After getting a taste of network television last season as a guest star on Suburgatory, Malin Akerman signed on for Trophy Wife, the latest in ABC’s long line of ironically named sitcoms that then has to work extra hard to overcome the ironic name. Trophy Wife was easily one of the best sitcoms to debut this past season, but it had a hard time finding an audience on Tuesday nights. The show was an obvious match with Modern Family, but ABC never tried it in that slot. Instead, it will go down as one of those one and done show, which deserved to get a second season but was done in by short-sighted network executives.
Tag / ABC
Post Mortem – Once Upon A Time In Wonderland
ABC originally intended for Once Upon A Time In Wonderland to have a limited run in the winter when its parent program, Once Upon A Time, went on hiatus. However, when it came time to introduce their fall schedule at the upfronts, the network had placed the spin-off on Thursday nights. “We really want to tell the story without having to worry about how to stretch it for five years,” said creator Edward Kitsis.
Turns out, they ended up getting less than one. ABC announced in March that the show would end after its initial 13 episode order, and the final episode aired in April. While I remain a fan of the original, this show didn’t work for me at all, even with former Lost star Naveen Andrews on-board as the series’ main villain. I made it through 2 episodes before deleting the rest from the DVR and dropping the show back in the fall. It seems like I wasn’t the only one who wasn’t enthralled.
Post Mortem – Mind Games
I’ve been a fan of Christian Slater dating back to 1988’s Heathers. Unlike most, I have enjoyed his recent forays into television, including My Own Worst Enemy, The Forgotten, and Breaking In. I’m also a fan of Steve Zahn. That said, putting the two together in this vehicle so the two could shout at each other did not result in a winning formula, which is why ABC pulled Mind Games off the air after only 5 episodes.
Mind Games was the tale of a bi-polar human psychology genius teaming up with his ex-con brother to start a new business where they use the “real science of human motivation and manipulation” to solve the problems of their clients. Not a great concept, but with two likeable stars, alongside reliable bit players like Megalyn Echikunwoke and Jaime Ray Newman, the show earned a spot in my rotation when it premiered in February. Unfortunately, with all of the screaming, things never really came together.
ABC Upfronts
ABC, which finds itself in fourth place as this season winds down, has provided a fall schedule that is relatively stable. Mondays, Saturdays, and Sundays will return in the fall exactly as they wrapped up this spring. Tuesday sees Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. move back an hour, with the new Pygmalion update Selfie, starring former Doctor Who star Karen Gillan, leading off the night.
Wednesday stays mostly the same, with The Goldbergs and new comedy Black-ish filling in the holes left by Suburgatory and Mixology. After years of trying, and failing, to find something on Thursdays that could lead in to Grey’s Anatomy, the folks at ABC have given up, instead moving both Greys and Scandal up an hour, leaving the 9:00 hour to the latest from Shonda Grimes.
In the winter, Agent Carter, a spin-off from the first Captain America film following Hayley Atwell’s character in the post-war years, will take over for Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. while Galavant, a musical fairy tale comedy, does the same for Once Upon A Time.
Midseason Review – Wednesdays
It’s Hump Day. Time to take a look back at my thoughts on the midweek offerings for the fall season.
7:00
Revolution – NBC’s lone hit from last fall moves to Wednesdays. This show struggled mightily once it returned from the winter hiatus, and it will need to start strong if I’m going to stick around for long.
Well, this one didn’t even make it to the second season premiere. Once again, bad reviews and a need to clear room off the DVR helped me realize once again that life is too short to watch shows I am not really enjoying.
Arrow – Surprisingly, the CW kind of hit it out of the park with this tale of Green Arrow. Season 2 will be offering an arc featuring Summer Glau, so I, for one, am excited to see where things go.
Arrow has basically turned itself in to the anti-Smallville, learning from the mistakes of its DC-based predecessor.
8:00
Criminal Minds – Another show heading into its ninth season. This one is getting a little tired, but it is still good more often than not.
No surprises here, but the show continues to be mostly entertaining.
Modern Family – This continues to be a funny show, even if most of the characters have become caricatures of themselves at this point. But that is to be expected in comedies entering their fifth season.
The show continues to chug along, although puberty has not really been kind to the youngest member of the Dunphy clan. Continue reading →
2013 New Fall Season – Tuesdays
It’s time to take a look at the Tuesday night offerings for this season, only 2 of which return from last year.
7:00
Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. – Following the success of The Avengers, ABC, corporate sibling of Marvel, gets to air the spin-off featuring a team of SHIELD agents tracking down threats across the globe.
7:30
Brooklyn Nine-Nine – There hasn’t been a real police workplace comedy since Barney Miller left the air in 1982. The premiere episode wasn’t bad, but sometimes a little bit of Andy Samberg can go a long way.
8:00
New Girl – This show really found its footing once Zooey Deschanel’s Jess and Jake Johnson’s Nick hooked up towards the end of last season. The two have incredible chemistry, and keeping them apart really served no purpose. Now if only they could find a consistent usage for Winston.
Supernatural – The show moves back to Tuesdays, in its original time slot from when it premiered, for its 9th season. The show has tried to find a consistent purpose post-season 5 and the wrap up of the original storyline. Maybe another year will do it.
2013 New Fall Season – Sundays
It is time once again to dive in to the new fall lineups for the television season that kicks into gear tonight. We start, once again, with the Sunday night offerings, which features some returning favorites, but nothing new to watch, except on cable.
7:00
Once Upon A Time – Season 2 of the show about fairy tale characters in the real world started to go off the rails a little as new characters showed up and the plot expanded. This season promises a more focused plot, which will hopefully result in the show becoming more enjoyable again.
8:00
The Good Wife – Last season, the show moved from solid to really good. With Alicia and Cary planning on leaving the firm, the season ended on a cliffhanger that will hopefully continue to carry it to new heights this year. The big problem once again will be catching the entire episode when football runs long, as it always does.
Revenge – Another ABC show that became much more convoluted in its second season. This went from one of the better shows of the previous season to one that, more often than not, was a chore to get through. Hopefully a new show runner will get things back on track this year. Otherwise, it might be time to say goodbye to the Hamptons.
The Walking Dead – Now here’s a show that keeps building and building. Following last season’s story with the Governor, things get shaken up at the prison this year. I can’t wait to find out what happens next.
Post Mortem – Private Practice
The Grey’s Anatomy spinoff came to an end in January after 6 seasons. Star Kate Walsh announced that she was leaving after the 13th episode of the 6th season, and Tim Daly had already been dropped due to budget cuts, so ABC and creator Shondra Rhimes decided to give the show an abbreviated final season and call it quits after 13 episodes. The sixth season was a bit of a departure for the show, with overlapping episodes that took place over the same longer periods of time, but episode focused on one character or set of characters.
To be honest, had this not been the final season, there was a good chance I would have cut bait and stopped watching the show altogether. It wasn’t a bad show, but it never reached the pinnacles that it’s sire did and it had a tendency to just kind of be. There was hardly a convincing argument to be made for why one must watch the show, nor could one be made for one why one shouldn’t. It was just on, and, sometimes, that is good enough for six seasons.
Post Mortem – Don’t Trust The B—- in Apartment 23
Don’t Trust The B—- In Apartment 23 debuted on ABC last spring as a mid-season replacement and earned itself a surprising renewal for a second season. Sadly, whatever charms the show had in its first season were overshadowed in the second by a disjointed approach that mixed in first season episodes that had been held back with newly shot episodes, leaving no continuity to the show and having characters relationships change week to week. Hopefully stars Dreama Walker and Krysten Ritter find themselves in new projects soon, as any problems this show had was not with them.
Post Mortem – 666 Park Avenue
This show seemed to have a good pedigree: the return of Terry O’Quinn to ABC and the always charming Rachael Taylor in a supernatural thriller about a haunted apartment building and the mysterious couple who manage it. Unfortunately, things did not turn out well, and the show was cancelled in early November. The episodes that did not air in the fall are being played out this summer, but, at this point, who really cares?