The thing to remember, when charting the collapse of THE OFFICE, is that the producers weren’t taken by surprise.  Steve Carell made it clear early last season that he wouldn’t be returning, and the show had months to plan for his departure and The Office 2.0.  The abject failure that resulted is a remarkable […]

  PERSON OF INTEREST:  Thursday 9PM on CBS WHERE WE WERE:  Watching Harold Finch (Michael Emerson), the secretive billionaire creator of the super-surveillance system that keeps tabs on all potential criminals and victims in the country, being kidnapped by the woman calling herself Caroline Turing (Amy Acker), who manipulated Finch’s system to make it appear […]

  PARKS & RECREATION:  Thursday 9:30PM on NBC WHERE WE WERE:  Celebrating the election of Leslie Knope to the Pawnee, Indiana City Council.  But a little concerned that her new post, and the new job in Washington DC taken by her soulmate Ben Wyatt (Adam Scott) could cause trouble in paradise. WHERE WE ARE:  As […]

  SALEM:  Sunday 10PM on WGN America Previously… on SALEM:  In the late 17th century, the town of Salem had a fanatical witch hunter in the person of Cotton Mather (Seth Gabel), but also a coven of very real witches, headed by the town’s most powerful woman, Mary Sibley (Janet Montgomery), along with Tituba (Ashley […]

  A serialized drama without major stars, a familiar genre or a grabby premise simply can’t afford to take half its season figuring itself out.  (Having a title that says absolutely nothing about what the series is about doesn’t help either.)  That almost certainly sealed the fate of HALT AND CATCH FIRE–although it’s AMC, so […]

  HOMELAND:  Sunday 10PM on Showtime WHERE WE WERE:  Wincing, as bipolar CIA agent Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes) underwent electroshock therapy, which we knew was going to make her forget the proof she had that former POW, current Congressional candidate and all-around American hero Nicholas Brody (Damian Lewis) was actually a deep-cover terrorist, working for […]

  THE CRAZY ONES was conspicuously missing from CBS’s long list of early 2014-15 series renewals, and of course it’s faint praise to say that the show isn’t as bad as that sounds.  It’s the case, though:  The Crazy Ones resisted the temptation to be merely “The Robin Williams Show,” and at its best it’s […]

  LEGENDS OF TOMORROW:  Thursday 8PM on CW – In the Queue Even with a half-season and the resources of two other series to prepare the way, LEGENDS OF TOMORROW finally arrived on CW heavy with exposition.  It was such a premise pilot, in fact, that the show’s ability to stand on its own feet […]