> Some shows find their creative voices during the course of their first season–but even after a super-sized order of 24 episodes that ended last night, UP ALL NIGHT is still floundering. On paper, Up All Night seemed to have everything going for it.  Its Executive Producer/godfather was Lorne Michaels, and it was created by […]

  After a so-so fall spent mostly in Neverland, ONCE UPON A TIME rebounded strongly with its midseason arc, which brought the Wicked Witch of the West (Rebecca Mader) to Storybrooke.  The plotline effectively continued the process of redemption for former Evil Queen Regina (Lana Parrilla) and Hook (Colin O’Donoghue) that had started in the […]

  Losing both David Letterman and Jon Stewart in a single TV year is more than a viewing public should have to endure, but tonight it was Stewart’s turn to walk through the exit door of THE DAILY SHOW WITH JON STEWART after 16 years on the air, a run that changed the very concept […]

  The Season 2 finale of TNT’s MAJOR CRIMES, intended to pay off the show’s one serialized storyline, about Rusty (Graham Patrick Martin), the teen ward of series protagonist LAPD Captain Sharon Raydor (Mary McDonnell) and witness to a murder committed by imprisoned serial killer and attorney Philip Stroh (who was originally introduced back in […]

  THE GOODWIN GAMES probably should have been a movie.  Its extremely high-concept premise–three estranged siblings come back to their hometown after their father’s death, forced to solve a series of posthumous games and puzzles in order to get his multi-million dollar inheritance, and meanwhile bond together as a family and become better human beings–could […]

> WARNING:  Spoilers Abound That expelled breath heard around the country this evening was a collective sigh of relief:  HOMELAND‘s season finale didn’t collapse.  On the contrary, it delivered a satisfying conclusion that resolved Season 1 storylines while setting the stage for an intriguing, and somewhat different, Season 2. No recent show has walked a […]

  It was probably unwise for TWISTED to end its first season with a cliffhanger, since it seems to be doomed–the ratings were low even when it had Pretty Little Liars as a lead-in, and once that show finished its season, they became downright awful.  As much as one hates to see people lose their […]

  A return visit to SIRENS after having seen its initial episodes revealed that the series, produced and co-created (with Bob Fisher) for US television by Denis Leary, had become even more like Rescue Me without fires, now including that show’s Lenny Clarke and John Scurti recurring as the fathers of the two main characters.  […]