It’s easy enough to say that the phrase “stranger than fiction” would have had to be invented to describe the murder trial of OJ Simpson if it didn’t already exist, but still, the natural tendency of Hollywood is to gild the non-fictional lily, making melodrama out of drama.  When it was announced that THE […]

  Once it became clear that, for the most part, THE LAST SHIP was science fiction only in the strictest sense (there was science and it was fiction), it was fairly enjoyable for the neo-Tom Clancy-esque action-adventure it aspired to be.  Much of Season 1 was, for all intents and purposes, a Cold War saga, […]

  The original, Las Vegas-set CSI didn’t just spawn a mini-industry of its own spin-offs, but it can fairly lay claim to being one of the most influential shows of its generation, more or less inventing the subgenre of high-tech procedural that’s populated every network over the years since it began.  The series rose from […]

  Very little about STITCHERS has made sense, and that includes ABCFamily’s decision to renew it for another season, despite ratings that have been lousy even with Pretty Little Liars as its lead-in.  The word is that the network desperately wants to be in the procedural business, and Stitchers is the only show it’s got […]

  Starz cut its losses quickly on FLESH AND BONE, which had been ordered as the first season of a continuing series, but was declared to be a finite miniseries before it had even started airing.  That late shift made tonight’s finale even more awkward and unsatisfying than it might have been, but Moira Walley-Beckett’s […]

  ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK may be the most tolerant show on television (or “television,” or whatever it is we’re calling distributed entertainment content in this new Netflixed world).  All the characters, even those who commit the most heinous acts–inmates and guards both–have their reasons and their frailties.  They’re miserably in love, or living […]

  It took some down-to-the-wire negotiations between ABC and production studio Lionsgate, but NASHVILLE made its way to a Season 3 renewal this week.  (And barring further ratings collapse, that makes a Season 4 more likely than not, since ABC would share in the increased revenues from syndication that would follow a 4-season run.)  It […]

  SLEEPY HOLLOW has been trying very hard to justify its survival this season under new showrunner Clifton Campbell.  In addition to telling its core story arc about Pandora (Shannyn Sossamon) gathering sundry demons to strengthen her evil god husband The Hidden One (Peter Mensah) in preparation for his destruction of, you know, the world, […]