12 MONKEYS:  Friday 9PM on Syfy – If Nothing Else Is On… Last year, the writer/producer Noah Hawley miraculously inhabited Joel and Ethan Coen’s Fargo, creating something that was original and yet satisfyingly true to the vision of two of the most distinctive filmmakers around. Lightning doesn’t strike that way for Syfy’s 12 MONKEYS. The 1995 […]

  ZOO:  Tuesday 9PM on CBS – Change the Channel Of all the broadcast networks, CBS is the biggest fan of branding.  It has its procedural hours during the regular season, its working-class half-hours (which are either multi-camera or feel like they could be), and more recently, its summer sci-fi thrillers.  Under the Dome begat […]

  OUTCAST:  Friday 10PM on Cinemax – If Nothing Else Is On… The surprise is that it took Cinemax so long to enter the world of TV horror.  With the notable exception of The Knick (and somewhat less notably, the network’s trademark “Skinemax” late-night soft-core programming), all of its original series have been genre pieces, […]

  THE MIST:  Thursday 10PM on Spike – Change the Channel THE MIST is far from the most imaginative or robust of Stephen King’s works.  King has rarely been accused of too much concision, but he was only able to wring out enough material from this premise for a novella; the title conveys just about […]

  LA TO VEGAS:  Tuesday 9PM on FOX – In the Queue Broadcast TV kicks off its new scripted series year with FOX’s well-paced LA TO VEGAS, a mostly retro workplace sitcom with a small twist:  Lon Zimmet’s series takes place almost entirely on the roundtrips of the titular run, operated by the Southwest-like Jackpot Airlines. The […]

  BRAND X WITH RUSSELL BRAND:  Thursday 11PM on FX – Change the Channel Russell Brand has been more or less flailing around for the past several years, trying to find a place in American pop culture.  His introduction to most domestic audiences came with his role as the comically dissipated rock star in Forgetting […]

> ROB – Thursdays 8:30PM on CBS – Change the Channel We live in a Dickensian era of situation comedies, the best and worst combined on every network.  ABC is the home of both Modern Family and Work It; NBC contains Parks & Recreation and Whitney; FOX has New Girl and I Hate My Teenage […]

  POLITICAL ANIMALS:  Sunday 10PM on USA – Potential DVR Alert   POLITICAL ANIMALS is a lot more Brothers & Sisters than it is The West Wing, which makes sense because it’s the work of Greg Berlanti, who took over as showrunner on B&S when show creator Jon Robin Baitz wasn’t giving ABC the soap […]