HUMANS:  Sunday 9PM on AMC – If Nothing Else Is On… The sentient robot story gets another workout in HUMANS, AMC’s first import series.  It’s set in a barely futuristic England where “synths” have taken over an increasing number of menial and routine jobs.  They’re housekeepers, nannies, companions to the elderly–and prostitutes–and they’ve been […]

  Although it’s part of the CW/Greg Berlanti DC Comics assembly line, BLACK LIGHTNING, created by Salim Akil, has been strikingly different from its comrades.  So far, it hasn’t noticeably been part of the shared universe formed by Arrow, The Flash, Supergirl and Legends of Tomorrow, aside from its invocation of “meta-humans” to describe those […]

  Not to be cynical, but no show on TV could have an easier time coming up with a season-ending cliffhanger than CHASING LIFE, a YA soap whose heroine is battling leukemia.  For most of the back half of the series’ first season, April’s (Italia Ricci) cancer had been in remission, which left the show […]

  BEN & KATE:  Tuesday 8:30PM on FOX – Worth A Look   However it may fare in the ratings, this fall’s FOX Tuesday schedule is a model lesson in what a smoothly engineered line-up looks like.  At 9:30PM, The Mindy Project is a perfect match with its lead-in New Girl, and at 8:30PM, the new BEN […]

  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 […]

  SEX&DRUGS&ROCK&ROLL:  Thursday 10PM on FX – If Nothing Else Is On… Denis Leary doesn’t have a world of range, and in his new comedy SEX&DRUGS&ROCK&ROLL, the aging never-quite-star he plays called Johnny Rock isn’t very different from Tommy Gavin, the fireman he played on Rescue Me.  (Leary created both shows, on Rescue Me working […]

  SCREAM QUEENS was 13 consecutive hours of shrill campiness, and it was only fans of shrill camp who turned out for it–and they were far lower in number than FOX and the Ryan Murphy brain-trust had hoped.  As the MTV reboot of Scream had previously demonstrated, slasher movies don’t lend themselves to being extended […]

  Whatever one may say about WHITNEY and whether it’s a sitcom that deserves to reach a Season 3, it’s clear that NBC and its producers (including star Whitney Cummings herself) heard the complaints about the show’s original version.  Season 2 wasn’t officially a reboot, but it featured an assortment of changes in style and tone.  Both Whitney and […]