2011 winter/spring TV thread: mid-season replacements, returning favorites, etc.

really enjoyed the 2010 Fall TV Premieres: What's good and what's not so good? thread and thought it might be cool to start fresh with a new one to talk about all the new shows debuting in the next few weeks, some shows returning as mid-season replacements, and continue discussing stuff already talked about in the fall thread

only new show of the year I've seen so far is Shameless on Showtime, which is entertaining enough (William H. Macy having fun playing against type, Emmy Rossum in various states of undress), could go either way. the other new Showtime show Episodes looks like it might be decent too.

Is Shameless a US version of our Shameless? Poor people getting into outrageous scrapes?

I see that it is. The first two or three series of the original are great.

new network shows premiering in the next couple months:

America's Next Great Restaurant (NBC, ::shrugs::)
Bob's Burgers (FOX, another in a long line of unpromising attempts to flesh out their animated sitcom lineup)
Breaking In (FOX, Christian Slater's 3rd attempt at TV stardom in recent years)
The Cape (NBC, comic book nerd bait, doesn't look very good)
The Chicago Code (FOX, cop drama)
Happy Endings (ABC, sitcom that everyone will be disappointed to learn does not take place in a massage parlor)
Harry's Law (NBC, David E. Kelley legal zzzzzz)
Live To Dance (CBS, banking heavy on how much people miss Paula Abdul pissing her pants on live TV)
Mixed Signals (FOX, adapted from popular Israeli sitcom)
Mr. Sunshine (ABC, Matt Leblanc's latest foray into doomed post-Friends projects)
Off The Map (ABC, medical drama set in South Africa)
Perfect Couples (NBC, Olivia Munn sitcom)

yall should be watching 'men of a certain age', it started its second season recently. especially if you like the part of ray romano's schtick where life is an unending sequence of affronts to (especially male) human dignity and frustrations of even the least ambitious hopes for satisfaction.

pysched for the return of pretty little liars

i was about to bring up Men Of A Certain Age! really good show, strong start to this season.

nice plot development at thoreau chevrolet—the garage workers and the thing with his dad.

Not looking forward to Bob's Burgers cutting into American Dad. Like usual American Dad probably won't be back until March.

pardon my bile, because I've been kind of wound up by talking to a couple people IRL recently who defended American Dad, but oh boohoo McFarlane will only have 60 minutes of TV every week for a while instead of 90! American Dad is the fucking worst. and I'll at least give Bob's Burgers a chance because of all the Home Movies people involved.

Breaking In (FOX, Christian Slater's 3rd attempt at TV stardom in recent years

makes about as much sense as the stephen dorff revival. well, slater was pretty funny in curb i guess.

I'm looking forward to the The Chicago Code and that's about it.

lol after posting that i actually had a dream in which Christian Slater, dismayed by a 3rd TV series cancellation, committed or at least attempted suicide. i'm weirdly rooting for him, though, My Own Worst Enemy was kind of admirably bad and The Forgotten had potential and someone i know had a guest role on it.

Mildred Pierce (HBO: minseries starring Kate Winslet; Todd Haynes)
Game of Thrones (HBO)
Enlightened (HBO: Laura Dern; Mike White)
Shameless (Showtime: William H Macy)
Episodes (Showtime: Matt LeBlanc)
Lights Out (FX) (premieres Tuesday)
The Killing (AMC)
Life Coach (AMC: Cheri Oteri; a comedy with miniepisodes)
Portlandia (IFC)
The Onion News Network (IFC)
Eagleheart (Adult Swim: Chris Elliott)
Mongo Wrestling Alliance (Adult Swim)

ooh chris elliott

Game of Thrones, psyched

Game of Thrones, psyched

Double psyched, lol

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/blogs/live-feed/complete-midseason-tv-calendar-series-69735

Jon Benjamin can make virtually anything entertaining; most of these animated sitcoms start off a little rocky (just like Home Movies) so I'll give it a few weeks. I gave Sit Down, Shut Up at least a few episodes before giving up on it. A bit weird that they got two men to voice two of the female roles on it, though, makes it feel a bit gimmicky already.

I love American Dad, btw - looks like they're pushing it back to 7:30 on Sundays in a couple of weeks. Thanks for the link poly (and starting the thread, some dude). Yay for Archer coming back at the end of this month, too..

I liked Bob's Burgers.

The Cape is ridiculous, but I am entertained! Terrible script.

Thought bobs burgers was 100% awesome

yeah Bob's Burgers pilot was good. kind of gave me pangs of missing Home Movies but i feel like it could become its own thing (although the animation really is butt-ugly).

The first episode of Lights Out was very good. It hits all the beats you'd expect from a drama about a boxer, but well executed.

Meant to watch Lights Out, but forgot. I really liked Bob's Burgers (and wouldn't miss American Dad one bit if it never came back).

The Chicago Code (fka Ridealong) is promising because it from Terriers showrunner Shawn Ryan. If it's even half as good as Terriers was, it will be the best show on broadcast tv.

Shawn Ryan's track record is pretty spotty imo

Oh wait, Wikipedia says he's actually the creator of The Chicago Code too. His last creation? The Shield.

Tim Minear (co-showrunner on Terriers) is running The Chicago Code with Ryan, too. A good omen.

good to know...tbh i'm pretty tired of cop dramas as a genre so i probably wouldn't have known to check for it if you hadn't pointed that out

don't say that kind of thing out loud

the public needs us to watch cop dramas, who else is gonna do it

i'm sure the army of Law & Order nuts who haven't managed to grow weary yet won't anytime soon

the latest attractive-doctors-having-sex show Off The Map is starting right now and i don't know if i have the energy to change the channel

i had the energy to change it

"objectifying the great humanist of our times" blah.

yeah i found my strength soon after when i realized Tosh.0 was on

Tosh.0

HATE that dude

Tim Minear (co-showrunner on Terriers) is running The Chicago Code with Ryan, too. A good omen.

I'd always rather have a good show that lasts one season than a bad show that lasts six seasons

also Tosh is hilarious fuiud

after Firefly, The Inside, Drive, and Terriers I'm starting to tire a bit of this old song and dance. at least Dollhouse got two seasons, i guess

Drive! I loved that piece of Nathan Fillion trash!

fmbid

huh?

xp hahah Yes! Castle just couldn't do it for me the way Drive could.

I liked Bob's Burgers tonight. Kristen Schal in particular is doing a great job as the youngest daughter.

the Lights Out pilot is really on-the-nose (much more telegraphed than I'm used to from cable dramas - esp like Terriers or Mad Men or Breaking Bad) but entertaining and I could see it shaping into something at least as fun as Dexter if not any deeper

Yeah given who's involved - and the great cast - it definitely has a lot of promise, just felt bogged down in too much first-episode exposition.

the lead has a lot of - idk if the word is charisma - but is really compelling to watch even when his dialogue is subpar

plus he definitely looks like he's hat the shit kicked out of him a few times.

*had

yeah, a lot of character in that face

q to someone who knows more about boxing than me: is it realistic that a boxer would retire and come back again five years later?

iTunes, but it's pricey. I'd forget about legit...

Yeah, time it took me to look it up on iTunes and then typing "g00d w!f3 m3g4v1d30" approaches zero.

I just caught up with all of it last week. It's pretty solid, save the obvious caveats about predictable case-of-the-week stuff. Actually, I can probably spout a lot of stuff about the interesting character stuff, the political intrigue, the office politics, but yeah, I really watch it because Archie Panjabi is <3<3<3.

Animal Planet has a new show called "Heidi Fleiss: Prostitutes to Parrots." i swear i'm not making this up.

What is it with disgraced celebrity figures from the 90s turning to reality shows about their obsession with birds?

there was an article about that in the new york times. i don't know that it would answer your question, though.

are you telling me that pee wee herman, vanilla ice and michael richards all have shows about running aviaries that i could have been watching too!?!?!?

Tried to watch some of the Drunk and On Drugs Happy Fun Time Hour, but I couldn't make it past 5 minutes into it.

is that the name of an actual show or your nickname for dr. drew's celebrity rehab

The name of the show, by the Trailer Park Buys people.

err Boys.

Necessary Roughness is a pretty decent show, although Andrea Anders started showing up as a regular which makes me think it'll find some way to get canceled even though it's on cable

nobody will believe me but State of Georgia, Raven Symone's new show on ABC Family, is kind of hysterical? like i couldn't even believe it myself when i watched it.

the pilot for 'suits' was really good

im really digging this show quite a bit the relationship btw mike and harvey has such an easygoing charm to it & i like the way the show is building up the world of the firm, reusing the disposable associate nerds that are always hovering around the office & generally making it feel like a 'real' if not all that plausible workplace. the weekly cases still tend to be boring and schematic to a fault but the characters are a lot of fun to hang around w/

yeah totally

So I've started in on the second season of The Good Wife, and it's nice to see Jason Street up and about.

hey some dude, wanna start the new fall thread? though tbh i'm not really excited about much

NOT EXCITED? so much excitement. like that one with the girl in the apartment, and that other one with the girl in the apartment, and the one with fairy tales, and that other one with the fairy tales, and that one set in the glamorous 60s, and that other one set in the glamourous 60s...

haha

i feel like in another time I would've been all like heeeeey for that Zooey Deschanel-working girl-in-the-big-city-sitcom, but ehhh

pan am and playboy club make me retch a little though, considering i don't even watch mad men

actually I've heard good things about Pan Am, but it's easy to rag. also, either 2 Broke Girls with Kat Dennings or the one that was called That Bitch In Apartment 23 that is now called Apt. 23 is supposed to have some promise.

also dinosaur drama on network tv!!

can we make it a poll of new show fall premieres?

there should be a separate poll. would hate to sully the purity of these threads.

i feel like in another time I would've been all like heeeeey for that Zooey Deschanel-working girl-in-the-big-city-sitcom, but ehhh

Maybe because I avoid hipster romcoms at all costs (and have avoided Zooey Saturation), and I have a terrible sense of humor, but I am all like heeeeey about The New Girl.

heh, yeah... also i think seeing her sister in Bones everywhere has had an unfortunate side effect of having me dislike Zooey a little more as well

xp agreed, a separate poll would be better. right now Terra Nova would get my vote

Yeah what is up with Terra Nova? It looks like a joint SyFy/BBC thing considering all the British accents.

BTW I <s>love</s> very much enjoy Bones, so I'm less affected by Emily Saturation.

hey all, I finally saw "Bob's Burgers"

fucking hilarious

Starts again in March!

I can't decide which one of the kids I like the most. Every time I think it's Louise, I remember something Tina did. And Gene is a consistent source of delight.

hmm i guess i should start a new thread huh?

what happened to ringer? did it get canned?

i think that ringer.... is dead
http://www.buddytv.com/articles/image/horatio1.jpg

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

All new episodes return
Tuesday January 31!

according to ringer's website

new metalocalypse in april!

RIP Work It. I never even saw a commercial for it.

Most horribly wrong-headed show I have ever seen. Predicated on the idea that women have it so good that men can't get jobs anymore. The main bloke's wife is only ever seen in a kitchen btw.

Work It was so obviously not a good idea that would appeal to anybody that i feel like everyone involved in putting on the air was just trolling the rest of America. I watched like 20 minutes of it this week and don't remember any of it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ORKyyHBy6JQ

I tried to watch !Rob! for some reason. It was boring.

watching Napoleon Dynamite cartoon. i've never seen the movie. can someone briefly explain to me what this aesthetic is supposed to be and what kind of person finds it funny?

The movie was like a more juvenile, obvious version of the Wes Anderson aesthetic. Haven't seen the cartoon.

And Gene is a consistent source of delight.

This. Whenever Gene shows up with his keyboard I think, "He's about to do something hilarious." And he always does.

Looks like they brought back King of the Hill... but they called it Napoleon Dynamite

that's REALLY unfair to king of the hill

is it though? is it?

ok, yes it is

http://tv.nytimes.com/2012/01/16/arts/television/alcatraz-on-fox-with-sarah-jones-and-sam-neill-review.html

anyone remember that show 'time trax'?

watched the 1st 2 eps of 'House of Lies' on showtime - this show is terrible

i was p '...' at it being a half hour comedy

2012 TV thread: winter, spring, maybe summer