Tuned In
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In 2007, Discovery aired the documentary series Planet Earth, which wowed critics, drew huge ratings and showed a nation of consumers what those new big-screen TVs were really for. An expansive nature documentary full of luscious, hard-to-get HD visuals, it combined a vaguely …
Tuned In
I don’t have a full-fledged review for you of the four-hour double-shot premiere of 24, which begins Sunday night. That’s partly because the kickoff, though it brings Jack Bauer to my city of New York and recruits Katee Sackhoff to CTU, does not have enough in it to convince me that the show has rebooted itself to the point where I’d …
Tuned In
For those of you who didn’t see the DVD last fall, Syfy airs the Battlestar Galactica prequel movie The Plan on Sunday night. Here’s my review (“curious but inessential”) from October; I’d recommend it mainly to BSG completists who can’t wait for Caprica.
Also Sunday, a Tuned In personal favorite, Big Love, returns to HBO. I’ve seen …
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No, not everything happening in TV right now is about Jay Leno. But it could well be that Chuck, which returns Sunday before moving to its regular timeslot Monday, could find that Conan’s loss is a certain Mr. Bartowski’s gain. The show, which teetered on the brink of cancellation last spring, got a surprise order of an extra six …
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Ken Burns’ The National Parks: America’s Best Idea begins its nightly run (twelve hours, in six parts) on PBS Sunday night. Last week, I wrote a column about how its premise—that Big Government saved wilderness and national treasures that private enterprise would have destroyed—is a lot more politically pointed (in the year of the …
Tuned InTelevision
It’s a tricky Sunday coming up for fans of finer television everywhere. The Emmys (hosted by the suddenly ubiquitous Neil Patrick Harris) are on that night. Mad Men, refusing to take a breather even for its likely slew of awards, airs an original episode. And HBO debuts a strong new comedy—Bored to Death—while Curb Your …
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This Sunday, Fox’s King of the Hill airs its last two episodes. Year in and year out, for thirteen seasons, it has quietly been the best family comedy on TV, despite being overshadowed for many reasons: because people (and Emmy voters) have a hard time taking a cartoon seriously (compared with the funny but much more cliched and …
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Today, you are already aware, is the eighth anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Tomorrow, you may or may not be aware, is the date of Glenn Beck’s 9/12 Project, which the Fox News host will be marking with a live-TV event in Washington, and which he announced in March in an effort to
bring us all back to the place we were on September 12,
…
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Posting will be light around here over Memorial Day weekend, but I would be remiss in my duty if I did not tell you about the Monday return of Jon & Kate Plus 8, for the first time since the dueling-affair charges started hitting the tabloids and celeb magazines. Or maybe I’m being remiss in my duty by telling you about it.
(If you need …
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…of course it’s on at the same time as the finale of Battlestar Galactica, so how are you supposed to watch both? I don’t know. Get a DVR. Have a friend record it for you. Download it. Call your local cable/satellite provider! Do I have to do everything here?
Seriously, it’s unfortunate timing for Dollhouse, considering the …
Tuned InTuned In
The first season of Breaking Bad was truncated by the writers’ strike at seven episodes out of a planned ten, though this did not stop Bryan Cranston for winning an Emmy for his portrayal of Walter White, dying chem teacher …
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Sunday brings the (much?) anticipated American debut of British teen show Skins on BBC America. I’ll just reproduce my brief TIME review in full:
Skins BBC America; Sundays; 9 p.m. E.T. This British teen dramedy comes touted as “daringly realistic.” Translation: lots of drugs and naughty bits! The realism doesn’t extend to the exaggerated
…
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…at least when it comes to cable reality TV. Sunday, National Geographic channel debuts L.A. Hard Hats, a show about Golden State high-rise construction workers that promises to be like Deadliest Catch, except warmer, higher above sea level, and not Deadliest Catch.
L.A. Hard Hats also joins the vaunted category of series titles that …
