MERCY STREET:  Sunday 10PM on (many) PBS stations – Potential DVR Alert PBS isn’t accustomed to acting like a conventional “network,” and so it took the service until the very last episodes of Downton Abbey to do what any normal network would have done years ago:  use Downton as a platform to launch a […]

  INTO THE BADLANDS:  Sunday 10PM on AMC – If Nothing Else Is On… The first 5 minutes of the pilot for INTO THE BADLANDS tell you pretty much all you need to know.  There’s an opening narration placing us in one of those post-apocalyptic, neo-western futures, the kind where “Barons” rule, aided by sworn […]

  NOTORIOUS:  Thursday 9PM on ABC – Change the Channel Any viewer apt to complain about the over-the-top melodrama of Scandal should be forced to watch the pilot for Notorious, a supposed “drama” so consistently idiotic that it’s closer in tone to the self-mocking theatrics of Jane the Virgin.  As it happens, Notorious is filling […]

  SOMEWHERE BETWEEN:  Tuesday 10PM on ABC – Change the Channel (Now!) There’s no politically correct way to put this.  ABC’s summer thriller SOMEWHERE BETWEEN hinges on the frantic efforts of TV producer Laura Price (Paula Patton) to stop the murder of her daughter Serena (Aria Birch) after the fact, when Laura is inexplicably transported […]

  Disclaimer:  Network pilots now in circulation are not necessarily in the form that will air in the Fall.  Pilots are often reedited and re-scored, and in some cases even recast or reshot.  These critiques shouldn’t be taken as full pilot reviews, but rather as a guide to the general style and content of the […]

  ABOUT A BOY:  Tuesday 9PM on NBC (Preview Tonight at 11:05PM) – If Nothing Else is On… ABOUT A BOY, which NBC will preview tonight at the close of Olympics coverage ahead of its regular timeslot premiere on Tuesday, has a daunting pedigree.  It’s based on the excellent 2002 Paul Weitz/Chris Weitz feature film […]

>THE CLIENT LIST: Sundays 10PM on Lifetime – If Nothing Else Is On… It’s the very prosaic, unsexy ordinariness of THE CLIENT LIST that makes it somewhat revolutionary. For HBO or Showtime to air salacious shows about the lives of hookers (as they have, with Hung and Secret Diary of a Call Girl) is just […]

> TOUCH:  Mondays 9PM on FOX, starting March 19 – Change the Channel FOX’s new series TOUCH got off to a very good start in the ratings with a “preview” episode last week (having American Idol as a lead-in didn’t hurt), and certainly indications are that it could be a solid hit when it makes […]