TYRANT:  Tuesday 10PM on FX – If Nothing Else Is On… For better or worse, it may be particularly unfair to judge FX’s new TYRANT on the basis of its pilot alone.  There’s been an unusual amount of behind-the-scenes dissension on the show that’s gone public, and one of the upshots is that although […]

  MURPHY BROWN:  Thursday 9:30PM on CBS MURPHY BROWN was Prestige TV comedy before that concept really existed.  When it went on the air 30 years ago, it was a year before the arrival of Seinfeld, and 5 years ahead of Frasier, and while there were other intelligent, funny sitcoms on the air, Diane English’s […]

  Read All Our Fall Pilot Reports here and Midseason Pilot Reports here. SUPER FUN NIGHT:  Wednesday 9:30PM on ABC starting October 2 – If Nothing Else Is On… Anyone who’s seen Rebel Wilson confidently walk away with chunks of Pitch Perfect, Bachelorette or Bridesmaids knows that she’s a breakout comic talent, and possibly even […]

  90210:  Monday 8PM on CW WHERE WE WERE:  Mid car-crash.  A truck was plowing into Dixon (Tristan Wilds), in a way that would surely kill an actor in the middle of contract renegotiations.  Dixon’s love Adriana (Jessica Lowndes), singer and sometime alcoholic, drug addict and maniac, to whom Dixon was driving, had given up […]

  Cable’s USA Network has the reputation of being a place where procedurals basically repeat variations on the same episode over and over for years, until the series finally dies of old age.  That’s certainly the case with some of the network’s stalwarts like Psych and Burn Notice, but recently USA has shown a welcome […]

  DECEPTION:  Monday 10PM on NBC – Change the Channel Stop me if you’ve heard this one before:  a beautiful young woman returns to the Long Island estate of the family she knew when she was growing up, becoming involved with their intrigues as she hides her true identity, unfinished business on her mind.  Now, […]

  FAMILY TOOLS –  Wednesday 8:30PM on ABC – Change the Channel   J.K. Simmons is one of our national character actor treasures, but he tests the bounds of our willingness to follow him anywhere with FAMILY TOOLS, which is getting a last-minute run starting tonight. Tools is sitcom with a capital “sit.”  The rollicking […]

  WATCHMEN:  Sunday 9PM on HBO The Damon Lindelof/HBO WATCHMEN provides a new wrinkle to the world of IP exploitation.  It’s not an adaptation of the classic Alan Moore/Dave Gibbons graphic novel (a la Zack Snyder’s all-too-reverent 2009 film) or even a reboot, but a newly conceived work that’s more like a spin-off or a […]