SEASON PREMIERE: This venerable newsmagazine, the longest-running continuing series in prime time, continues to score often with significant scoops, ending up, more than not, in the end-of-week Top 10. Tonight is the start of Season 47 for 60 Minutes, and one of the ways I put that astounding run into perspective is to remember that during its first season, it did a story on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour, a fellow CBS show that, in 1968 when the story ran, was stirring up all kinds of troubl

2014

Sep

MASTERPIECE MYSTERY: “MISS MARPLE: A CARIBBEAN MYSTERY” By David Bianculli

SEASON PREMIERE: Fans of the PBS Mystery series just lost David Suchet as Hercule Poirot for good – but only a few months later, get to enjoy the return of another famous Agatha Christie sleuth, the prim but observant Miss Marple. Julia McKenzie returns for another small sampling of Miss Marple mysteries, starting with A Caribbean Mystery, in which a planned vacation turns into an unplanned murder investigation – involving the suggested element of voodoo. Check local listings.

2014

Sep

MADAM SECRETARY By David Bianculli

SERIES PREMIERE: I’m very happy to see Téa Leoni back on television, and also glad to see CBS mount a political drama with such an outstanding cast – others in the mix here include Keith Carradine, Tim Daly and Bebe Neuwirth. But the script, at least in this pilot episode, is much less intelligent than its characters are supposed to be, so approach this with low expectations, but hopes for some rapid improvement in the writers’ room. For my full review on NPR’s Fre

2014

Sep

THE GOOD WIFE By David Bianculli

SEASON PREMIERE: The final show of last season, after a superb run of episodes, ended with Alan Cumming’s Eli Gold surprising Julianna Margulies’ Alicia, and himself, by asking her to run for State's Attorney. This new season picks up that conversation exactly where it left off, and dives in so confidently, and so entertainingly, that The Good Wife, once again, establishes itself as the broadcast drama to beat when it comes to both acting and writing. For my full review on NPR’

2014

Sep

THE STRAIN By David Bianculli

In tonight’s episode, the trail to the lair of the Master leads deep, deep underground – and to a hellish image straight out of Dante’s Inferno. I wasn’t sure The Strain could get any creepier, but tonight, as it nears the end of its first season, it sure does.

2014

Sep

ABC'S 'BLACK-ISH' TACKLES A TV TOPIC THAT'S TRICKY-ISH By Gerald Jordan

Thirty years after NBC's The Cosby Show introduced 34 million American homes to a well-to-do African-American family, ABC wants to up the ante with the new comedy black-ish...

2014

Sep

1970: 'MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL' KICKS OFF ON ABC By Christy Slewinski

On this day in 1970, ABC introduced Monday Night Football...

2014

Sep

THE COSBY SHOW MARATHON By David Bianculli

Want to feel old – or at least older? It was 30 years ago that Bill Cosby revived the sitcom, and handed NBC a Number One hit show that changed TV history, with the instantly successful premiere of The Cosby Show. That pilot show is televised tomorrow at 2 p.m. ET, to kick off Day 2 of this two-day, 16-hour marathon – but today, the marathon begins with “How Ugly Is He?,” when Cosby’s Cliff Huxtable meets the smarmy boyfriend of daughter Denise (Lisa Bonet). And the

2014

Sep

THE ROOSEVELTS: AN INTIMATE HISTORY By David Bianculli

Part 7. When this final installment of The Roosevelts begins, in 1944, there still are two Roosevelts, Franklin and Eleanor, alive at the center of this fascinating narrative. By the time it ends, another world war has ended, the United Nations has been formed – and as for the Roosevelts, and then there were none. This latest Ken Burns documentary is a superb work of research and storytelling from start to finish – and tonight is the finish. For my full review, see Bianculli’s

2014

Sep

DOCTOR WHO By David Bianculli

Doctor Who is especially adept at introducing villains who have a primal sense of terror about them – truly creepy bad guys that seem crafted from the stuff of childhood nightmares. Tonight, here comes another one… a high-security alien prisoner known as the Teller.

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