> On Saturday night, HBO’s GAME CHANGE scored the network’s highest premiere rating for an original TV-movie in 8 years.  (As it always the case with HBO, the movie will be rebroadcast many times, as well as being available on HBO GO and other platforms.)  While there were certainly A list names associated with the […]

> A lot can happen between the creation of a TV pilot in the spring and the production of episodes for the regular season: a writing/producing team is hired, audience focus groups weigh in, networks and studios (which may have had their own turnover) give plenty of notes, helpful and otherwise, and critics begin to […]

THE NEWSROOM:  Sundays 10PM on HBO – DVR Alert We live in an era of TV auteurs.  Although there will always be networks and studios writing the checks–just ask Dan Harmon–it’s arguably the case that writer/producers like Matthew Weiner, Louis C.K., Kurt Sutter and Lena Dunham have more clout than all but a tiny handful […]

  LAST RESORT: Thursday 8PM on ABC – Potential DVR Alert The strangest new show on any network this season may be LAST RESORT, created and written by the man behind The Shield, Shawn Ryan, with Karl Gajdusek. The problem with trying to evaluate LAST RESORT based on its fairly riveting pilot is that the […]

  COPPER:  Sunday 10PM on BBCAmerica – If Nothing Else Is On… A lot can happen between the creation of a TV pilot in the spring and the production of episodes for the regular season: a writing/producing team is hired, audience focus groups weigh in, networks and studios (which may have had their own turnover) […]

  LAW & ORDER:  SVU:  Wednesday 9PM on NBC WHERE WE WERE:  A turf war between escort services run by Delia (Brooke Smith) and Ganzel (Peter Jacobson) turned murderous, leading to the death of a prostitute and the former Governor of NY.  Detectives Benson (Mariska Hargitay) and Amaro (Danny Pino) were on the case, along […]

  MAJOR CRIMES has been doing for TNT what it was created to do–that is, fill the hole left by the departure of the network’s long-running hit The Closer–and it’s earned the Season 2 renewal it’s already received.  Putting aside a bump for last night’s season finale, it’s been getting around a 0.7 rating in […]

  For reasons sociologists can ponder, we happen to be at a great moment for spy stories.  Last year’s remake of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, the superb Homeland (barring last week’s speed-bump episode) and the upcoming Zero Dark Thirty, the reconstruction of the fossilized bones of James Bond into the triumphant Skyfall–you can hardly take […]