The braintrust behind AMERICAN HORROR STORY, headed by series creators Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk, seemed to think their work was done when they came up with the FREAK SHOW subtitle for this season.  Despite the limitless psychopaths on hand and the abundant graphic violence, this was by far the least frightening of Horror […]

  CSI:  CYBER – Wednesday 10PM on CBS – If Nothing Else Is On… Nobody tunes into a CSI show to be surprised.  The franchise has been spectacularly successful for CBS, and even now, 15 years into its run, the mothership series does a fair number each week (better than Battle Creek, which replaced it […]

  GAME OF THRONES:  Sunday 9PM on HBO There’s intrigue behind the cameras as well as in front of them on GAME OF THRONES these days.  Series creators/showrunners David Benioff and D.B. Weiss have let it be known that they want the show to end in a couple of seasons, while HBO would like this […]

  HALT AND CATCH FIRE:  Sunday 10PM on AMC The first season of HALT AND CATCH FIRE realized late in the game that it had been telling the wrong story about the wrong characters, and tonight’s Season 2 premiere was burdened to an extent by the aftereffects of that fact.  The original protagonists were the […]

  “That’s not moving on, that’s moving in a circle,” said returning Dr. O’Hara (Eve Best) in tonight’s finale of NURSE JACKIE, and of course the statement applied to most of the 7 seasons of the series as well.  Jackie Peyton (Edie Falco), a born nurse, was always sociopathically lying her way out of being […]

  Lorene Scafaria’s THE MEDDLER spins its way past so many potential crash sites that it’s practically an example of cinematic stunt-driving.  The premise itself is something out of a thousand terrible sitcoms:  the widowed mom of the title, Marnie (Susan Sarandon), is so desperate to micro-manage her daughter’s life that she moves from New […]

  THE LEFTOVERS:  Sunday 9PM on HBO It would be hard to imagine a more appropriate theme song for a Damon Lindelof TV series than one that includes the refrain “Let the mystery be.”  The title sequence of THE LEFTOVERS, which along with much else about the series has been completely revamped from its polarizing […]

  Lorne Michaels does know how to throw a party.  The 2015 finale of SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE closed with a rollicking “Santa Claus Is Coming To Town” from Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band, joined by the cast, the night’s hosts Tina Fey and Amy Poehler, special guest Maya Rudolph, fake in-studio snow–and Paul […]