Read All Our Fall Pilot Reports here and Midseason Pilot Reports here. LUCKY 7:  Tuesday 10PM on ABC – If Nothing Else Is On… LUCKY 7 doesn’t feel like a jackpot.  Although its premise pilot doesn’t necessarily give a clear idea of what the series will be, the seemingly irresistible plot hook–a half-dozen ordinary […]

  KILLER WOMEN:  Tuesday 10PM on ABC – Worth A Look KILLER WOMEN can’t keep up the pace of its Kill Bill-inflected opening, but it’s a fun ride nonetheless.  The premise, adapted from an Argentine format (one of the producers is Sofia Vergara) by US series developer Hannah Shakespeare, is straightforwardly procedural:  Molly Parker (Tricia […]

  WE ARE MEN:  Monday 8:30PM on CBS Previously… on WE ARE MEN:  Carter (Chris Smith), whose recent engagement stopped short of the altar, has joined a colony of men without women at a San Fernando Valley apartment complex.  Frank (Tony Shalhoub), Stuart (Jerry O’Connell) and Gil (Kal Penn) are all in various stages of […]

  Improved isn’t the same as good, and the first half of REVENGE‘s third season has languished in the gulf between those two.  Under new showrunner Sunil Nayar (who replaced series creator Mike Kelley), Revenge has backed away from the extreme idiocy of last year’s The Initiative storyline, with its quasi-government conspiracies, its psychotic long-lost […]

  CHICAGO PD:  Wednesday 10PM on NBC Previously… on CHICAGO PD:  Sergeant Hank Voight (Jason Beghe) is a tough-as-nails cop out of the Dick Wolf school of tough cops, and he runs a tough squad, although he has a heart of sufficient gold to rescue street kids who come his way.  His tough squad includes […]

  The only thing more boring than a typical Oscars is one without surprises, and the closest thing to a major upset this year turned out to be Disney’s loss in the Best Animated Short category.  (The studio almost instantly rebounded with the much more important Animated Feature prize for Frozen.)  All the conventional wisdom […]

  Would ONCE UPON A TIME IN WONDERLAND have fared better if scheduled as originally planned, in the role of Sunday 8PM filler between the two half-seasons of its parent Once Upon A Time, instead of being sent to fend for itself on Thursdays?  In the short term, probably so, as Once fans might well […]

  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 […]