US TV

An archive of articles about US television programmes and production.

Tuesday’s “2.5, not 24” news

9 February 2010 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Film

British TV

US TV

US TV

Review: Smallville – Absolute Justice

8 February 2010 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

Absolute Justice

In the US: Friday 5th February 2010, 8/7c, The CW

I gave up watching Smallville at the start of this season. As I said at the time, for most of its previous nine years, the show had admirably tried to square the comic book silliness of Superman with the sensibilities of Dawson’s Creek, albeit with decreasing success. Come the tenth season, it just all got very silly indeed and went into comic book overload.

This week, the producers of Smallville fired up their Flash-powered running wheel to give us a two-part story stuck together as a movie. Doing its best to channel Watchmen, Absolute Justice saw former members of the so-called Justice Society of America being killed by an old enemy, necessitating its disgraced surviving members team up again and join forces with the fledging Justice League that Clark Kent, Chloe, Oliver (Green Arrow) and co have been trying to put together.

And like a giant bat signal in the sky, it called to my inner geek to watch it. There’s ironic, huh?

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The CarusometerA Carusometer rating of 3

Third-episode verdict: Life Unexpected

8 February 2010 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

In the US: Mondays, 9/8c, The CW

To maintain a sense of consistency with my first-episode review, I’m about a week late with this third-episode verdict. But hell – let’s do it.

So as we all recall, Life Unexpected sees a precocious teenager who’s been through seven foster families track down her birth parents so that she can be emancipated and lead her own life, free of adults. However, despite leading separate lives now, they decide to be ‘Lux’s’ parents for real.

Now, the first episode was actually quite good: it played a little with the darkness of the concept, had some reasonably witty dialogue and moments and the characters were broadly likable. Trouble was, it was pretty much a self-contained concept – where was the show going to go from there?

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The full Jon Stewart-Bill O’Reilly interview

8 February 2010 Rob Buckley Post a comment

You may not have realised this, but over in the US last week, Jon Stewart of The Daily Show was interviewed by Bill O’Reilly of Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor, where they discussed political coverage, Fox News bias. Only edited highlights were shown on Fox, but they’ve posted the full 42-minute interview and you can watch it below. Worth watching if you have an interest in US news programmes

Monday’s “Sandman’s Gaiman’s Smith’s man” news

8 February 2010 Rob Buckley 4 Comments

Doctor Who

  • Big Finish to do The Four Doctors, another Mara story
  • Neil Gaiman writing ep for second Matt Smith season

Film

British TV

  • Mark Gatiss, Matt Horne and Marc Warren to star in Boy George drama for BBC. No filming in Eltham, though! Pah!
  • Persuasionists ratings halve
  • Trevor Eve to star as hostage negotiator in ITV1 thriller

US TV