Midseason Finale

THE SKED Fall Finale Review: “Agents of SHIELD”

Posted December 10, 2013 by Mitch Salem

  For its fall finale (the show is taking a relatively brief break, returning on January 7), AGENTS OF SHIELD turned to its continuing storylines, such as they are.  The script by Co-Producer Shalisha Francis, directed by Holly Dale, went back to the pilot and its story of the Centipede project, which has recurred in […]

Full Story »

Reviews

THE SKED Season Premiere Review: “Episodes”

Posted January 11, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  EPISODES:  Sunday 10:30PM on Showtime EPISODES, written from beginning to end by David Crane (a creator of Friends) and fellow sitcom vet Jeffrey Klarik, improved considerably in its second season, adding some shading to its original cartoon about a married pair of relative babes-in-the-woods British writer/producers corrupted by the comfort and thorough superficiality of […]

Full Story »

Netflix

THE SKED Netflix Review: “House of Cards” Season 2 (Eps 11-13)

Posted February 18, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  House of Cards Season 2 Eps 1-3 Review Here. Eps 4-7 Review Here. Eps 8-10 Review Here. It’s a paradox of the Netflix version of HOUSE OF CARDS that in many ways, its least interesting character is the one at its center.  Pick the wildlife metaphor of choice:  Frank Underwood (Kevin Spacey) is a […]

Full Story »

Pilot + 1

THE SKED Pilot + 1 Review: “Crisis”

Posted March 23, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  CRISIS:  Sunday 10PM on NBC Previously… on CRISIS:  On its way to a field trip in New York, a class of students from a Washington DC private school are kidnapped by a large and well-organized group of captors, and in the course of the crime, first-day Secret Service agent Marcus Finley (Lance Gross) is […]

Full Story »

Reviews

THE SKED Season Finale Review: “Scandal”

Posted April 18, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  There was a scene in tonight’s Season 3 finale of SCANDAL where Olivia Pope (Kerry Washington) and Cyrus Beene (Jeff Perry) sat together after a shocking death and, in a manner that was remarkably low-key for this series, talked about the fact that they’d become such monsters that when the death occurred, their minds […]

Full Story »

Reviews

THE SKED Season Finale Review: “The Blacklist”

Posted May 12, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  THE BLACKLIST was a hit before it was much of a show, and it’s still decidedly uneven.  That was underscored again by tonight’s season finale, which killed off–well, apparently; you never know with this series–at least one regular and grievously injured more, but put very few cards on a table that could have used […]

Full Story »

Reviews

THE SKED Season Finale Review: “Silicon Valley”

Posted June 2, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  While not as loudly buzzy as Girls, SILICON VALLEY has been far more popular, indeed HBO’s highest-performing new comedy in quite a while (the fact that it follows the massive Game of Thrones on the network’s line-up hasn’t hurt, of course). Unlike a lot of comedies, both network and cable, that need some time […]

Full Story »

Pilot Reports

THE SKED Series Premiere Review: “Manhattan”

Posted July 27, 2014 by Mitch Salem

  MANHATTAN:  Sunday 10PM on WGN America – Potential DVR Alert If Salem was WGN America’s Hemlock Grove, the new MANHATTAN is the network’s bid for a House of Cards, a serious, classy drama that takes on Big Issues and is meant to put its network into another, higher league.  Of course, since WGN doesn’t […]

Full Story »