MIDNIGHT, TEXAS:  Monday 10PM on NBC – Change the Channel NBC’s summer series MIDNIGHT, TEXAS is a horror, all right.  It’s based on novels by True Blood author Charlaine Harris, and the idea was plainly to do a broadcast network version of HBO’s hit.  But even if Midnight had been any good, the idea […]

  ANIMAL KINGDOM:  Tuesday 9PM on TNT – In the Queue The opening hour of TNT’s new ANIMAL KINGDOM is daringly light on plot.  Although TNT’s meat and potatoes programming is still mainstream entertainment like The Last Ship and Rizzoli & Isles, it’s been trying to cultivate a darker, more adult image lately, albeit not […]

  ZOO:  Thursday 10PM on CBS Every summer, CBS changes its drama hat from procedural to low-rent sci-fi.  It’s a path the network has followed since Under the Dome became a (temporary) surprise hit, even though the results, after that initial success, haven’t been great.  (BrainDead did earn points for sheer weirdness.)  ZOO had just […]

  SALVATION:  Wednesday 10PM on CBS CBS’s summer series SALVATION presents a potential end of the world so pedestrian that viewers might fall asleep while awaiting the apocalypse.  It’s a disappointment, because at their best (BrainDead, the first season of Under the Dome), CBS’s forays into the sci-fi potboiler genre can be entertainingly over the […]

  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 […]

  THE INBETWEEN:  Wednesday 10PM on NBC The flow of broadcast summer product continues with NBC’s workmanlike paranormal procedural THE INBETWEEN.  The show was created by Moira Kirland, previously a writer/producer on Medium, Hawaii 5-0 and Madam Secretary, among other shows.  It’s the first of those that counts here, as The InBetween is very much […]

  FEED THE BEAST:  Tuesday 10PM on AMC – Change the Channel There’s not much on the menu of AMC’s new FEED THE BEAST, which previewed tonight in advance of its regular timeslot debut on Tuesday.  The show is based on a Danish format, and perhaps that version had more meat on its bones, but […]

  USA Network has handed its keys to Sam Esmail and MR. ROBOT, and with good reason.  Although it was only a moderate success in the ratings last year, the series gave creaky old USA a jolt of pure critical adrenaline, becoming a zeitgeist show at a time when the sheer clutter of new television […]