“Joey, do you like movies about gladiators?” – Captain Oveur Only a creepy airline pilot could appreciate the epic television fart that is Spartacus: Blood and Sand. Yes, you will…
Television
717 Articles
Robert Cass
14 Min Read
On the morning of January 11, numerous media outlets reported that former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich had proclaimed to Esquire magazine that he’s “blacker than Barack Obama” in its February…
Scott Malchus
2 Min Read
The first 13 episodes of Fox’s new hit musical series, Glee, released here in a 4 DVD set, are an entertaining, yet wildly inconsistent group of episodes that sees the…
Ken Shane
2 Min Read
Are you tired of having it shoved up your ass by the suits? If so, then Conan O’ Brien is your man. After being toyed with by what passes as…
Ann Logue
1 Min Read
John Maynard Keynes, the eminent economist who is back in style, described the stock market as a beauty contest. He asked the readers of his General Theory of Employment, Interest,…
Ken Shane
2 Min Read
Maybe it’s because I’ve read Peter Guralnick’s comprehensive 2005 Sam Cooke biography Dream Boogie: The Triumph of Sam Cooke that the newest entry in the generally wonderful PBS series American…
Dw. Dunphy
1 Min Read
Spoiler Alert: Some key jokes of this release will be discussed. If you intend to view this DVD, you might want to consider avoiding the rest of this review. A…
Kelly Stitzel
1 Min Read
“It’s not Tommy, is it?” —Loudon Wainwright III, on his son’s first opera, Prima Donna, from the Sundance Channel documentary Rufus Wainwright: Prima Donna Whether you’re an ardent fan of…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
The second season of Spectacle: Elvis Costello With … is upon us. Year two of the acclaimed Sundance Channel music series debuted last week with Elvis welcoming Bono and The…
Jeff Giles
1 Min Read
People have been warning of the demise of serial dramas on television for years now, and from a certain perspective, the warnings seem frighteningly accurate, what with scripted series of…
Bob Cashill
8 Min Read
The ”Golden Age of Television” is roughly defined as that period from the early 50s to the very early 60s when productions broadcast live captivated millions of viewers. As the…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
TV viewers who enjoy good conversation about, and performance of music will be pleased to know that Elvis Costello’s acclaimed series Spectacle: Elvis Costello with … will be returning to…
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
Premiering tonight on TNT is the new dramedy series, Men of a Certain Age, which comes from Emmy winners Ray Romano and Mike Royce, one of the executive producers and…
Dw. Dunphy
1 Min Read
It is solely through bias that I consider Mr. Magoo’s Christmas Carol the best version of Charles Dickens’ oft-interpreted story of a miser who, through the efforts of the supernatural,…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
Exactly one year ago, ten terrorists from the Jihadist group Lashkar-e-Taiba (Army of the Pure) sailed from Pakistan to India. Their goal was to attack that country’s financial and culture…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
The latest installment of the vaunted PBS series Independent Lens is No Subtitles Necessary: Laszlo & Vilmos. The documentary about the legendary Hungarian cinematographers debuts this week around the country….
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
Andy Barker, P.I. was, by far, my favorite new series to premiere during the winter of 2007. Andy Richter’s second foray into half-hour comedy was a hybrid comedy/mystery series, co-created…
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
The holidays will have a lot to offer fans of all types of entertainment, including those of us who enjoy some pretty sick and twisted stuff. For those of you…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
Gary Hustwit is best known (to me, anyway) as the filmmaker behind the award-winning documentary about Wilco, I Am Trying To Break Your Heart, and his film about synthesizer pioneer…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
Beginning this Sunday night, AMC will be asking you to invest six hours of your television viewing time, over the course of three nights, in their remake of the iconic…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
The Airmen and the Headhunters is the most recent entry in the PBS series Secrets of the Dead, which has been running for nine years on the network. The documentary…
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
As a longtime Monty Python fanatic, I’ve often heard of the legendary Fawlty Towers, the British sitcom John Cleese co-created and starred in after Flying Circus had gone off the…
Ken Shane
1 Min Read
On November 9, to coincide with the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, PBS in New York (check your local listings for date and time in your…
Jack Feerick
2 Min Read
Jack Feerick has the deadline blues this week, leading him to publish his first flashback column — a previously unpublished look at “The Biggest Loser.”
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
If vampires, mysteries and romance are your thing, you can do much worse than Blood Ties, the supernatural drama that aired on Lifetime in 2007. The second season collection contains…
Dw. Dunphy
1 Min Read
You don’t remember what I was talking about last week. I’ll just move on to — what? You say you do remember? Oh. Crap. The crux of last week’s column…
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
Reality television is always open to satire and there have been many fine examples of the genre getting sent up (The Office and Arrested Development are two shows that come…
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
New Tricks: Season One (2009, BBC) purchase from Amazon: DVD Call it Cold Case for the retired crowd. The BBCÁ¢€â„¢s mystery series New Tricks doesnÁ¢€â„¢t break any new ground as…
Robin Monica Alexander
1 Min Read
I barely knew him. Yet here I was, on a cold Tuesday night, at his apartment. We had had a drink or two at the bar/lounge/restaurant down the street from…
Scott Malchus
1 Min Read
ItÁ¢€™s Always Sunny in Philadelphia is the twisted spawn of Seinfeld. Much like NBCÁ¢€™s beloved sitcom, the show centers around four friends (three males and a female). In this case,…