BLACK BOX:  Thursday 10PM on ABC Previously… on BLACK BOX:  Dr. Catherine Black (Kelly Reilly) is a brilliant neurologist who happens also to be hiding her bipolar condition from almost everyone in her life, even though her propensity to stop taking her meds can make her symptoms dangerously obvious.  These include a hypersexuality that […]

  A return visit to SIRENS after having seen its initial episodes revealed that the series, produced and co-created (with Bob Fisher) for US television by Denis Leary, had become even more like Rescue Me without fires, now including that show’s Lenny Clarke and John Scurti recurring as the fathers of the two main characters.  […]

  VIKINGS had a strong second season, both in the ratings (despite a move to a new night, and the loss of the blockbuster The Bible as its lead-in) and creatively.  The season, written start to finish by series creator Michael Hirst, cannily built on the story of 8th century Viking explorer Ragnar Lothbrok (Travis […]

  BAD TEACHER:  Thursday 9:30PM on CBS Previously… on BAD TEACHER:  As in the movie, Meredith (Ari Graynor in the Cameron Diaz role) is teaching grade school strictly as a way of meeting the rich fathers of her students, and otherwise devoting little effort to the job.  While she waits for Mr. Right Bank Account […]

  THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2:  Watch It At Home – The Webs Aren’t Very Tight This Time The huge, lumbering pieces of THE AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 2 rarely succeed in fitting together.  It’s as though the studio and filmmakers–director Marc Webb and screenwriters Alex Kurtzman, Roberto Orci and Jeff Pinkner (plus co-story writer James Vanderbilt)–started with […]

  A planted pilot is just what it sounds like:  an episode of an existing TV show temporarily invaded by the elements of a prospective newcomer for an semi-official on-air tryout.  Networks and studios like them because they’re cost-effective, since most of the expenses can rolled into the episodic budget of the series being utilized, […]

  PLAYING HOUSE:  Tuesday 10PM on USA – If Nothing Else Is On… Created by and starring real-life best friends Jessica St. Clair and Lennon Parham, PLAYING HOUSE is, as sisterhood comedies created by and starring real-life best friends go, less edged and genuine than HBO’s recent Doll & Em (which was the work of […]

  It was no easy feat for the second season of THE FOLLOWING be even more idiotic and vicious than its Season 1.  But devotion to craft pays off in the end, and series creator Kevin Williamson and his writer/producer partners managed to do it, with tonight’s season finale capping the accomplishment. Where to begin […]