On balance, it's hard for me to argue that receiving a couple hundred cable channels is a bad thing. I may only watch a fraction of them, but it's nice to know that if I wanted to get tips on refinishing furniture or watch a Premier League match, I could.

In the past ten months, both The Sopranos and The Wire have ended their runs, so it's worth asking: What takes over from them as the Best Show on Television?

The first season of FX's series Dirt signaled the coming of a cultural apocalypse, with tabloid editor Lucy Spiller (Courteney Cox) leading the horsemen. Season two, though, brings a lighter touch.

Pushing Daisies immediately proved itself worthy of being afforded the same special "Lost Rules" treatment.

Weird year, 2007. It began with the public immolation of Grey's Anatomy star Isaiah Washington and ended with the possible immolation of TV as we know it. In between came the greatest fade to black of all time, the twee-est TV show ever to earn a full-season pickup and all kinds of really good (and some really bad) television.

TNT asked the folks at The Closer to do a Christmas episode this year, and creator James Duff was happy to deliver. But it's still The Closer, so those looking for big doses of holiday cheer should probably hold out for It's a Wonderful Life.

Side Order of Life gives our three main women potentially happy endings this week -- which can't be good, because it's not the end. Jenny thinks she's found Cell Phone Man, Vivy thinks she's found a man to love her despite her illness, and Becca thinks she's finally landed Ian. I can't help but think things aren't going to stay happy for long.

It's time again for the most inappropriate show on television, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. And while last week's two-parter pulled up lame in the second half, I'm happy to say both episodes of week two were hilariously wrong. Continue reading »

Burn Notice! Two-hour season finale! Now! On USA! (Yeah, I'm a little pumped. Wanna fight about it?)

In Eureka, if it isn't one thing, it's another. (In this case "one thing" refers to a breakdown of Eureka's underground cooling system, and "another" refers to Mild-Mannered Sheriff Jack Carter being transformed into Irresistible Man-Meat Jack Carter.)

We finally find out Grace's big bad secret on Saving Grace, and it's ugly. We also find out that it takes approximately 11 years for anything to get through Grace's thick skull -- like, perhaps bringing strange men home and giving them access to handcuffs is not the best plan. Just a thought.

With no word on a fifth season, The 4400 had two choices for its season finale: meekly beg for a renewal, or burn as many bridges as it could while still leaving the door open for another season. The show chose the latter option, and we were left with a very different Seattle, and a very high body count that included some important characters.

This week's episode of Curb Your Enthusiasm starts off with Larry, Cheryl, Jeff and the Blacks unpacking boxes as they move into a different house following last week's fire.

You know all the stuff that didn't happen in the rest of the season of Dead Zone, stuff about conspiracies and apocalypses and bad men and secrets and all the rest? They saved it all up for this episode. They jam so much in here that I can hardly keep track of it all. But in the end, it looks like we're right back at the beginning, like this season never happened.

This was a curiously transitional episode of Side Order of Life -- lots of loose ends dangling, lots of unfinished thoughts. And they really made it work. None of the plots are revelatory, but it all adds up to a sense of things moving, things changing, things that will never be the same.

It's been a long and hard road for the Rock of Love fans, but we are near the end. In fact, there's only 3 girls left. Although, I think perhaps two of them should have been hospitalized for blood alcohol poisoning after the Vegas trip we witnessed last week.

What do a graffiti-spraying punk, tattooed guys wearing capes and a petulant princess have in common? Why, Flash Gordon of course!

This is whiplash: Within the course of a few days, I've gone from My Boys (a sweet, good-hearted sitcom) to tonight's premiere of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia. If that means nothing to you, you've never seen the latter show. The Paddy's Pub gang makes the "Seinfeld" miscreants look like saints. Continue reading »

Finally, after what seems like months of waiting for the U.S. Open to end, Burn Notice is back, baby! And don't get me wrong--I love tennis. But I'm pretty sure Bruce Campbell hasn't swung a racket at Flushing Meadows anytime recently, so it's just innately less awesome than Burn Notice. I mean, come on. Bruce Freaking Campbell! (Yeah, the first season is coming to an end and I'm still not over the awesomeness.)

Yes! There has been a mystery solved on Damages! Have you been wondering why Ellen will be wearing underwear under a trench coat when she finds David dead? Did it keep you awake at night? You can sleep soundly now, my friend; the explanation is that her clothes get stained with blood from the fight in Patty's apartment, so she takes them off. Thanks, Damages! So that's one down, what, forty-seven to go?

At the risk of angering the many rightfully loyal Eureka fans who frequent this website, I'm gonna go ahead and say that this episode wasn't one of Eureka's finest moments.

It's a miracle: We got through an entire episode of Saving Grace without seeing Grace have sex with anyone. Hallelujah! Next time, maybe she'll remain fully clothed for the entire episode, too. At least the shot of her in her bra wasn't so much about debauchery as to show off the wicked bruise she got from being shot and mostly dead. That's progress.

This episode of The Closer was nearly perfect. The crime was twisty, and Brenda's leaps of logic to catch the bad guy were suitably breathtaking. Plus, the team was in top form, snotty DA Garnett got roundly mocked, and Fritz and Brenda fought it out and came to a realistic resolution. It was a great way to wrap up the season. Just please, no more equating snack cakes to anyone's naughty bits, ok?

Well, lookee here, my second double-episode finale in as many weeks. Is it the new in thing? While one of tonight's episodes of My Boys was mostly filler, the second was really good and captured the best qualities of the show.

Man, tonight's season finale certainly was action-packed! And as usual, we learned a valuable lesson from the good folks at Greek, this time about how lying is bad and prone to backfiring. Mostly. Except when it's kind of not. Thanks, Greek!

Apparently Haim will not be returning for this, the last episode of the season (as you may remember he flew out of town in the previous episode). So, that leaves Feldman and Susie here to remind us about all the wonder and magic in this season of The Two Coreys. Is there anything better than going out in your season finale with a clip show? I think not.

You can't say nothing happened on The 4400 this week. With only a week to go before the season finale, there was enough action in this episode to get everyone who cares about the fate of the promicin-enhanced world keyed up for next week. Deaths! Shootings! Arguments! Kidnapping! Nanotechnology! And injections! Lots and lots of injections!

It's the second to last episode of Dead Zone, and we finally get around to addressing what was ostensibly supposed to be the central mystery again: Why did Walt Bannerman die?

What has always impressed me about Curb Your Enthusiasm is that Larry David makes it very obvious within the first few minutes of the episode exactly where the story is going to go, but it is still always funny watching it get there.

Oh, Rock of Love fans ... it feels like such a farce to go through the previouslys each week, as if something unexpected occurred. As if perhaps the girls put away the cans of Coors and opted instead for nice orange pekoe with a splash of milk. Instead of dry humping the stripper pole in the main room, they decided to change it up and discuss Sartre's defense of Existentialism. Alas, constant readers, no.

The season finale of State of Mind had surprise pregnancy, lost children, heartfelt conversations, confessions, love lost, love found, and a rousing dance number at the end (sort of). And as far as I can tell, I was the only person in the Zap2It universe watching it.

Side Order of Life is so crazy-making sometimes. It's got good characters, a reasonably compelling set-up, decent dialog... and then it throws in something so completely unbelievable that it makes me want to scream.

After taking a week off for Labor Day, Flash Gordon returns, still only playing the remade Queen theme in 30-second intervals under next week's previews. I demand a full, voice over-less playing of the song! But I digress.

This is the end, true believers, with a double-sized finale for Who Wants to Be a Superhero? When last we met, Parthenon was (surprisingly) sent home, leaving as the final three Defuser, Hygena and Hyper-Strike. We open with the heroes repeating the phrase "step it up" in reference to their collective game. Then they take time out to watch Hyper-Strike juggle. Continue reading »

It's been two weeks since the last Top Chef: Miami, but the loss of Tre still leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Let's see if the judges did better this time around.

Damages began with a simple premise: innocent law school grad gets tangled up with worldly, scheming attorney. Well, actually, it wasn't that simple, and things have only gotten more complex as the season has progressed.  And now it seems that the naïve newbie is getting more complex, too.

Ah, invisibility. Such an apt metaphor for a wide variety of situations. On the one hand, we've got a literal invisibility crisis. On the other hand, we've got the classic "nerdy loner turns from invisible to desirable when cute girl is forced to interact with him" situation. On the other, other hand, we've got the magically appearing new cast member, who was but an invisible Eureka resident to us until she became a love interest.

We get up close and personal with the graphic sex on HBO's new drama Tell Me You Love Me, sneak a peek at the sixth season of Curb Your Enthusiasm and peruse Tim Gunn's Guide to Style.

We finally met Grace's sister Paige in this episode of Saving Grace, and it's hard to see how they could be related. Not just because they are diametrically opposed in attitude and outlook, but also because they're so different physically.

Now we know why Brenda tries so hard to get a confession out of her perp every week on The Closer -- jury trials are a crapshoot. It's so much more tidy when you get your murderer to confess at the end of the hour. Now we've got a wait a week to see if Brenda found the right man, and whether he'll actually pay for his alleged crimes. Curses!

Tonight on Greek, passive-aggressive behavior was at an all-time high. And, for the record, it didn't pay off. So I wouldn't bother with that note you're about to leave for your messy roommate -- it'll probably just turn into an escalating prank war, or backfire and make everything think you're a jerk.

Monday (Sept. 3) night's Weeds was dedicated to Nancy Botwin getting her first seemingly legitimate job (appropriate for Labor Day, I guess) and meeting her new employer, who may not be so legitimate himself.

Well, I got my wish that someone would get hurt on this midseason finale of Kyle XY. I just thought that Madacorp would be more directly responsible.

Welcome to the Church of Class! Oh wait, this is Rock of Love. Welcome to the Church of Trash!

Wow, they're not messing around. After the Model Life recap and title credits they go straight to revealing the fates of our Models-In-Training.

Sisters are doin' it for themselves as we rejoin Who Wants to Be a Superhero? -- at least, Hygena is claiming that with Whip-Snap's dismissal, she's got to represent for all the women that were previously booted. Me, I'd be in it for myself. Remember, we're at the final four. It's not like the guys are helping each other win, or that Hygena would get to bring back Basura and the gang for her comic-book debut, so the sisterhood seems misplaced. Continue reading »

Tonight