+Music | 128 days ago

Top 10 Date-Specific Songs

By Joseph McCombs
albums

Earth, Wind & Fire’s hit “September” asks, “Do you remember the 21st night of September?” This Sept. 21, TIME takes a look at songs with specific date references

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 129 days ago

The Morning After: Waitresses and Waltzes

By James Poniewozik
CBS

It was a big night of debuts and returns last night: now it’s your turn to tell us all what you thought—about the waitresses of 2 Broke Girls, the cocktail waitresses of The Playboy Club, the return of Dancing with the Stars or the double-shot of How I Met Your Mother (which I’ll check back [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 129 days ago

Monday Night Sheen-a-Thon: Ashton Moves In, Charlie Moves On

By James Poniewozik
Ashton_HORIZ

During the Great Charlie Sheen War of 2011, there was a lot of attention on Two and a Half Men as a business — how much it cost, how much it made, how many it employed — and not as much on it as a TV show. Watching its long-delayed return with new star Ashton [...]

+TV Recap Dancing with the Stars: Season 13, Episode 1 | 129 days ago

Dancing with the Stars Recap: Chaz Bono Shines, Elisabetta Canalis Tanks

By Melissa Locker
ABC

Dancing with the Stars kicked off its 13th run last night, proving that it is capable of crafting a buzz-generating cast (and stretching the definition of the word “star”) even after 12 seasons.

+Music | 130 days ago

Music Monday: Can ‘The Whole Love’ Compare to Wilco’s Best?

By Claire Suddath
Wilco_400

Here’s a question for you:  If a band releases an album that’s not its best work, but is still better than most music produced by most other bands, would you praise it?

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 130 days ago

TV Tonight: 2 Broke Girls, Playboy Club

By James Poniewozik
Playboy_HORIZ

Tonight brings the debuts of two network premieres, CBS’s 2 Broke Girls and NBC’s The Playboy Club, which I covered in my roundup in this week’s TIME of series focusing on female characters. It’s a busy season, and neither pilot has changed from their original versions in ways that would significantly shake my preview Test [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 130 days ago

Emmys 2011: Getting It Mostly Right — the Awards, at Least

By James Poniewozik
Emmy

When someone asks, “What did you think of the Emmys?” — let’s pretend this is a question that comes up in daily conversation — it can mean two things: the Emmy Awards, and the Emmycast itself. The broadcast this year was not exactly prizewinning, marred by too many flubbed attempts at humor and some, er, [...]

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Tuned In+TV Recap Breaking Bad: Season 4, Episode 10 | 130 days ago

Breaking Bad Watch: $#*! My Dad Says

By James Poniewozik
AMC

SPOILER ALERT: Before you read this post, get any necessary bathroom breaks out of the way and watch last night’s Breaking Bad. The previous episode of Breaking Bad opened a rift between Walt and Jesse that’s going to be hard, if not impossible, to close anytime soon. So it follows that “Salud” was two very [...]

+Box Office Report | 131 days ago

Box Office: The Lion King Roars, Drive Purrs, Straw Dogs Whimpers

By Richard Corliss
Everett

Disney’s 3-D reissue of its 1994 megahit The Lion King dominated multiplexes this weekend, with an estimated opening weekend haul of nearly $30 million

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 133 days ago

Dead Tree Alert: Femme TV, Cupcakes, and a Look at New Girl

By James Poniewozik
CBS

In this week’s issue of TIME (subscription required, but of course you have one, right?), I preview the fall TV season by looking—as several others have as well—at the many, many new shows this fall that have female stars or mostly female ensembles. It’s impossible to draw a single conclusion from so many different shows, [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 133 days ago

In Which I Predict the Emmy Winners, Probably Incorrectly

By James Poniewozik

The 2011 Emmy Awards are this Sunday night; I’ll be live-tweeting them as usual, and I’ll have some sort of writeup on the awards the next morning. There are several very competitive categories this year, with, for instance, the ineligibility of Breaking Bad opening space in the drama categories. Who will win? Who should? After [...]

+Review Movies | 134 days ago

I Don't Know How She Does It, but Bagels Trump Kegels

By Mary Pols
The Weinstein Co.

Sarah Jessica Parker is a harried yet glamorous mother in this adaptation of Allison Pearson’s best seller

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 134 days ago

TV Tonight: Season 7 of Sunny and an Archer Bonus

By James Poniewozik
FX

Consider this more a public service announcement than a review (I’ve been too busy with fall pilots to get through all the screeners), but FX’s Thursday comedy block returns tonight, a week before NBC’s does. Starting off is It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia; in the premiere, Frank (Danny DeVito) falls for the tender ministrations of [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 134 days ago

The Morning After: Re-Redemption

By James Poniewozik
CBS

I originally started The Morning After posts on this blog a few years ago during fall premiere season, to give Tuned Inland a chance to discuss shows that premiered or returned the night before, shows I hadn’t gotten around to reviewing, or simply anything that was on TV last night worth talking about. Last night, [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 135 days ago

Love to H8; Plus, My Fall Review Plans

By James Poniewozik

I know it’s not really critically responsible to simply link to someone else’s review of a show and say, “What he said,” but I’m going to do that with Daniel Fienberg’s review of The CW’s H8R, starting tonight, because (1) I’m not doing a full-length review of every new show debuting over the next few [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 135 days ago

TV Tonight: Up All Night, Free Agents

By James Poniewozik
NBC

Reviewing a new TV series can be part detective work and part psychic reading. You try to not only judge the finished pilot you’re looking at, but get a sense of where it’s come from (the history of its talent or influences, any source material), intuit where it’s heading next (from the performances, the writing/direction [...]

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Tuned In+News Media | 136 days ago

The Morning After: CNN Throws a Raucous Tea Party

By James Poniewozik

Last night, the Republican field met for another debate, this one organized by CNN and a Tea Party group, and held in Florida. Michael Scherer at Swampland has a play-by-play, but in short we learned that (1) the GOP contenders want to make sure that Rick Perry does not pull away from the field; (2) [...]

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Tuned In+Tuned In | 136 days ago

TV Tonight: Ringer

By James Poniewozik
CW

When I previewed the pilot of The CW’s twin-noir thriller Ringer earlier this summer, I wanted to be charitable. Partly because, like many of you, I suspect, I loved Sarah Michelle Gellar in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. But also because the pilot seemed more technically rough than most—a lot of awkward greenscreen and splitscreen effects [...]