It’s easy enough to say that the phrase “stranger than fiction” would have had to be invented to describe the murder trial of OJ Simpson if it didn’t already exist, but still, the natural tendency of Hollywood is to gild the non-fictional lily, making melodrama out of drama.  When it was announced that THE […]

  TNT’s MAJOR CRIMES, like its predecessor The Closer, belongs to the “procedural-plus” subgenre, with a crime to be solved every week combined with a secondary amount of continuing serialized plot.  However, there was very little of the “plus” to be found in tonight’s season finale (really a half-season finale, with the show scheduled to resume […]

  Vampires may live forever, but TV shows don’t, and tonight the coffin closed on THE VAMPIRE DIARIES, the pre-superhero champion of the then-fledgling CW network when it debuted 8 years ago.  In truth, the close of business was a season or two past due:  not only were the ratings way down from their peak, […]

  Although there was plenty more going on–too much, in fact–it was fitting that Season 7 of DEXTER came down, in the end, to the women in Dexter Morgan’s life.  One could even say that this season might have been titled Deb, as a great deal of it tracked the journey of Dexter’s beloved adopted […]

  The first season of AMC’s INTO THE BADLANDS felt entirely predigested.  It was Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon by way of Game of Thrones by way of every post-apocalyptic Chosen One fantasy you’ve ever seen.  The Matrix was in the mix, and so was Star Wars, and Mad Max, and The Wizard of Oz, and […]

  Audiences of TV drama have the luxury these days of being spoiled, and that raises the question:  what separates a great series from one that’s merely very good?  WGN America’s MANHATTAN had an original, intriguing premise and setting, exploring the scientific and personal tensions amid the creation of the world’s first atomic bomb at […]

  The thing to remember, when charting the collapse of THE OFFICE, is that the producers weren’t taken by surprise.  Steve Carell made it clear early last season that he wouldn’t be returning, and the show had months to plan for his departure and The Office 2.0.  The abject failure that resulted is a remarkable […]

  Since this is posting before the West Coast airing ends, SPOILER ALERT. …although I’m not sure how much of a Spoiler it is when the Internet has been expecting it for weeks.  Perhaps the biggest surprise in the series finale of HOW I MET YOUR MOTHER was that series creators Carter Bays and Craig […]