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Welcome to Cyber Monday! Shop for TV DVDs, and Plan Your Holiday Viewing, Here at TV WORTH WATCHING...
December 1, 2008 7:50 AM
Because it's Cyber Monday, TV WORTH WATCHING is making it easy for you. And, since every gift you order helps us, too, it's a holiday win-win.
Click on one of the Santa-hatted home-page puppies, and start shopping for the best, or most holiday-appropriate, TV shows on DVD...
I posted this description of our constantly updated DVD holiday shopping guides over the weekend, but on Cyber Monday, it bears repeating:
You can find these just below BIANCULLI'S BLOG on the home page -- click on either of the Santa-hatted puppies, and they'll take you there. "Christmas Shows on DVD" takes you to collections of holiday specials on DVD, and "Holiday Shopping Guide," immediately below it, is a giant guided tour of big boxed sets, individual DVDs and everything in between -- anything having to do with TV, which we consider cool.
Diane Werts did most of the work on this year's version, but some of my reviews and recommendations are there, too, and we're both very proud to present these online offerings to you. And Diane did ALL the work on her borderline-insane exhaustive list of TV holiday offerings -- the ones not for sale, but just to watch and/or record, if you know where and when to find them. Diane does.
Newly added to the site, and updated regularly for the rest of the year, is her triple-threat guide to all the Christmas specials, holiday movies and Christmas-themed series episodes on TV between now and 2009 and beyond. Three different lists, all exhaustive, and all searchable.
Want to find out when A Charlie Brown Christmas is showing this year? When White Christmas will be on? Where to find the Seinfeld episode of "Festivus"? Check out the lists: Linus and company will show up Dec. 8 on ABC, White Christmas will be shown on Lifetime Dec. 19, and "Festivus"... you'll just have to keep checking back.
All this work -- all these lists -- are the absurdly time-consuming handiwork of our own Diane Werts, who used to provide them for New York's Newsday. TV WORTH WATCHING is extremely proud to be their new home base. You can find all three lists on the home page, just to the right of Diane's regular FOR BETTER OR WERTS column. Just look beneath BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS.
For today, you can jump to them by linking here for EPISODES, here for SPECIALS, and here for MOVIES. But keep coming, and keep reading. Diane's going to keep updating the lists all year long.
I couldn't find Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol, one of my favorite all-time holiday specials, on her viewing list -- but it IS on our shopping list, as one of the many offerings available to order for the holidays. I'm not trying to bug you, or humbug you -- just let you know what's there, after all our hard work assembling it and throwing it out into the cyberspace ether...
Holiday DVD Shopping? Holiday TV Viewing? TV Worth Watching Has It All, So Please Dive In!
November 27, 2008 11:15 PM
Well, it seems to be time to start thinking about holiday shopping, and holiday viewing -- and here at TV WORTH WATCHING, do we have a gift for you! (Yes, we do. That wasn't a question.)
Newly added to the site, and updated regularly for the rest of the year, is a triple-threat guide to all the Christmas specials, holiday movies and Christmas-themed series episodes on TV between now and 2009 and beyond. Three different lists, all exhaustive, and all searchable.
Want to find out when A Charlie Brown Christmas is showing this year? When White Christmas will be on? Where to find the Seinfeld episode of "Festivus"? Check out the lists: Linus and company will show up Dec. 8 on ABC, White Christmas will be shown on Lifetime Dec. 19, and "Festivus"... you'll just have to keep checking back.
All this work -- all these lists -- are the absurdly time-consuming handiwork of our own Diane Werts, who used to provide them for New York's Newsday. TV WORTH WATCHING is extremely proud to be their new home base. You can find all three lists on the home page, just to the right of Diane's regular FOR BETTER OR WERTS column. Just look beneath BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS.
For today, you can jump to them by linking here for EPISODES, here for SPECIALS, and here for MOVIES. But keep coming, and keep reading. Diane's going to keep updating the lists all year long.
Something else that's being updated all through December: the pair of DVD shopping guides, giving reviews, details and shopping links to the year's best TV-on-DVD releases.
You can find these just below BIANCULLI'S BLOG on the home page -- click on either of the Santa-hatted puppies, and they'll take you there. "Christmas Shows on DVD" takes you to collections of holiday specials on DVD, and "Holiday Shopping Guide," immediately below it, is a giant guided tour of big boxed sets, individual DVDs and everything in between -- anything having to do with TV, which we consider cool.
Again, Diane did most of the work on this year's version, but some of my reviews and recommendations are there, too, and we're both very proud to present these online offerings to you.
We're not too proud, though, to point out the fact that, if you use one of the gift guides to purchase a DVD or two, TV WORTH WATCHING gets a small kickback from Amazon. It costs you nothing extra, but believe me, every little bit definitely helps.
We'll never charge for this site, and we want to make it as good and useful as we can -- adding features and writers when possible, and generally being a reliable, readable guide to quality television.
Let us know what you think of the Christmas TV listings -- and, if you used or looked at the gift guides, what you thought of them, too. Even we worker elves are hungry for feedback from time to time... especially around the holidays.
For Thanksgiving, TV Worth Watching Will Spare a Turkey: "Rosie Live!"
November 27, 2008 7:09 AM
The original plan today was to review last night's Rosie Live!, Rosie O'Donnell's attempt to revive the variety-show format on NBC. But since today is Thanksgiving, and the show was such a turkey, TV Worth Watching has decided to spare it.
Embracing the adage that if you can't say something nice, don't say anything at all, TV Worth Watching will say nothing at all about Rosie Live! At least not today.
Enjoy the holiday...
The Variety Show Deserves to Be Reincarnated -- But Is Rosie Its Savior?
November 26, 2008 9:25 AM
Tonight at 8 ET, in a very rare attempt to revive the TV variety show format, Rosie O'Donnell is hosting a one-hour live special on NBC, smack in the middle of prime time. I concur completely with her passion that this is a genre worth reviving -- but I doubt whether Rosie, despite her enthusiasm and clout, is the person to do it.
If a variety show is going to be brought back for the 21st century -- and it should be -- it will have to be hosted by someone with talent.
A lot more talent that Rosie O'Donnell has, anyway. Hers is a talent for standup comedy, occasional controversy, and fanboy-level enthusiasm. The first and third served her well on her talk show, and the middle one served her on The View. But Ed Sullivan notwithstanding, a variety show host for a new generation must bring talent, as well as viewers and guests, to his or her TV party.
Rosie sang, many times, on her daytime talk show, especially with visiting performers from Broadway shows. She sang on Broadway herself, in Grease, but "sang," in all these instances, is a rather charitable description. She plans to "sing" tonight, too, with Liza Minnelli and others. Okay. If you must.
But compare that to another old-fashioned TV special that premiered last week: Comedy Central's A Colbert Christmas. Colbert not only had a wide range of guests, from Willie Nelson to Elvis Costello, but sang with them, too.
If a variety show is going to work, circa 2008, it has to do what The Smothers Brothers managed to do with their landmark variety show, circa 1968. Make room for the veterans and the cutting-edge new performers -- and, when possible, get them to interact during the same hour.
Some network, from CBS to TV Land, certainly should give the Smothers Brothers a prime-time special in 2009 to celebrate their 50th year as a comedy duo.
Also, Tom and Dick would be great guests on a new-generation show. In their prime, Tom and Dick played host to such wonderful, still-funny show-biz veterans as George Burns and Jack Benny. Now it's their turn to be the honored guests. But guests of whom?
If O'Donnell's proposed deal with NBC -- six sporadically scheduled specials per order, if tonight's pilot fares okay -- is used as a template, then a network could get a variety host who wouldn't commit to a full season or half-season order, but who might like to preside over a special from time to time.
So who would be the ultimate host for such a show? Someone talented enough to work with old and new singers, dancers and comics? Someone who could be funny in skits, exciting in song, impressive in dance? Someone held in such high regard among peers that booking popular acts would be no problem? And, last but perhaps most, someone with a loyal enough fan base to bring new viewers to the tube for an old-fashioned TV show?
The answer to all those questions is the same one.
Justin Timberlake.
Every time this guy has hosted Saturday Night Live, he's stolen the show, and made for the best SNL of that season. Earlier this month, in an unbilled guest appearance, he appeared in two skits and ran away with both. The audience loves him, and with good reason. He sings and dances with verve and skill -- and he's a goofy, truly funny comic actor.
Yes, it's high time variety TV made a comeback. But if it's to return successfully, it'll probably take a champion more multi-talented than Rosie O'Donnell. And wouldn't it be nice if the man who sang of "bringing sexy back" would also be the one to bring variety back?
FX's "The Shield" Ends As It Began, with a Killer Episode
November 25, 2008 9:42 AM
The FX series The Shield shook up viewers, and all of TV, when it burst onto the scene in 2002 -- with the show's purported hero, Michael Chiklis' rogue cop Vic Mackey, knowingly and ruthlessly killing an undercover officer.
Tonight at 10 ET, six years later, The Shield goes out the way it goes in -- with a killer episode.
For more than a year now, series creator Shawn Ryan has been building the confrontation between Vic and his former second-in-command, Walton Goggins' Shane Vendrell, to critical mass. All that energy and dramatic tension pays off tonight, as we finally learn the fates of Vic and Shane -- fates which were blood-stained from the start.
Don't worry: I'll say nothing about what happens in this expanded finale. Only that it's fabulous, and unceasingly tense, and loaded with one gripping, sometimes startling scene after another.
And it's not just the endgame between Vic and Shane that makes this last Shield shine so brightly. CCH Pounder as critically ill police chief Claudette Wyms, and Jay Karnes as principled detective Dutch Wagenbach, also get meaty, satisfying scenes in this finale.
For six years, the image of Vic shooting another officer in cold blood has stayed with me -- just as the bold example of the protagonist as extreme antihero has inspired and driven basic cable dramas ever since, from Nip/Tuck and Damages to Breaking Bad and Mad Men.
Tonight's episode contains images that, I'm sure, have seared themselves into my TV brain just as indelibly. Literally, from start to finish, The Shield has been one amazing, satisfying thrill ride.
Even Sweeps Don't Keep Cable From Demanding Attention
November 24, 2008 9:03 AM
Last night the broadcast networks presented one of their biggest guns of the November ratings sweep: Fox's two-hour telemovie, 24: Redemption. But over on cable, some of the regular weekly offerings were even more satisfying -- including the season finales of HBO's True Blood and Entourage.
True Blood ended its first season with all cylinders firing: a murderer unmasked, a heroine threatened, and so many juicy cliffhangers introduced that it'll be tough to wait until next summer for season two.
(Between the rebellious teen vamp returned to her "daddy" Bill, and the menacing, mysterious woman played by Michelle Forbes, there are two big new reasons to watch. And what in the world has happened to Lafayette? He vanished in last night's episode after being attacked by... something.)
Anna Paquin, as Sookie, has embodied one of this year's most intriguing characters -- and HBO, with True Blood, has presented its first truly buzzworthy series of 2008.
HBO also said goodbye for the season to another series last night: Entourage, which ended strongly with Vince bouncing back from defeat (not being cast in a Gus Van Sant movie) to the promise of his biggest victory yet (being cast as Nick in a remake of The Great Gatsby, directed by Martin Scorsese). If this story line is followed through next year, it ought to make for the show's best season yet.
It was an impressive one-two punch: Two solid series, two satisfying season finales, two shows doing better work, last night, than almost anything the broadcast networks had to offer on a hugely competitive sweeps night.
And don't even get me STARTED about Showtime's Dexter, which still has a few weeks to go before its own season finale. Or Comedy Central's A Colbert Christmas, which was SO much fun.
When broadcast TV's best offering is a 24 movie, that's no cause for shame or concern. But when, that same night, it's only the fifth best thing on TV... that IS something that should strike fear into the hearts of network executives.
But, as proven by last week's treatment of Pushing Daisies, not all of them HAVE hearts.
ABC Mows Down "Daisies," Fox Presents Bite-Sized Taste of "24"
November 21, 2008 1:21 PM
Pushing Daisies, the best new series ABC has presented in two years, has been cut down by the network. Obviously, and stupidly, ABC loves it not...
The remaining shows in the 13-episode order will play through January, but the network has decided to punish Pushing Daisies for ABC's own post-strike stupidity. The work stoppage by Hollywood writers may have been strike one -- but for ABC, not returning the show in the spring was strike two, and not promoting the show well enough this fall was strike three.
Three strikes, and Daisies is out!
What a shame. ABC executives, this is a stupid, stupid move.
Over at Fox, meanwhile, the executives are smart, smart, smart. They, too, decided not to return one of their series, 24, after the strike was through -- but with good reason. There was no way to present a full-length season of 24 hours without letting it spill into the summer, so it opted to wait until January 2009 to restart the show.
But because that's such a long time -- only The Sopranos went that long between seasons -- Fox this Sunday (9 p.m. ET) presents a two-hour telemovie, 24: Redemption, to try and give fans something to remember the show by.
Two hours, compared to 24, may not be much, but it's something. Hell, I was grateful for the mini-episodes of Rescue Me served up by FX for a similar reason -- and they were only five minutes long.
24: Redemption, by being so fast-forwarded in nature, points out some of the flaws and crutches of the 24 writing staff, but it's still lots of fun, and Robert Carlyle is a great guest star. For a fuller review, listen to today's (Friday's) Fresh Air with Terry Gross.
The best part of the 24 telemovie is what follows it immediately: a lengthy promo teaser for the January 2009 story arc. It's thrilling to see what's coming, and to know that we've got lots of hours of 24 ahead.
Sadly, though, we're down to our last few hours of Pushing Daisies.
By the way: Is it any surprise, or any coincidence, that Fox is ahead of ABC in the network ratings race?
"Pushing Daisies" Needs ABC's Support Now More Than Ever
November 20, 2008 11:27 AM
Last night's episode of ABC's superbly sublime Pushing Daisies tied, in the preliminary ratings, with NBC's supremely stupid Knight Rider. Not good. For Daisies, it was a series low in terms of viewers, but close to a series high in terms of writing and acting.
ABC, ignore the ratings for now. It's time to grow a pair, or at least rent one, and renew your best new show of the past two years...
Here are five quick reasons.
One: I put it to ABC that no show in prime time this week was promoted LESS than Pushing Daisies, and I was keeping track. How can a show build an audience, at a crucial time in its history, if its own network ignores it?
Two: The drop in viewership is ABC's fault. After the strike, it held back on new episodes, figuring it would relaunch the show this fall. Poor strategy -- but Bryan Fuller, Barry Sonnenfeld and the rest of the people involved with Daisies did nothing wrong. So stand by them now, and make it up to them.
Three: There hasn't been as visually ambitious and unique a series on broadcast network TV since Twin Peaks.
Last night, the climactic image -- involving a dead magician encased in concrete, an unconscious geek killer and a suddenly rescued and regurgitated kitty -- was laugh-out-loud hilarious.
Abra cadaver!
Four: This company of actors is pitch-perfect, and a total treat. Anna Friel and Lee Pace, as the look-but-don't-touch lovers (see above), are magical. The aunts, played by Ellen Greene and Swoosie Kurtz, are as lovable as they are colorful. Chi McBride's cynical investigator is a hoot, that's what he is. (Sorry: now I'm channeling Boston Legal.)
And Kristin Chenoweth, as Olive, is my favorite character in the entire series. She's almost like a three-dimensional cartoon character
And next week, when she goes undercover like some sort of modern Eva Gabor from Green Acres (diamonds, upswept hairdo, false eyelashes, pig on a leash), who can look at this woman and not smile, broadly?
Five -- and this is my final point -- there was a time when the networks would stand behind their best shows, and watch and wait as Hill Street Blues, Cheers, Seinfeld and other quality shows climbed from the ratings basement to much loftier heights. Pushing Daisies had big audiences once, pre-strike. Given network patience and support, it can get them again... and shows this excellent don't come around that often.
Give the show a renewal for the rest of the season, ABC, and get behind it. Daisies, like any flower, will benefit from a nurturing environment -- and it doesn't count that it's surrounded, on much of the rest of the lineup, by a bunch of manure.
Fans of Pushing Daisies recognize what a special show it is. Does ABC?
ABC, now's the time to demonstrate taste and patience... or admit, as a network, you don't have enough of either.
ABC's "Pushing Daisies": An Endangered Flower That Must Be Protected
November 19, 2008 10:38 AM
The latest episode of ABC's Pushing Daisies airs tonight at 8 ET, and its fate may be determined by the number of viewers who tune in. So please, please watch -- but shame on ABC for not supporting and nurturing this excellent series more lovingly.
If I were holding a daisy and pulling its petals one by one, this is the chant I'd use regarding Pushing Daisies and ABC: "I love it. ABC loves it not..."
When Pushing Daisies was unveiled at the network upfronts last year, and again when the networks delivered their fall series pilots, I championed the show as the best new fall series of 2007. But because of the writers' strike, only nine episodes of Bryan Fuller's inventively different TV confection were shown last season. Their average audience was 9.4 million -- very solid, but not great -- and ABC decided to hold back on additional episodes until this fall, when it would, in effect, relaunch the series.
That approach, it's now obvious, was wrong. CBS, which put shows back into production last spring, fared better than the networks that held back on inventory. So far this season, Pushing Daisies has seen its audience drop to 6.6 million.
ABC, not the series itself, is to blame. This season's episodes of Daisies have been just as enjoyable and inventive as last year's, and ABC appears to have all but given up on promoting the show.
Tonight's episode features, as guest star, Fred Willard, playing a magician. But you might not know that, because ABC's on-air promos for Pushing Daisies have pulled their own vanishing act.
I checked this week's three series most likely to appeal to a Daisies viewer -- Desperate Housewives, Boston Legal and Eli Stone -- representing one show each from ABC's Sunday, Monday and Tuesday lineups. All three of those series promoted Private Practice and other ABC shows heavily, but not one presented a promo for Daisies, except for one tossaway mention by an announcer at the end of Eli Stone.
How can a show build an audience if its own network won't support it?
What's worse, Pushing Daisies is so much better than so much of what's on broadcast TV right now, it should be nurtured carefully and stubbornly by ABC. Yes, the network deserves lots of credit for developing and scheduling the show in the first place. But now is the time for ABC executives to step up and embrace Pushing Daisies, even if it takes viewers a little longer.
ABC, You've planted, and grown, a beautiful flower in Pushing Daisies. Now's not the time to nip it in the bud.
New Holiday DVD Shopping Guides Are Up -- Please Shop. Please. Pretty Please...
November 18, 2008 7:42 AM
I know, it's not even Thanksgiving yet, so talking about holiday shopping may seem premature. But if you want to buy the perfect TV-on-DVD gift for someone, you can save a lot on shipping by ordering early. So shop soon -- and, because we're launching these nifty shopping guides today, please, PLEASE shop here...
Some of you may have been around this site long enough to have ordered from our Holiday Shopping Guide last year. It's back -- and this year, thanks to a lot of great, exhaustive work by TVWW contributor Diane Werts, it's better, and a lot bigger, than ever. If you can't find a DVD boxed set or individual release on this list that will thrill someone you know, that person must HATE television.
Selections range from single discs (my personal favorite: The Point) to massive complete sets, such as the new The Sopranos: The Complete Series. You can access the list at any time by clicking on the Holiday Shopping Guide banner, just above BIANCULLI'S BEST BETS. Or, for now, by clicking HERE.
Starting today, there's a second list to peruse, too, and this one taps into Diane's expertise as the author of Christmas on Television. TVWW's Guide to Christmas Shows on DVD is another list of recommended gift possibilities -- but this list is devoted specifically to TV shows on DVDs that are ABOUT the holidays. These range from brand new offerings (A Colbert Christmas) to really vintage ones (A Shari Lewis Christmas). Again -- if you can't find the perfect gift on this list, you're shopping for a Scrooge. And even then, you'd have LOTS of choices.
Sample that list by clicking on the banner just beneath BIANCULLI'S BLOG on the home page -- or, for now, by clicking HERE.
Also in the Christmas spirit, Diane will be posting a full list of holiday specials and holiday-themed TV shows as they appear on TV this season. So watch for that, and keep checking her main-page blog, FOR BETTER OR WERTS -- and buy her book, which I reviewed glowingly long before she ever came aboard this website. Click HERE to buy her Christmas on Television.
Sorry for the hard-sell approach, but there are two reasons we're throwing so much space and effort into these special pages and offerings. One is because DVD sets of TV shows are among the best inventions of the decade -- and yes, they've pretty much all come out in this decade. Another is because holiday television is one of Diane's pet passions, and she's the recognized national expert on the subject.
And the third, which we've always been upfront about here, is that every purchase made that originates from this website results in a small kickback for TV WORTH WATCHING. Small, but, if enough of you buy a DVD or two by clicking on one of the "Buy Now" buttons here, not insignificant.
So while shopping for a friend or loved one, you're buying a gift for us as well -- one that doesn't cost you anything, but which helps us stay alive. Really. That's the dream, anyway.
Enjoy! And thanks, Diane and Rich and Eric, for teaming up to make this year's holiday guides a reality. Now I can start shopping for gifts for YOU....
