Category: TV (Page 401 of 595)

Quickhit review: “K-Ville”

September 18, 2007 /

Our main TV reviewer, Will Harris, put together a terrific preview of the fall season for Bullz-Eye, but I thought I’d chime in on a few of the premieres and see if we can get some discussion going about the new season.

“K-Ville” follows a New Orleans cop Marlin Boulet (Anthony Anderson) and his mysterious new partner Trevor Cobb (Cole Hauser) as they try to navigate the crime-filled streets of a city on the rebound. Anderson had a nice stint playing Antwon Mitchell on “The Shield,” and after a start in comedy, his career has taken a decidedly dramatic direction. To this point, Hauser has done mostly supporting work in films, but is now taking his quiet confidence to the small screen. The show looks a lot like a Bruckheimer film and the two lead characters have a nice dynamic. The backdrop of New Orleans is a gritty one, so the series needs to be careful to keep itself completely realistic. (SPOILER: The whole running-up-and-wrapping-a-chain-around-the-leg-of-a- helicopter-so-it-couldn’t-take-off routine didn’t really work for me.) I’m not sure the world needs another cop show, and one wonders if the country is willing to re-live the depression of Katrina on a weekly basis, so the series seems to be doomed from the start. Still, the cast is good, the writing is decent and the premiere was enjoyable (if a bit heavy-handed), so it has a shot. I’m going to take it week-to-week.

So, what did you think?

If you missed the premiere, Fox is re-airing it tonight at 9 PM…and if you miss that, too, there’s always this teaser:

External Entertainment, External TV, Fall TV Preview, Pilots, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas

Prison Break: “Orientacion”

September 17, 2007 /

After a season of being on the run, some fans of the show complained that they missed the overwhelming claustrophobia of the first season. Well, to put it succinctly, it looks like the old “Prison Break” is back.

When last we left them, Michael, Mahone, T-Bag and Bellick were all sent to Sona, which is Panama’s toughest and most ruthless prison (of course). I had to laugh when that cat at the American embassy painted an overly bleak picture for Linc. He said that Sona was “the worst of the worst,” that “the guards had pulled out” and are now just “keeping a perimeter.” Good grief.

With Lincoln exonerated, I was curious to see how the show would be able to reinvent itself, and it looks like Michael’s new mission will be to break a very important person (Whistler?) out of Sona. He only has a week to do it, so assuming one episode per day, this new storyline might only eat up a third of the season. Whistler is probably the guy that Bellick spoke to in the basement. Speaking of Brad, how disturbing was it to watch him walk around in those tighty whities?

Mahone wants to help Michael, if only to get Michael to testify on his behalf once the two are out of prison. Since Mahone killed his pops, Michael isn’t too keen on the idea, but he might not have much of a choice given how badly the cards are stacked against him. T-Bag seems to have already wormed his way into the good graces of Luchero, a Panamanian drug kingpin who runs the prison. By the way, Luchero is played by Robert Wisdom, who was terrific as Major Howard “Bunny” Colvin on “The Wire.” It will be fun to watch him play such a cartoon-ish character.

It looks as if the roles of LJ and Sara will once again be to coerce the brothers into working for the unseen powers that be. I get the feeling that Michael and Sara won’t be able to truly be together until the series finally comes to an end, whenever that is.

It also appears that two or three new women will have major roles this season. There’s the woman that Linc met at the bar, the prostitute that dressed up as a nun, and the woman outside the prison who was looking for the notes from the guy in the basement. (They’re all brunettes, by the way.)

And there’s still the question of all that money which, if I remember correctly, is sitting in a lagoon under a few feet of water.

So we’re off. Do you like the new direction of the show or do you wish they had wrapped everything up at the end of last season? I’m not sure how I’d answer that question, but so far, so good.

External Entertainment, External TV, Prison Break, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas

So much for getting the jump on my “Heroes” blog…

September 17, 2007 /

With the second-season premiere of “Heroes” scheduled for next Monday at 9 PM, I had hoped I’d be able to provide you with a few teasers of what the episode contained, since NBC generally sends out advance screeners of its season premiere.

Not so, however, for “Heroes.”

I approached the network and asked if I should be expecting a screener, or if NBC wanted the critics to be watching the season premiere for the first time along with the rest of America.

“Actually,” responded a network spokesperson, “we are not sending the ‘Heroes’ premiere (or) early episodes out for review. The producers want to hold it back and allow viewers to be completely surprised. ”

Disappointing…but not entirely surprising. And, hey, it actually makes me even more excited for Monday to get here, so how can I really complain?

External Entertainment, External TV, Fall TV Preview, Heroes, News, TV, TV Action, TV Dramas, TV Sci-Fi

Pilots Revisited: “Aliens in America”

September 17, 2007 /

The CW has started sending out revised pilots for its new fall shows…and by “revised,” I mean that, in some cases, different actors have been plugged into some of the roles. In the case of “Aliens in America,” the role of the show’s patriarch, Gary Tolchuck, was recast, removing Patrick Breen, who most recently played A.D.A. Otto Beedle on “Boston Legal,” and instead inserting Scott Patterson, a.k.a. Luke from “Gilmore Girls.”

I can’t help but what wonder what caused the switch, given what a great job Breen did in the pilot while playing Justin Tolchuk’s clueless dad. My first thought was, “Okay, maybe they promised Patterson that he’d always have a home at The CW, and when they decided to yank the ‘Girls,’ they decided Breen was expendable.” But the more I think of it, the more I wonder if the network tested the pilot with their core demographic and were told that the kids thought that Justin’s mom – played by Amy Pietz (Annie on “Caroline in the City”) – was way too hot to have ever married a goofy-looking dork like Breen. (Nothing personal, Patrick.) Frankly, from the get-go, I was concerned about the fact that, for as much as I dug Patterson’s work on “Gilmore Girls,” he’s got a completely different comedic style from Breen’s, and, in short, I just couldn’t envision how Patterson would fit. Fortunately, however, he does a nice job. It doesn’t say much for his versatility, mind you, since he plays the role in such a way that it feels as though he’s just adapting his Luke persona slightly to match the material, but at least he’s funny.

The CW has provided a second episode of “Aliens in America” for Bullz-Eye’s viewing as well, and it continues to look like the series will be a perfect match for its lead-in, “Everybody Hates Chris.” The premise of the series, in case you missed one of the countless plugs for Bullz-Eye’s Fall TV Preview, is that Justin Tolchuk is less than popular at his school, so his parents decide to host a foreign exchange student to give him a built-in best friend, only to find that the student is a Muslim Pakistani named Raja Musharaff, who doesn’t exactly fit easily into the population of Medora, Wisconsin. In the second episode, entitled “No Man Is An Island,” Justin and Raja’s class is discussing “Robinson Crusoe,” and Raja makes the cultural error (well, it’s an error amongst American teenagers in 2007, anyway) of announcing in front of everyone that Justin is his best friend, and that if he could only take one thing with him onto a desert island, that thing would be Justin.

Yikes.

It’s nice to see that the second episode doesn’t latch onto the whole “Muslim people are terrorists” aspect that was touched upon in the pilot (though I’m sure it isn’t gone for good), instead focusing simply on general cultural differences. It’s also clear that producer Richard Day is going to utilize the comedic touches he learned on “Arrested Development,” such as quick cutaways to flashback gags.

Lookin’ good so far, “Aliens.”

Here’s a teaser:

Actors, Actresses, External Entertainment, External TV, Fall TV Preview, Pilots, Reviews, TV, TV Comedies

Sooooooo…did you watch Fox’s “Nashville” on Friday?

September 17, 2007 /

That’s okay, neither did anyone else.

Ouch.

Sorry, but it’s true: Fox scored a 3rd-place finish on Friday, and the premiere episode of the so-called “docu-soap” about the life of several aspiring country singers trying to get their big break in Music City, USA – which aired this past Friday at 9 PM – scored a lowly 1.0 rating amongst adults aged 18 – 49, which is precisely the demographic that was supposed to be excited about the show.

To put this in a little better perspective, “America’s Funniest Home Videos” scored a 1.8 in the same timeslot.

Ouch again.

Frankly, though, we’re not even remotely surprised…and, if anything, we’re a little too gleeful about the show’s failure. We said all along that the show was a ridiculously airbrushed representation of your average struggling performers in Nashville, with every one of its cast members way prettier than most people who are out there trying to get a recording contract. And, then, when we finally saw the first episode of the show, we couldn’t believe how incredibly contrived it felt. It’s from the same people who brought you “Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County,” so our standards weren’t that high to begin with, but “Nashville” hit new lows with lines that felt fake, forced, and straight out of a grade-Z drama.

Stay tuned for a cancellation announcement any day now. It’s one thing to pull in low ratings on a Friday night, but it’s quite another for a brand-new show to turn in a showing that’s less than the numbers a “Bones” re-run pulled in the same spot a few weeks back.

If you’re curious, though, here’s what you’re missing:

External Entertainment, External TV, Fall TV Preview, Pilots, Reality TV, TV, TV Dramas

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