Reviews

THE SKED Season Premiere Review: “Masters of Sex”

Posted July 14, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  MASTERS OF SEX:  Sunday 10PM on Showtime MASTERS OF SEX was one of television’s best surprises last season.  Despite a title and premise–the groundbreaking study of human sexuality by Dr. William Masters and Virginia Johnson–that seemed to promise a pay-cable softcore version of history, Michelle Ashford’s series was so bracingly smart and emotionally complicated […]

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Current Release

SHOWBUZZDAILY Toronto 2014 Review: “St. Vincent”

Posted September 5, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  ST. VINCENT (Weinstein) – Opens October 24 – Worth A Ticket Bill Murray has perfected the persona of the grouchy, reluctant hero.  The image has even attached itself to him professionally:  although he’s not close to being even semi-retired (ST. VINCENT, which premiered at the Toronto Film Festival and opens next month, will be […]

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Pilot + 1

SHOWBUZZDAILY Pilot + 1 Review: “Scorpion”

Posted September 29, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  SCORPION:  Monday 9PM on CBS Previously… on SCORPION:  Walter O’Brien (Elyes Gabel) is the leader of a group of geniuses–behaviorist Toby (Eddie Kaye Thomas), mathematician Sylvester (Ari Stidham), and engineer Happy (Jadyn Wong)–who solve high-tech crimes for the government, represented by Homeland Security agent Gallo (Robert Patrick).  The team’s ambassador of empathy is Paige […]

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Pilot + 1

SHOWBUZZDAILY Pilot + 1 Review: “Jane the Virgin”

Posted October 21, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  JANE THE VIRGIN:  Monday 9PM on CW Previously… on JANE THE VIRGIN:  Jane (Gina Rodriguez) is what the title says she is, much to the relief of her grandmother Alba (Ivonne Coli), yet still pregnant, thanks to the mistake of a doctor who accidentally inseminated her.  This naturally complicates her relationship with fiance Michael […]

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Reviews

SHOWBUZZDAILY Season Premiere (-ish) Review: “Hart of Dixie”

Posted December 16, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  CW is treating Season 4 of HART OF DIXIE as carelessly as its characters tend to treat each other.  The show’s return has been delayed until midseason, moved to the nether reaches of Friday nights, and its order cut to 10 episodes, all of which suggests that although no one is saying so for […]

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Film Festival

SHOWBUZZDAILY Sundance 2015 Review: “I Am Michael”

Posted January 30, 2015 by Mitch Salem

As an actor, James Franco often delivers performances that are packed in quotation marks, as though he’s an actor playing the role of an actor playing his role.  In I AM MICHAEL, however, he does serious, substantive work as Michael Glatze, a real-life one-time gay activist who became not just a fundamentalist Christian pastor, but a […]

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Midseason Premiere

SHOWBUZZDAILY Series Premiere Review: “One Big Happy”

Posted March 17, 2015 by Mitch Salem

  ONE BIG HAPPY:  Tuesday 9:30PM on NBC – Change the Channel Have you heard the one about the guy who makes a pact with his lesbian best friend that if they’re not with anyone else when they turn 30, they’ll have a baby together?  Have you heard the one about the guy who meets […]

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Reviews

SHOWBUZZDAILY Season Finale Review: “Broadchurch”

Posted April 23, 2015 by Mitch Salem

  The first season of BROADCHURCH was a phenomenon in the UK, one that prompted the ill-fated FOX US remake Gracepoint, and also, back in England, the somewhat controversial decision to renew the series beyond its seemingly self-contained initial season.  Against the odds, though, in Broadchurch Season 2, writer/creator Chris Chibnall wove a more inventively plotted, less monotonously paced […]

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