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DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

Bianculli's Blog

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

The Cold Light Reader

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Dateline Donovan
Contributors

DAVID HINCKLEY

All Along the Watchtower

ED BARK

Uncle Barky's Bytes

ALEX STRACHAN

TV That Matters

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Open Mike

ED MARTIN

Ed Martin's TV Mix

KIM AKASS

Aerial View

MONIQUE NAZARETH

MNtv

BILL BRIOUX

TV Feeds My Family

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TV Eye

GARY EDGERTON

Must-Click TV

TOM BRINKMOELLER

Raised On MTM

GERALD JORDAN

Crossing Jordan

NOEL HOLSTON

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TVWW ARCHIVE

Contributors Archive
 
 
2020
Dec
16
PBS OFFERS A LOOK AT LEGEND AND PIONEER CHARLEY PRIDE By Mike Hughes
 
 
Over the next few days, viewers can celebrate one of the great figures in American music...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
16
THE RIPPER By David Bianculli
 
 
DOCUMENTARY SERIES PREMIERE: This multi-part documentary has a purely British flavor, in approach and tone as well as subject matter. It tells of a period, in the mid-1970s, when a killer skulked around West Yorkshire, murdering and brutally disfiguring prostitutes in the general manner of the infamous Whitechapel murderer Jack the Ripper a century or so before. In such areas as Leeds, four women had been murdered in a 10-mile radius within 18 months – but then the patterns widened. From t
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
16
ALFRED HITCHCOCK MARATHON By David Bianculli
 
 
Tonight’s all-night Alfred Hitchcock binge from TCM begins at 8 p.m. ET in prime time with two movies centered around two of the director’s iciest blondes: Kim Novak’s mysterious femme fatale, or fatale femme, in 1958’s Vertigo (pictured), followed at 10:15 p.m. ET by Tippi Hedren’s kleptomaniac in 1964’s Marnie. And after those two movies, the Hitch just keep on coming. At 12:45 a.m. ET, there’s 1955’s&
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
16
1975: CBS DEBUTS 'ONE DAY AT A TIME' By TV WW
 
 
This day in 1975 marked the premiere of CBS's One Day at a Time...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
15
1954: ABC'S ANTHOLOGY SERIES 'DISNEYLAND' PRESENTS 'DAVY CROCKETT' By David Bianculli
 
 
On this day in 1954, ABC's anthology series, Disneyland, aired the first installment of Davy Crockett...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
15
TENET By David Bianculli
 
 
MOVIE PREMIERE: This would have been one of the bigger movie premieres of December, had there not been this pesky pandemic. Christopher Nolan, of The Dark Knight and Inception fame, writes and directs this new mind-bending, and time-bending, adventure film, which stars John David Washington as the protagonist. Make that the Protagonist, with an upper-case P, because that’s all he’s named in this new movie. Co-stars include Robert Pattison and Elizabeth Debicki.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
15
THE LAST BLOCKBUSTER By David Bianculli
 
 
DOCUMENTARY PREMIERE: This new documentary really goes off the beaten path, and completely around the Bend. As in Bend, Oregon, the location of the last operating Blockbuster video store in the U.S. How is that possible? How does it operate? What clientele does it serve? Watch this nonfiction account, directed by Taylor Morden and written by Zeke Kamm, and see. And afterward, be kind – rewind.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
15
THE VOICE By David Bianculli
 
 
CYCLE FINALE: This is the culmination of the first fully pandemic edition of NBC’s The Voice. But not the last, presumably, as this musical competition show usually produces two cycles per year – and early next year, when The Voice returns, we’re likely to still be in the thick of it.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
15
BIG SKY By David Bianculli
 
 
WINTER FINALE: This is the seasonal ending of this particular portion of the narrative adapted by David E. Kelley for Big Sky, which benefits from a few strong leading players: Dedee Pfeiffer as investigator Denise Brisbane, Valerie Mahaffey as the repressive mother of a sexual trafficker, and John Carroll Lynch as a less than noble cop. The plot has strained credulity at times, but Lynch and Pfeiffer, especially, are fun to watch.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2020
Dec
14
THE VOICE By David Bianculli
 
 
SERIES FINALE: Part 1 of 2. Adjusting to the pandemic, and being one of the few broadcast TV series that has managed to keep producing episodes during this crisis, has been a hallmark of the 2020 cycles of NBC’s musical competition show. Tonight’s installment features the five surviving contestants of this latest cycle of The Voice – and in this new dangerously infectious environment, “surviving” has an entirely different and more somber subtext – wh
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
 
New From TVWW

PBS' 'Frontline’ Examines Pension Promises and — Spoiler Alert — Finds the Math Doesn’t Add Up
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
The Decadence of ‘Versailles’ Comes to Ovation
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
Prescribing Mamie Gummer in 'Emily Owens, M.D.'
By Ed Bark
 
 
 
 
Looking for a Free Ride? HBO Can Deliver
By Christy Slewinski
 
 
 
 
'Pass the Biscuits' Part of the Hatfield-McCoy Pop-Culture Legacy
By Noel Holston
 
 
 
 

Dispatches From TVWW

'Extinction: The Facts' is a Sobering Call to Action
By David Hinckley
 
 
 
 
How 'Mayans' Has Been Influenced by the Show's Creator Elgin James
By Mike Hughes
 
 
 
 
For Whom the Bell Tolls: Ken Burns and Lynn Novick Take on Ernest Hemingway, the Man and the Myth
By Alex Strachan
 
 
 
 
In the Final Season, Sutton Foster's Liza is Now the Genuine Version of Her 'Younger' Self
By Monique Nazareth
 
 
 
 
Season 2 of 'City on a Hill' Returns with Kevin Bacon, Aldis Hodge, and Boston Corruption
By David Hinckley