ANIMAL KINGDOM:  Tuesday 9PM on TNT ANIMAL KINGDOM has been a key part of TNT’s rebranding as a hipper TV destination than the home of Major Crimes and The Last Ship, and tonight’s Season 2 premiere promised more of the same, with plenty of FX-level sexuality and general grittiness on display.  The key change, […]

  STILL STAR-CROSSED:  Monday 10PM on ABC – If Nothing Else Is On… The idea of a Shonda Rhimes-produced sequel to one of Shakespeare’s classics sounds like something that might air on a satirical network, but STILL STAR-CROSSED is real, albeit relegated by ABC to its summer minor leagues.  (The actual series creator/showrunner is Heather […]

  DOWNWARD DOG:  Tuesday 8PM on ABC – If Nothing Else Is On… Television may have undergone a revolution over the past few years, but one thing hasn’t changed:  broadcast networks don’t air their A-level material during the summer.  ABC’s odd gimmick comedy DOWNWARD DOG is premiering a pair of episodes at the very tail […]

  TV’s summer of 2016 was notable for a splendidly entertaining and emotionally satisfying 1980s-themed horror thriller.  Unfortunately for Freeform and DEAD OF SUMMER, it was Netflix’s Stranger Things.  Dead, which ended a low-rated season tonight, did have its moments, though, especially in its grand guignol final episodes. The general pattern of the series was […]

  Last year, the cop novel “The Whites” was published as the work of Harry Brandt–except that “Harry Brandt” was actually a pseudonym for Richard Price.  This seemed odd at first, because unlike, say, JK Rowling deciding to write detective stories, crime novels were already Richard Price’s bread and butter, in celebrated works of fiction […]

  In recent years, Cameron Crowe has had trouble keeping his scripts coherent even when they only have to last 2 hours.  It probably shouldn’t have come as a surprise that giving him 10 hours to play with was asking for trouble, and much of his Showtime series ROADIES has been unfocused and self-indulgent, a […]

  HALT AND CATCH FIRE:  Tuesday 10PM on AMC HALT AND CATCH FIRE is AMC’s charity project; every episode could bear a credit saying “This series is brought to you thanks to the generosity of The Walking Dead.”  That show’s mega-success has allowed AMC to indulge itself with a drama that has only gone downward […]

  There are none less cool than those trying desperately to be seen that way, and that was the fate of Freeform’s GUILT.  Series creators Kathryn Price and Nichole Millard, along with showrunners Todd Slavkin and Darren Swimmer, all frantically pushed every “scandalous” button they could think of–drugs!  prostitution!  sex clubs!  DJs!  Blackmail!  kinky royals!  […]