SERIES PREMIERE: This eight-episode prequel series is based on a 2001 movie comedy that, at the time, earned only $295,000 at the box office – but since became a cult favorite for fans of a certain generation (i.e., the generation after mine). The concocters of the original, Michael Showalter and David Wain, enticed all the original actors – many of them now major stars, such as Paul Rudd, Bradley Cooper, Elizabeth Banks and Amy Schumer – to return for a Netflix prequel. So the

2015

Jul

DESCENDANTS By David Bianculli

Disney Channel is throwing all the clout it can into this new made-for-TV musical, hoping to recreate the lightning that was captured in High School Musical a Disney generation ago. (Specifically, 2006.) Kenny Ortega, who directed High School Musical, is behind Descendants as well, and it centers on the secretly raised, now-teen children of four iconic Disney villains. Mal (Dove Cameron) is the daughter of Maleficent (played here by Kristin Chenoweth, pictured with the young series leads); Carlo

2015

Jul

LUCY By David Bianculli

In this 2014 sci-fi action movie, Scarlett Johannson plays a woman who’s a sort of spiritual sister to the protagonist of Flowers for Algernon, whom Cliff Robertson played in the movie Charly. She’s a woman who, thanks to exposure to an unstable drug, begins to evolve significantly. In Charly, the mentally challenged protagonist got smarter and smarter, to genius level, until he began to regress. In Lucy, she just keeps getting smarter and smarter – and more powerful, and much

2015

Jul

FOXCATCHER By David Bianculli

Mark Ruffalo and Channing Tatum play wrestlers asked by an eccentric millionaire to come to his private training facility in preparation for the 1988 Olympic Games. What sounds like a traditional, inspirational sports movie is anything but, because, by sticking to the facts, Foxcatcher becomes something much more unpredictable and disturbing. And speaking of defying expectations: Steve Carell is all but unrecognizable as the wealthy, wrestling-obsessed John du Pont.

2015

Jul

COLD JUSTICE: SEX CRIMES By David Bianculli

SERIES PREMIERE: Think of this new TNT reality-series series spinoff in the form of an SAT question. “Cold Justice: Sex Crimes is to Cold Justice as Law & Order: Special Victims Unit is to ______.” Then decide, from that completed answer, whether you’re interested in tuning in.

2015

Jul

HBO TAKES TCA PRESS TOUR SOMEWHAT LAYING DOWN By Ed Bark

Renowned and even revered for its star-powered TV "press tour" panels, HBO shrunk to something of a Little Dipper with its Thursday afternoon/evening show and tell...

2015

Jul

THE UNBEARABLE LIGHTNESS OF BEING JON STEWART By Alex Strachan

I come neither to praise Jon Stewart nor to bury him. Many have done the former, and Fox News seems only too happy to do the latter...

2015

Jul

AFI LIFE ACHIEVEMENT AWARD TO STEVE MARTIN By David Bianculli

This is a repeat showing of the American Film Institute’s recent salute to Steve Martin – a salute that boasts not only a generous sampling of clips from Martin’s decades-long movie career, but appearances, and funny short speeches, by lots and lots of Martin’s cinematic colleagues and friends. Martin Short alone is worth tuning in to see, but there’s so much more. And afterward, TCM presents two of Martin’s films: At 9:30 p.m. ET, 1991’s Father of the B

2015

Jul

DATES By David Bianculli

Tonight’s new dates feature more returning characters, who haven’t given up on dating entirely yet. In the first of this evening’s two episodes, Stephen and Mia (Ben Chaplin, Oona Chaplin) agree to meet for another date – but she’s a no-show, leading to another dating adventure entirely. And in the second episode, Jenny (Sheridan Smith) decides to try, try again, and go out on another date with a guy she met online: this time, a guy named Christian (Andrew Scott), w

2015

Jul

THE SEVENTIES By David Bianculli

Tonight’s new episode is called “Terrorism at Home and Abroad” – and it’s kind of amazing, when you start tallying up all of the domestic and international terrorist incidents that occurred in the Seventies, how frequent and brazen they were. And it’s all recounted here, from the kidnaping of Patty Hearst by the Symbionese Liberation Army to the rash of airline hijackings that led to intensified airport security, and from dozens of bombings by the anti-war Wea

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