DAVID BIANCULLI

Founder / Editor

ERIC GOULD

Associate Editor

LINDA DONOVAN

Assistant Editor

Contributors

ALEX STRACHAN

MIKE HUGHES

KIM AKASS

MONIQUE NAZARETH

ROGER CATLIN

GARY EDGERTON

TOM BRINKMOELLER

GERALD JORDAN

NOEL HOLSTON

 
 
2017
May
24
 
 
SEASON FINALE: Tonight is the season finale of this particular, very entertaining narrative of Archer, which, all season, has taken place inside an imagined film noir landscape and mystery dreamed by Archer, who actually is in a coma after sustaining life-threatening injuries. This season, fittingly, has been called Dreamland – and as it concludes tonight, it may, and should, give us hints about what Archer, and the show’s writers, are dreaming up for next season. For more on Archer,
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
24
 
 
Two years ago, in the early days of his new CBS gig, Stephen Colbert made a big deal of presenting what he said was an unknown but talented Paul Simon “cover band,” called Troubled Waters. He introduced the lead singer, Alan (“You can call me Al,” he told Colbert), who indeed bore an amazing resemblance to the smaller half of Simon & Garfunkel. And indeed, he was Paul Simon, and proceeded to play a very strong mini-set (pictured). Tonight, Paul Simon is scheduled to a
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
24
 
 
Announced and scrapped twice, ABC’s “re-imagined” Dirty Dancing finally slides into prime-time on the closing night of the May “sweeps”...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
24
 
 
Every presidential photo op is another meme possibility these days, and today’s (5/24/17) audience at the Vatican with the Holy Father was no different... Apply everyone’s favorite closing theme, and presto...
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
23
 
 
SPECIAL: This one-hour standup comedy concert was filmed in January, three months before Hasan Minhaj hosted this year’s sparsely attended White House Correspondents’ Dinner. He did a really good job there, especially under the circumstances. But he has an advantage when performing in this January concert, in David, CA – it’s home-field advantage, because he grew up there.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
23
 
 
SEASON PREMIERE: First three episodes of Season 3, the new season, are available today, as Casual embarks on yet another run of 13 episodes about an unusual, but not twisted, sort of sibling living arrangement. Tommy Dewey plays a single man whose sister, played by Michaela Watkins, is newly divorced – and with a teenaged daughter (played by Tara Lynne Barr) to raise, she decides to cohabit with her bachelor brother. It’s a Casual living arrangement that leaves plenty of room fo
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
23
 
 
SEASON FINALE: Part 2 of 2. All four finalists singing Monday had good turns, and showed off their respective strengths. But based on it all, and all season, I’d go for Jesse Larson (pictured) first, and then Chris Blue. Tonight, we learn how America voted. And right now, your opinion on America’s track record for voting depends, in part, on which side of the political fence you’re on.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
23
 
 
Part 2 of 3. In “Blood and Soil,” the second part of this three-part documentary on the origins of roots music, American Epic proves that weather has had an effect on music in general, and the blues in particular. An actual flood in Louisiana, for example, led to a flood of new music emigrating to the North. Watch and see – and, more to the point, listen. Check local listings.
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
23
 
 
Clark Gable is TCM’s Star of the Month – and tonight, in prime time, TCM presents a movie which NBC showed in two parts, in 1976, and got ratings strong enough to land in the all-time Top 10 at that point in television history. It’s 1939’s Gone with the Wind, and any time it’s shown in its proper screen ratio, unedited and uninterrupted, as it is tonight on TCM, you ought to watch it. And if you have what you think is a good excuse not to, well, frankly, my dear&hel
 
 
 
  
 
 
2017
May
23
 
 
Last week’s episode was an interrogation showdown in which Elizabeth and Philip (Keri Russell, Matthew Rhys) asked questions of another couple. She was a Russian woman, now living in the U.S., and suspected by the spies’ Russian handlers of being a former Russian prisoner of the Nazis in WWII who survived by turning against, and killing, some of her fellow prisoners. The woman’s husband, an American, loved her, and knew nothing of her suspected past. By the end of the hour, bot