BURN NOTICE:  Thursday 9PM on USA USA Network is beginning to clean its programming house, with tonight marking the beginning of the 7th and final season of BURN NOTICE (the exit of veteran Psych is expected not to be far behind), and the arrival of the new Graceland.  Burn Notice has been a stalwart […]

  KEVIN (PROBABLY) SAVES THE WORLD:  Tuesday 10PM on ABC – In the Queue ABC’s KEVIN (PROBABLY) SAVES THE WORLD is the closest any broadcast network has to a Big Swing this fall, and as such, it deserves some respect.  But wow, is it a mess.  The only reason the fantasy-inspirational dramedy holds together even […]

  GOTHAM did a better job of navigating its clog of characters in its second season.  Bruno Heller’s mash-up of Batman origin story, the Dark Knight trilogy, 1930s-style cop drama, and all-around comic book freak-show still had at least one plotline too many–truthfully, no one would miss its Riddler, Edward Nygma (Cory Michael Smith), if […]

  Although frequently tortuous to watch, TOP OF THE LAKE wasn’t really Snob TV, where a Famous Filmmaker slums their way through a series.  It’s more that narrative has never been of particular interest to Jane Campion, even in her best films like The Piano or Holy Smoke, and giving her 6 hours to play […]

  CHASING LIFE:  Tuesday 9PM on ABCFamily Previously… on CHASING LIFE:  Very inconveniently, 24-year old aspiring Boston reporter April Carver (Italia Ricci) has just been diagnosed with leukemia.  The timing couldn’t be worse, not because she’s afraid for her life–April more or less tosses that concern off–but because she’s just started dating hunky reporter Dominic […]

  AMERICAN CRIME:  Sunday 10PM on ABC John Ridley’s AMERICAN CRIME feels even more like an outlier amid the world of network television than it did when it debuted two years ago.  Broadcasters have largely responded to the erosion in their ratings by seeking bigger and bigger tents, relying on procedurals, franchises, remakes and stars […]

  RAY DONOVAN:  Sunday 9PM on Showtime When a car crashes into a Los Angeles wall in the Season 4 premiere of Showtime’s sizable if somewhat inexplicable hit RAY DONOVAN, it doesn’t just crash into a wall:  it crashes directly into a giant mural of the Virgin Mary.  That’s the way Ray Donovan rolls, its […]

  ONCE UPON A TIME IN WONDERLAND:  Thursday 8PM on ABC Previously… on ONCE UPON A TIME IN WONDERLAND:  In this revisionist spin on the classic tale, a Victorian-era young adult Alice (Sophie Lowe) has escaped from the asylum where her father kept her after hearing the wild tales of her childhood, and she’s headed […]