Television

Latest Articles

Metal Feathers net their best record yet

Dredging up the low
If you're going to make huge structural changes, before your third record is a fine time to do it.
By NICHOLAS SCHROEDER | February 20, 2013

Community’s state of play

By the time you read this, NBC's brilliant, neglected stepchild of a sitcom will back on the air, having survived its creator's firing, various scheduling debacles, and the epic flouncing-off of Chevy Chase.
By S.I. ROSENBAUM | February 05, 2013

Dexter — still bloody good

When we saw Dexter last, his sister Deb had walked in just as he plunged a knife into Travis Marshall's chest.
By ALEXANDRA CAVALLO | September 25, 2012

Homeland's victory lap

Is there a more compelling spectacle in television these days than Claire Danes slowly decompensating into full-on mania?
By JON GARELICK | September 25, 2012

Treme's third season is in the money

From the beginning, Treme has been too much — too many stories, too many angles, too many scenes.
By JON GARELICK | September 18, 2012

The 10 TV premieres to DVR this fall

Last Resort, The Mindy Project, American Horror Story, and more
With new projects from Andre Braugher, Mindy Kaling, Michael Chiklis, and, uh, Lucy Liu?
By RYAN STEWART | September 19, 2012

Trade search or junket?

Letters to the Portland Phoenix editors, September 14, 2012
Isn't it wonderful that the government that has cut every human-services program it can and has filed a lawsuit against the federal government to further cut MaineCare and health programs for fellow citizens has somehow now found the capital to send a group of political lackeys on a sell-Maine-business junket to China?
By PORTLAND PHOENIX LETTERS | September 12, 2012

Review: The Inbetweeners

Based on the popular British telly series
Based on a popular British telly series and directed by Ben Palmer, The Inbetweeners sends its four randy, clumsy, post-high-school twits on a journey to the hedonistic vacation resort of Malia on the Mediterranean island of Crete.
By GERALD PEARY | September 04, 2012

Fall 2012 TV Preview

Big Fat Whale
Stay tuned for "Sports Yell"
By BRIAN MCFADDEN | September 05, 2012

Interview: The RiffTrax crew revisit another 'classic'

MST3K forever!
MST3K took its curtain call in 1999 after 10 years on cable, but the show's end ultimately liberated host Mike Nelson and the revolving cast of cinematic satirists.
By BARRY THOMPSON | August 07, 2012

Interview: Aziz Ansari is on the fly

Jet setter
It's been a good few months for Aziz Ansari.
By MIKE MILIARD | May 09, 2012

Interview: Aziz Ansari is on the fly

Jet setter
It's been a good few months for Aziz Ansari.
By MIKE MILIARD | May 09, 2012

Interview: Brendon Small finds his niche

Guitar hero
Years before he cracked the dimensional barrier that separates the real from unreal by turning Dethklok, the lovably sociopathic stars of Adult Swim's Metalocalypse , into one of the most lucrative metal acts in both cartoonland and the material world, Brendon Small trudged through stints at Berklee and Emerson.
By BARRY THOMPSON | April 24, 2012

HBO's Veep needs more mean

Soft serve
Reality, right now, is so absurd that almost everyone has already adopted a "laugh-to-keep-from-crying" approach to the news. We don't need someone to tell us how truly horrifying our political landscape is. So what's a satirist to do?
By RYAN STEWART | April 23, 2012

Not much 'magic' on Starz's new drama

City of blahs
Premium networks play by different rules from the rest of television, but Starz has taken things to a new extreme: they've twice renewed shows before episode one even aired.
By RYAN STEWART | April 05, 2012

Interview: Adam Green gets frightful laughs with 'Holliston'

It’s "Friends" ... only with monsters. And set in Holliston, MA.
Director and Holliston native Adam Green ( Frozen, Hatchet ) knows a thing or two about what it's like to be stuck in your hometown post-college, working a dead-end job, and pining for the high school girl of your dreams. Green parlayed all that angst into Holliston , a new television series for FEARnet.
By ALEXANDRA CAVALLO | April 04, 2012

And thus the 'Game of Thrones' continues

Calling Dr. Zaius!
'Twas the thud heard round the world. In the penultimate episode of the first season of HBO's Game of Thrones , our hero Ned Stark (Sean Bean), after a brief, fraught tenure as the King's Hand, discovered the Lannisters' incestuous affair, was falsely declared traitor to the realm, and was beheaded in front of a frothing horde in the town square at King's Landing.
By EUGENIA WILLIAMSON | April 04, 2012

Mad Men tries to pick up the pieces

Morning after
"Is it my imagination, or is the lobby full of Negroes?"
By JON GARELICK | March 21, 2012

On the Road with Patti Smith and Bob Dylan

A backstage diary
It's Thanksgiving at the Smith home, across the Delaware River from Philadelphia.
By AL GIORDANO | March 07, 2012

Get in on the TV Show action

Lights, camera, action!
Each episode of TV Show, the multimedia collaboration between Bomb Diggity Arts and Shoot Media Project (itself a part of Creative Trails, a community support program for adults with intellectual disabilities), explores a diverse range of topics.
By DEIRDRE FULTON | February 22, 2012

Review: Luck

HBO goes to the races
You get the feeling that Milch and Mann just want to show off what they know about horse racing. When one of Marcus's crew keeps screaming out during the big Pick Six race, "What's going on!?," he speaking for the audience.
By JON GARELICK | January 24, 2012

Interview: A new world for the Coma junkies

Awkward talks
Based on gustatory adventurer Joe Ricchio's cult foodie blog Portland Food Coma, Food Coma TV (foodcomatv.tumblr.com) has had a revelatory first season.
By NICHOLAS SCHROEDER | January 05, 2012

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Review: Being Elmo

A moving portrait of an unheralded artist
Just in time for the release of The Muppet Movie on November 25 comes Constance Marks's look at the man behind the pilly-fabric Sesame Street character.
By PETER KEOUGH | November 15, 2011

GoLocal takes a stab at TV

The Tubes
In a media marketplace that is too often timid, golocalprov stands out.
By DAVID SCHARFENBERG | October 26, 2011

Prohibition drinking game!

Play along with the upcoming Ken Burns documentary
Leave it to Ken Burns and PBS to crash our romantic Boardwalk Empire fantasies with a scholarly five-and-a-half-hour, sepia-tinted tome about the rip-roaring Twenties.
By CHRIS FARAONE | September 28, 2011