When NBC announced its new sitcom Animal Practice—a.k.a. That One Show With the Monkey In It—plenty of critics, myself included, leapt into the trees to fling, um, stuff at it: so this is what it’s finally come to! In truth, …
The Morning After: Honey Boo Boo Don’t Care
The theme song of TLC’s Here Comes Honey Boo Boo is a fart. Well, that’s not entirely true. There’s about four seconds of guitar noodling as the camera pans down to the Thompson family of Georgia, posed cheerfully in front of …
PolitiFact, Harry Reid’s Pants, and the Limits of Fact-Checking
Fact: I do not know whether Mitt Romney paid federal income taxes, when, or how much, in any year before 2010, for which he publicly released his tax returns. Fact: You probably do not either, unless you are among the small army …
TV Tonight: Go On
When he pitched NBC’s new fall season to TV critics a few weeks ago, network president Robert Greenblatt said that the network was aiming for sitcoms more “broad” than its current crop of critics’ favorites like 30 Rock and …
The Morning After: NBC Shoots, Scores With Live Soccer
This past weekend, I went on NPR’s On the Media to talk about NBC’s practice of tape-delaying big Olympic events until primetime—a strategy that had earned the network big ratings, big ad money and the enmity of a subset of fans who’ve had to wait until hours after the world knew results to watch the events on TV.
Well, credit where …
Breaking Bad Watch: Pool Party
SPOILER ALERT: Before you read this post, fry yourself up some bacon and watch last night’s Breaking Bad.
When Walter White defeated Gus Fring at the end of Breaking Bad‘s season four, my mind naturally went to the question: …
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 …
TCA Roundup: Aaron Sorkin Meets the Press
The Television Critics Association press tour in Los Angeles continued its second week, as a chorus line of cable networks presented new and continuing shows to close out the tour. Highlights from yesterday’s sessions, which were …
When Twitter Becomes the Tweet Police
It was — to paraphrase Twitter’s own terminology for when it crashes — a whale of a fail. The social-media service, and NBC, apologized for the suspension of a British reporter, critical of NBC’s Olympics coverage, who tweeted the e-mail of an NBC executive to his followers.
TCA Roundup: Elementary, My Not-Too-Dear Watson
I’m back from the TCA press tour, but the show went on yesterday and Sunday at the Beverly Hilton, as CBS, The CW and Showtime presented their new fall shows (and some returning ones) to the nation’s TV critics and reporters. …
NBC’s Olympic Livestreaming Is a Step Forward. But Is It a Permanent One?
Let me say upfront that complaining about the quality and immediacy of one’s video options for watching the Olympics in the comfort of my home is, more literally than usual, a First World problem. It’s what we do every two years, …
Breaking Bad Watch: Do You Want To Know a Secret?
SPOILER ALERT: Before you read this post, turn off that Three Stooges movie and watch last night’s Breaking Bad.
“Hazard Pay” broke almost neatly into two halves. The first was a kind of getting-the-band-back-together …
TCA 2012: Homeland, Louie Win Big at TCA Awards
Last night at the Beverly Hilton, the Television Critics Association gave out the annual TCA Awards for the best in television at our annual summer meeting. And it may not surprise you that, since critics like me were voting, the …