BATTLE CREEK:  Sunday 10PM on CBS – Change the Channel While not the worst show of the season, BATTLE CREEK may well be the most disappointing.  The light procedural combines the talents of two of TV’s premier writer/showrunners, Breaking Bad‘s Vince Gilligan and House‘s David Shore, with a cast that includes Josh Duhamel, Dean […]

  THE SHANNARA CHRONICLES:  Tuesday 10PM on MTV – If Nothing Else Is On… MTV is late to the YA fantasy-adventure party with THE SHANNARA CHRONICLES, so it doesn’t have the element of surprise going for it.  There’s no innovation here, either, because while the main source material, Terry Brooks’ 1982 novel “The Elfstones of […]

  THE NIGHT OF:  Sunday 9PM on HBO – DVR Alert “Noisy” is the byword of the television moment, and HBO makes noise as well as any programming service, whether its shows are laden with dragons, foul-mouthed politicians or coke-snorting record executives.  Every so often, though, the network demonstrates that it can also deliver unadorned […]

  VICTORIA:  Sunday 9PM on PBS – In the Queue Female British monarchs are certainly having a television moment, with Elizabeth I a regular character on CW’s soon-to-return Reign, her current namesake at the center of Netflix’s The Crown, and now the PBS/ITV VICTORIA.  The newest arrival is far classier than CW’s YA soap, but […]

  GOOD GIRLS:  Monday 10PM on NBC – Potential DVR Alert GOOD GIRLS is one of the more promising pilots of the broadcast season–even if it’s itching not to be a broadcast series.  Jenna Bans’ script is a #MeToo slant on Breaking Bad and Fun With Dick and Jane, and as that list may suggest, […]

  ZOEY’S EXTRAORDINARY PLAYLIST – Sundays 10PM on NBC (starting February 16) In a broadcast network landscape musty with procedurals and the mildest possible sitcoms, NBC deserves credit for commissioning Austin Winsberg’s ZOEY’S EXTRAORDINARY PLAYLIST, an original musical fantasy (the collected works of Dennis Potter and ABC’s short-lived Eli Stone aside).  It’s a genuine attempt […]

  COMMON LAW:  Fridays 10PM on USA – Change the Channel CBS may own the world of serious procedurals, but USA Network has the patent on the jocular ones.  Monk, Psych, Burn Notice, Suits, In Plain Sight, Fairly Legal…  the list goes on and on.  In every show, there’s a quirky protagonist (“Characters Welcome”) who […]

> See A Word About Busted Pilots For those who like Six Degrees of Separation-ish linkages:  the protagonist of ABC’s busted pilot GRACE is Michael Grace, an aging, womanizing choreographer who bears some resemblance to Bob Fosse–or at least to Joe Gideon, the center of Fosse’s semiautographical All That Jazz.  The actor playing Grace is […]