With rare exceptions, sex scandals around kids’ TV shows rarely pose any threat, physical or psychological, to the child …
dead tree alert
Dead Tree Alert: Murphy’s Lawlessness
In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter that ran earlier this week, Ryan Murphy said, “You either love me or you hate me.” In my essay in the new print issue of TIME magazine (subscription required), I beg to differ: it is …
Dead Tree Alert: Big Bird Is a Republican
OK, he’s not, literally. (Though he was the first one to see the elephant. Coincidence?) But as I write in my print TIME column this week, one thing that’s been lost in the debate over PBS funding is that PBS not only serves …
Dead Tree Alert: Check, Please
My column (subscription required) is back in the print TIME magazine this week, and it catches up on what’s been one of the major distinguishing media features of the 2012 campaign: the rise, and limitations, of fact-checking in …
Dead Tree Alert: The Thrill of Video Vs. the Agony of Tape-Delay
I’ve taken my digs over the past week at NBC’s TV coverage of the London Olympics, but I also have to give credit where it’s due. The network’s decision to livestream every competition from the games–however buggy and dependent …
Dead Tree Alert: Walter White, the Greatest American Antihero
I’m back! And so, nearly, is Walter White and the first half of Breaking Bad‘s final season. I’ve been away for a week, but while I was out, TIME published my essay on White and the past decade’s army of cable-drama antiheroes …
Dead Tree Alert: Blowhardball: The Not-So-Special Comment of HBO’s The Newsroom
Sunday night, HBO premieres The Newsroom, Aaron Sorkin’s attempt to do for cable news what The West Wing did for politics: present a romanticized version of a beleaguered institution, with a cast of hard-working idealists, long …
Dead Tree Alert: Daddy Issues; Plus, What Shows Do Right By Dads?
In the latest print edition of TIME, I have an early Father’s Day present for all the dads out there: a look at how the image of the hands-on, Baby Bjorn–wearing dad has become a go-to sight gag in TV and movies. From my column (subscription required):
The baby carrier is a symbol of a generation of dads–the Baby Bjorners–who,
…
Dead Tree Alert: Law & Order: DVR; or, Confessions of an Ad-Skipping Thief
My latest column in TIME (now free from the paywall!) is about the uproar in broadcast TV over Auto Hop, a new feature on Dish Network DVRs which takes commercial fast-forwarding one step further, allowing viewers to …
Dead Tree Alert: Summer TV Preview; Plus, the Shows I’m Most Intrigued by for Fall [VIDEO]
In the new print issue of TIME, we have our summer Arts preview (subscription required), in which I blurb 11 summer TV shows I’m most interested in seeing. This is not to say the “best” shows of the summer, because they’re shows …
Dead Tree Alert: Mad Men—Now in Color!
My column in this week’s print TIME (subscription required) is a midseason update on Mad Men. In it, I look at how the show’s (literally) brighter, bolder 1966 color palette reflects (figuratively) the less subtle times it’s …
Dead Tree Alert: The Year of the Nontroversy
Who’s nicer to dogs? Whose idiot supporters said more obnoxious things than the other guy’s idiot supporters? Who didn’t eat a cookie that it would have been more advisable for him to eat? These are some of the burning issues that have faced America as the general election of 2012 has gotten under way. And in my column in the print TIME …
Dead Tree Alert: Brave New Girls
In this week’s print issue of TIME (subscription required, sorry), I have a long-ish piece on HBO’s Girls (premiering April 15) and its young creator-star Lena Dunham. You will hear–and are probably already hearing–an awful lot …