted with 24-ness since it went on the air.  It’s in the show’s DNA, given its creators’ resumes and the overlapping subject matter.  This week, barring a startling reversa...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

THE SKED’S MONDAY NETWORK SCORECARD – 12/3/12

A night of mostly declines. NBC: THE VOICE fell 0.3 to 3.9,  still the highest-rated show of the night.  BLAKE SHELTON’S NOT SO FAMILY CHRISTMAS held very well, with a 2.8 that was higher than several recent episodes of...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

THE SKED FALL FINALE REVIEW: “Once Upon A Time”

  Having blown up the initial premise of their show in its Season 1 finale, ONCE UPON A TIME creators Edward Kitsis and Adam Horowitz have inventively plotted a Season 2 that came to a satisfying Act 1 culmination in the s...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

THE SKED FALL FINALE REVIEW: “Revenge”

  REVENGE, in its second season, demonstrates the perils of stretching a good thing too far.  (Also being stretched:  ABC’s concept of a “fall finale,” since unlike shows like Revolution and The Walking...
by Mitch Salem
 

 
 

SUNDANCE 2013: The Premieres

  The Sundance Film Festival saved its most high-profile announcements for today, releasing the titles of its Narrative and Documentary Premieres.  The lion’s share of the festival movies that reach theatres/VOD wil...
by Mitch Salem
 

 

 

CRITICS AWARDS: “Zero Dark” Fires the First Shot

  Year-end awards from critics groups have two purposes in the big-picture (which is to say the Oscar) context.  In the aggregate, if enough of the groups are in agreement to form a consensus, they can make an accolade se...
by Mitch Salem