The trial of Saddam Hussein is as much about the appearance as the execution of justice; as important as bringing a former tyrant to account is saying, Look, this is how we do it in a democracy. As the trial has returned to session, the audience watching on TV sets across Iraq is getting a taste of American-style justice, all right. We

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World News Tonight officially became World News Hot today, as ABC named Bob Woodruff and Elizabeth Vargas to be the fortysomething, experienced and, let’s face it, quite easy on the eyes anchors of its nightly newscast. The announcement was otherwise not exactly earth-shattering. Both candidates, set to take over officially Jan. 3, were

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Terrorists are like screenwriters. Their job is to look at ordinary situations and figure out how to apply horrible twists to them: how to turn an airplane into a cruise missile, or a shoe into a bomb. Like thriller writers, they want to dream up scenarios most of us are too conventional, or simply humane, to even imagine. That’s why

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Part of growing up is learning to accept that sometimes even the yahoos can be right. Today, the yahoos in question are the FCC regulators who are trying to push an anathema idea on cable companies: giving their customers more choices.

Most cable viewers buy dozens, even hundreds of channels, even if they don’t watch most. (Studies

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Ted Koppel left Nightline last night after 25 years. His last episode, devoted to Morrie Schwartz, the professor and subject of Mitch Albom’s Tuesdays with Morrie, was a typical, graceful signoff: thoughtful, modest and unsentimental. It was the sort of gesture that obliges a TV critic to thank Koppel for his service. Or it would,

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With the word out that Arrested Development is as good as canceled — Fox cut back the Emmy-winning sitcom’s episode order from 22 to 13, the point at which most shows start ordering the liquor for the wake — fans are going through the traditional stages of TV death. From denial and anger, we’ve commenced bargaining, with TV critic Tim

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You could have predicted that Democratic Rep. Matt Santos (Jimmy Smits) would win last night’s live West Wing debate over Sen. Arnold Vinick (Alan Alda). Not because of the candidates’ oratorical record or their stances in the campaign: Santos had to do better because it would make a better TV. Vinick led the campaign by 9 points going

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When CNN announced that Anderson Cooper would take over Aaron Brown’s 10 p.m. slot and that Brown would leave the network, it was tempting to call it youth over experience. Or male-model looks over, well, less-than-male-model looks. (No offense to Mr. Brown. The present author will not be doing any Details spreads anytime soon either.)

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In the premiere of the cartoon series The Boondocks (Cartoon Network, Sundays, 11 p.m. E.T.), a black servant at a garden party—jealous of new black neighbors who’ve ingratiated themselves to his white boss—takes the stage and does an impromptu song: "Don’t Trust Them New Niggers Over There." One young white woman looks at

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Usually, a major American tragedy isn’t a major American tragedy until the entertainment industry overreacts to it. After the Littleton school shootings, TV executives pulled scenes of violence; after 9/11, movies and TV shows featuring terrorism and spectacular explosions were held until it was deemed safe (and profitable) to scare

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Between the news tickers, stock numbers, story captions and "BREAKING NEWS" screamers, we’ve already gotten used to our cable news channels being lit up like the Ginza at midnight. But the newest addition to cable-news screens is the picture-in-picture inset, the video box in the lower-right corner that tracks an image from one story

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Like a new fall show that you would have expected to be canceled by now but has managed to escape the axe, Tuned In is staying on the air, but with some scheduling changes. Now that the deluge of debuts is over, I won’t be blogging on the same daily (or near-daily) basis. But I’ll keep posting—when there’s a new show worth

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