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Hot Off The Press: The Latest TV News and Information

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#1 · (Edited)
AVS Forum/"HOTP" Notes
WELCOME!
By dad1153, AVSForum.com - Mar. 29, 2015

Hello and welcome. This is the "Hot Off The Press" thread in AVS Forum's HDTV Programming Forum. Established in 2004 by long-time AVS contributor Fredfa, "HOTP" is your daily one-stop destination for the latest in TV news, industry trends, new technological breakthroughs, Nielsen ratings (overnights and C+3/C+7), personality profiles, professional reviews and miscellaneous items related to the industry from all over the internet. Fredfa's mission statement for "HOTP" was (and still is) to keep the content as professional and guided by journalistic principles as possible while having a sense of community fostered among its many contributors.

LIKE WHAT YOU SEE? WANT TO CONTRIBUTE TO "HOTP"?

Whether you're new to "HOTP" or a long time reader, if you like what you see feel free to contribute either your comments and/or any TV/media news stories to our humble little thread. The more diverse voices "HOTP" features the better. We just ask you to follow these simple steps before posting stories:

--Read a few stories/pages back to see if the story you're about to post has already been featured. Two stories about the same subject (like, for example, a review of a particular TV show) are welcomed as long as they feature different and/or complementary content that doesn't overlap.

--Ask yourself: Does this story interest anybody else besides me? We're not opposed to celebrity gossip or sensational content, but ask yourself whether anyone else besides you would like to know X person's personal life or whether Y celebrity's latest scandal impacts the TV show he/she is on.

--Always attribute the news item you post in "HOTP" to its original reporter/news organization/website. It's not only courteous, but the proper thing to do to give the news sources providing the information their due recognition. [NOTE: Per Fredfa's instructions, Associated Press/AP articles cannot be posted on "HOTP" for legal reasons. If AP is the source of any or all the content of an article, please DO NOT POST in "HOTP"]

--No political comments, please! Be respectful of others' opinions. Self-explanatory.

* * * *

With over 125,000 posts and 11,000,000+ views in its combined three incarnations, "HOTP" is the longest-running, most read and most frequently updated thread in AVS Forum history. Here are links to the previous two incarnations of "HOTP," 11 years worth of news stories, listings, comments and miscellaneous content archived for posterity:

"HOTP I": August 27, 2004 - April 23, 2007. (25,503 posts, 2,231,621 page views).

"HOTP II": April 22, 2007 - March 28, 2015. (100,744 posts, 8,957,851 page views).

On behalf of myself and the behind-the-scenes people running the AVS Forum empire, thanks again for being a part of "HOTP." Whether it's been 11 years or 11 days, your readership means the world to us and we'd like to help us live up to our potential. Feel free to fire a private message to either my profile or the profiles of the moderators of the HDTV Programming thread (Dr. Don, etc.) with your comments, suggestions, criticisms and/or complaints.

Sincerely,
'dad1153'
 
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#6,361 ·
Critic's Notes
Why we need ‘Supergirl’ and ‘Jessica Jones’
By Kelly Lawler, USA Today - Dec. 8, 2015

This fall saw the premieres of two highly anticipated and, in some places, critically acclaimed TV shows. One was a broad CBS procedural, the other an adult, serialized Netflix drama that dropped all 13 episodes of its first season last month. One follows a young woman as she sets out on the path she wants to follow in her career; the other centers on a slightly older woman — an abuse and rape survivor — dealing with the sudden reappearance of her assailant.

The only thing they have in common is a protagonist who can leap tall buildings in a single bound and also happens to be female.

CBS' Supergirl (Mondays, 8 p.m. ET/PT) and Netflix's Jessica Jones are wildly different shows, but because they are television’s only recent forays into female-led superhero series, they are inextricably linked, forced into comparisons and (regrettably) sometimes pitted against each other by some fans debating the shows online, many of whom see Jones as infinitely superior to Supergirl.

But we live in a world big enough for both. We live in a world big enough for a lot of female superheroes.

Supergirl flew onto the television landscape in October and raked in solid ratings for its network debut. Its light tone stood out from some of the darker superhero shows, including the CW’s Arrow and Netflix’s first Marvel series, Daredevil. It wears its particular brand of feminism (which many have associated with Sheryl Sandberg’s Lean In movement) proudly on its sleeve. It challenges viewers to ask why its hero, who has all the same powers as the ever-popular Superman, is treated differently than him. The show is insightful, optimistic and above all, fun.

When Jones hit Netflix less than a month later, it felt revolutionary in its own right. Jessica is a hero unlike any audiences have seen before, uninterested in donning a cape or doing any kind of daring deeds. Her heroism is pulled from her as she is forced to play a game of cat-and-mouse with Kilgrave (David Tennant), a mind-controlling villain who held her captive for months, sexually assaulting her and forcing her to kill someone. It’s the rare story of sexual assault portrayed entirely from the point of view of the survivor, and it is not played for exploitation or titillation.

Both shows are dealing with the same building blocks — comic book source material, a female title character and themes of sexism — in very different ways: Supergirl is leaning in, while Jessica Jones is just trying to hold on. Supergirl must remain family-friendly on a major broadcast network, while Jones has the freedom to include sex, violence and profanity at its whim on Netflix. But the existence of one does not invalidate the other.

What’s more important than a conversation about which of these shows is better is the recognition that we need more shows to include in that conversation. The arrival of Daredevil did not make Arrow a worse or less-relevant show. Neither was Arrow sidelined by the arrival of The Flash.

When it comes to representation, every bit matters. There are no 12-year-old girls looking up to Jessica Jones. Older women may find even less in common with the young and awkward Supergirl. Plenty of people may not enjoy watching either. And that’s OK.

The fact that audiences have this choice at all is a huge step up from where we were a year ago, or where the film industry is right now. Because while there are only a few places on the small screen to find female heroes, it’s a much better pool than what you’ll find on the big one.

The first scheduled female-led film in the recent superhero resurgence is DC's Wonder Woman, due in 2017. Marvel will release Ant-Man and the Wasp, which co-stars Evangeline Lilly (Lost) as Hope Van Dyne/Wasp, in 2018, but fans will have to wait a year later for a female-led movie, Captain Marvel.

We can only hope Supergirl and Jessica aren’t the only female heroes we’ll have to tide ourselves over until then.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/...rl-jessica-jones-cbs-netflix-marvel/76932494/
 
#6,362 ·
Critic's Notes
How ‘South Park’ Perfectly Captures Our Era of Outrage
By James Poniewozik, The New York Times - Dec. 9, 2015

If “South Park” were a person, it would be old enough to vote, though it probably wouldn’t. That scabrous cartoon has been a one-stop shop for anti-partisan satire and blasphemy on Comedy Central since 1997.

Few comedies can stay first-rate for that long. (Sorry, Homer.) Early in the current season, the show’s 19th, the creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone seem to wonder how well the show’s offend-at-all-costs ethos has aged. “It’s like I’m a relic,” a recurring character says. “Sometimes I feel like I’ve outstayed my welcome.”

The character in question is a white restaurant owner who believes he is Chinese and speaks in a grossly stereotyped Asian accent. Maybe, that meta-lament seemed to suggest, the show had started punching down in its later years.

Yet this fall “South Park” has gone and revitalized itself, by telling a more ambitious, serialized story and by asserting that it takes an outrageous comedy to capture an era of outrage.

This season, which airs its finale on Wednesday, is built around an extended satire of political correctness. South Park, Colo., is taken over by a new school principal — named, aptly, P. C. Principal — and his crew of like-minded, jacked-up frat bros, who believe that being p.c. “means you love nothing more than beer, working out and the feeling that you get when you rhetorically defend a marginalized community from systems of oppression!” They meet microaggression with macroaggression, bullying kids and adults who, say, refer to the transgender reality star Caitlyn Jenner as anything less than “stunning and brave.”

But the season also targeted the rise of Donald J. Trump, a phenomenon who has thrived on a resentment of things p.c., just this week crowing that his plan to ban Muslims from the United States was “probably not politically correct.” A longtime character, Mr. Garrison, begins a White House bid on a familiar-sounding platform of xenophobia against Canadians (recurring boogeymen of “South Park,” going back to the “Blame Canada” number from the 1999 movie musical). Canada, in turn, has elected its own Trump-like figure, with disastrous results. “We thought it was funny,” one Canadian laments. “Nobody really thought he’d ever be president!”

In reality, Canada has a prime minister. But “South Park” has never cared much about political fine points so much as comedy that deflates zealots and defends the offensive, like an American Charlie Hebdo. It was ahead of the curve in asserting a right to depict the Prophet Muhammad, who appeared in a 2001 episode (though Comedy Central squelched later attempts).

Now, it was as if our culture had been shining an Eric Cartman-shaped Bat-signal and “South Park” answered. You could see the news from college campuses — safe spaces, trigger warnings — and conclude that America was more radically leftist than ever. You could read a dispatch from the Republican primary — border walls, refugee panic — and conclude that it was more reactionary than ever. The country is deeply polarized, and between two poles is precisely where the quasi-libertarian “South Park” most likes to swing.

“South Park” used to be so anti-continuity — its episodes are often written days before airing — that the show would kill the same character, Kenny McCormick, every week. By shifting toward serial stories, Mr. Parker and Mr. Stone have been able to make more complex arguments this season: acknowledging, for instance, that sometimes outrage culture has a basis in actual outrages. An episode on police brutality posits both that South Park’s cops are needed to keep the peace and that many of them joined the force to have carte blanche to beat up minorities.

And where past “South Park” satires once looked at single issues, this season is sketching something like a grand — if messy — unified theory of anger, inequality and disillusionment in 2015 America.

Even as the p.c. wars rage, the town of South Park is being gentrified: It’s attracted a Whole Foods and built Sodosopa (South of Downtown South Park), an enclave of hipster eateries and condos built literally around the house of the dirt-poor McCormick family. The townspeople are delighted, until they realize many of them can’t afford to join the few, the smug, the artisanal. Under the town’s chichi new facade is a familiar slurry of resentment (of the privileged, of immigrants, of elites) and fear (of terrorism, of crime, of economically falling).

And all that, in the “South Park” worldview, drives people to a self-pitying narcissism that extends to politics but also goes beyond it. In the season’s darkest episode, “Safe Space,” the townspeople assign a single child to filter every negative comment from their social media, to protect their self-esteem from all manner of “-shaming.”

After the boy nearly dies from the strain of filtering the entire Internet’s hate, an allegorical figure named Reality — wearing a silent-movie villain’s cape and mustache — shows up to scold South Parkers with a lecture that sums up this season’s Swiftian brimstone morality: “I’m sorry the world isn’t one big liberal-arts college campus! We eat too much. We take our spoiled lives for granted. Feel a little bad about it sometimes.”

Affected by his words, the citizens are moved to action: They take Reality to the town square and hang him.

It’s not exactly subtle, nor is the show’s argument entirely focused; the season-ending arc has involved a tangent about deceptive online advertising. (The finale may be more timely. Only a week after the terrorist shooting in San Bernardino, Calif., the episode promises a story on how “the citizens of South Park feel safer armed”; a teaser video has Cartman getting in an armed standoff with his mother at bedtime.)

And by making P. C. Principal and friends white dudes, the show sidesteps the fact that “politically correct” is often a label lobbed by white dudes at women and minorities who’ve faced actual prejudice. Mr. Parker and Mr. Stone anticipate this criticism too, having Cartman tell his schoolmate Kyle, with atypical self-awareness: “We’re two privileged straight white boys who have their laughs about things we never had to deal with.”

This product of two white guys does have a different vantage point from many of today’s best comedies dealing with identity issues, from “black-ish” to “Master of None.” But in a way, its project and theirs are the same: to deal with tensions by prescribing more conversation, even if it’s uncomfortable, not less.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/09/a...rander-satire-themes.html?ref=television&_r=0
 
#6,363 ·
TV Review (Streaming)
In 'Transparent' season 2, change comes slowly, but it is beautiful to watch
By Mary McNamara, Los Angeles Times - Dec. 9, 2015

There is no American border as perilous as the one separating self-knowledge from self-absorption and, as the second season of Amazon's "Transparent" proves, no one charts it as fearlessly, humanely and thoroughly as Jill Soloway.

"Transparent" debuted last year with a deceptively simple, albeit revolutionary, hook: Well into middle age, transgender woman Mort Pfefferman (Jeffrey Tambor) finally decides to live her authentic life as Maura.

The joy and terror of Maura's transition, beautifully expressed by Tambor, provided the ecstatic fuel of the first season, but Maura's truth reverberated throughout her family, causing each member to question his or her identity. The tightly wound Sarah (Amy Landecker) abandoned her "perfect" marriage to pursue her college girlfriend Tammy (Melora Hardin); Josh (Jay Duplass), a music producer, attempted to escape the confines of perpetual childhood; professional waif Ali (Gaby Hoffman) first emulated then tried to understand her "Moppa's" life, while Maura's ex-wife, Shelley (Judith Light), was forced to reconsider the "meshuga" bits of her first marriage.

"Transparent" is undoubtedly one of the richest and most ambitious half-hour comedies ever, and given television's new standard of excellence, that's saying something. It is a tale of transition, a deconstruction of gender, a story of family and, in the second season, an exploration of faith and history.

But more than anything, it bravely takes on the often infuriating modern notion of self. Who are we really, separately and together? How much of that is real and how much imposed by expectation, social direction and circumstance? What do we owe ourselves, the people we love, society in general?

And most important of all, how does one search for personal truth without collapsing into narcissism?

This last question is crucial to a society in which the exultant echoes of Walt Whitman's "Song of Myself" often seem to have dimmed into a culture of self-narration and scathing commentary, in which "personal pain" has become shorthand for political entitlement.

It's certainly a question that drives the second season of "Transparent" in which each Pfefferman wrestles with bravery, brattiness and the dangers of an overly examined life.

As if to make her intentions immediately clear, Soloway opens the first episode, which Amazon made available earlier this week, with a wedding. Sarah and Tammy's wedding.

But this is no #lovewins celebration, this is your basic "tyranny of image over reality" wedding. Roses and gilt decorate the dessert, everyone is clothed in white, and the ceremony is overshadowed by the creation of an extended family portrait, the logistics of which are guaranteed to make children cry and everyone hate the bride, in this case Sarah, who is clearly having second thoughts.

It may be the best symbolic use of overblown ritual since the Communion party in "Godfather II."

The wedding also provides a smorgasbord of exposition. We learn that Josh is now involved with Rabbi Raquel (Kathryn Hahn), who is pregnant, that Sarah is just as lost as she ever was, that Ali is taking herself more seriously as a person, that Shelley has reconnected with Maura and that Maura is no longer the center of the story.

Oh, and through a series of flashbacks to 1920s Berlin, we see (perhaps), the tap root of the Pfefferman present.

It's a bit of a mess, this first half hour, what with Sarah having a breakdown and quick jaunts to the Weimar Republic, but it gives "Transparent" more elbow room and the episodes that follow take full advantage.

Though still heroic in her decision, Maura is more fully realized, a woman who can be selfish, judgmental and who, having lived for so long as a man, has been guilty of the same prejudice she now faces. (Cherry Jones shows up as a splendid feminist poet to make this point, and a few others.) Maura's relationship with Shelley twists and turns on itself, allowing Shelley a bit more humanity and the excellent Light much more screen time, which benefits everyone.

But it's the Pfefferman children who now struggle to live authentic lives. They are all so obviously wounded and selfish, emotional hypochondriacs whose pain is real but mostly self-inflicted. The flashbacks to Berlin may offer some explanation (and certainly a tutorial on the Weimar era and anti-Semitism) but as Maura is discovering, revelation is not change. Change is change. It comes slowly, with effort, and it is maddening, and beautiful, to watch.

http://variety.com/2015/tv/reviews/dolly-partons-coat-of-many-colors-review-nbc-movie-1201653799/
 
#6,364 ·
Nielsen Notes
Obama’s Sunday Address Watched By 46 Million Viewers
By Lisa de Moraes, Deadline.com - Dec. 8, 2015

President Barack Obama’s Sunday night primetime speech might have, according to GOP White House candidates, been too little too late – and why give the address from the intimacy of the Oval Office if you’re going to shove a podium in front of the POTUS desk? – but it attracted a whopping 46 million viewers.

To give you a sense of scale, in January, not quite 32 million Americans watched Obama’s State of the Union address on television. Yes, that was the lowest turnout since President Bill Clinton’s final State of the Union address in 2000. But Sunday’s crowd also was bigger than for Obama’s SOTU address in 2014, which clocked more than 33M. Sunday’s audience drew much closer than those speeches to Obama’s biggest audience to date, which remains his address to the joint houses of Congress in 2009, when he drew more than 52 million viewers.

Nielsen did not break out each network in its ratings information. But cable news networks did send stats, and Fox News Channel, as usual, led this ratings derby, clocking 3.316 million viewers. That’s about 262% better than the network has averaged this year in the Sunday time slot. And, the next day, FNC suspended two of its contributors for their potty-mouthed analysis of Obama’s address.

CNN jumped the most, percentage-wise – 289% – to average 1.722M viewers. And, so far as we know, no one got suspended. MSNBC climbed 182% but did not crack a million viewers (861K).

The news-demo pecking order lined up similarly in audience size. FNC clocked 695K viewers between the age of 25 and 54 years, which is 340% than its season average in the slot. CNN’s 536K is a 248% improvement, following FNC’s. MSNBC’s 160K news-demo viewers for Obama’s address represents a 34% improvement over its calendar-year-to-date average in the Sunday slot.

President Obama interrupted primetime TV for 16 minutes Sunday to call last Wednesday’s shooting in San Bernardino an act of terrorism perpetrated by two people who had “gone down the dark path of radicalization,” and to call on Congress to block people on the country’s terrorism watch list from buying firearms.

The White House on Friday contacted networks requesting the Sunday primetime slot in the wake of San Bernardino’s slaying of 14 people and wounding of 21 others by a pair of heavily armed shooters. Syed Farook and his wife Tashfeen Malik were gunned down by police after they killed 14 people and injured 21 others during a holiday party attended by Farook’s co-workers. The FBI is investigating the massacre as a terrorist attack since late last week after learning Malik had pledged allegiance to ISIS on Facebook shortly before the attack began. The Obama White House presumably wanted the air time on Sunday because HUT levels are particularly high that night, in order to reach as many Americans as possible.

Viewers were more likely to watch Sunday’s address on the broadcast networks, where they already were watching Sunday football, etc. The number of people who watched the speech on the cable networks edges out, say, the 5.2M who watched Obama’s last visit to David Letterman on CBS’ The Late Show in September 2012.

It’s only the third time Obama has spoken to the public from the Oval Office, which was intended to raise the stakes, insiders said in the walk-up. It was an effort to reset the conversation in the wake of inflammatory rhetoric after Wednesday’s attack, they said. The next day, GOP front-runner Donald Trump called for a ban on all Muslims entering the U.S. while the government tries “to figure out what is going on.” So that went well.

http://deadline.com/2015/12/46-million-viewersratings-1201657394/

* * * *

Nielsen Notes (Cable)
‘Into The Badlands’ Ratings Take A Hit Without ‘Walking Dead’ But Still Kicking
By Dominic Patten, Deadline.com - Dec. 8, 2015

The post-apocalypse martial arts drama got a cable top tier debut from having the biggest show on TV as its lead-in but now things have changed – kind of. After three weeks with The Walking Dead as its programming predecessor, Into The Badlands had to get in the ratings ring alone this week and it had a solid performance for AMC.

The ‘Two Tigers Subdue Dragons’ episode of December 6 saw the war drums beating very loud on the Daniel Wu- starring show. While no blockbuster, the fourth episode of ITB also saw 2.4 million total viewers with 1.35 million among adults 18-49 for a 1.06 rating. That’s a drop of 54% among viewers and 56% in the key demo from Badlands’ November 29 episode. While a significant decline, a couple of things need to be noted for context – 1. Last week’s ITB aired right after the midseason finale of TWD, which was the second-highest-rated episode of the zombie apocalypse series of its sixth season so far. Secondly, as had happened in previous weeks, a TWD sneak peek was embedded in the first commercial break of ITB, drawing tons of fans into the show to, in this case, see a preview of the rest of the big show’s Season 6.

Also, that’s a decline of just 6% more in viewers and 4% in the demo than Better Call Saul had for its second show of February 9, a Monday, after debuting to record numbers for AMC the night before after TWD.

Even without TWD, Into The Badlands ended up being the third-highest-rated original cable show of Sunday night, bested only by reality heavyweights The Real Housewives Of Atlanta and Keeping Up With The Kardashians. And that’s with a lead-in of last weeks’ ITB as part of a mini-marathon into the December 6 new episode – a 9 PM ET lead-in that got just 531,000 viewers in the 18-49. Long story short – even without TWD, ITB is alive and kicking for the remaining half of its 6-episode first season. With ITB commonly getting around a 30% life in Live + 3 numbers, delayed viewing results could be the key to how hard that kick really is.

http://deadline.com/2015/12/into-th...walking-dead-better-call-saul-amc-1201658976/
 
#6,365 ·
Technology Notes (VR/Gaming)
PlayStation VR Creator Says Trial Will Be the Biggest Challenge
By John Gaudiosi, Fortune.com - Dec. 9, 2015

Dr. Richard Marks, director of Sony PlayStation’s Magic Labs research division, is one of the key designers of PlayStation VR, as well as the PlayStation Move controllers that gamers use within virtual reality games.

“The challenge is getting people to try it for the first time,” Marks says. “It’s not available yet, and you really have to experience it to understand how amazing it is. Of course, there have been tons of technical hurdles that we’ve overcome throughout development, but those have been easier to address.”

Thousands of gamers were able to play over a dozen PlayStation VR games at the second annual PlayStation Experience (PSX) at the San Francisco Moscone Center on Dec. 5 and 6. Sony introduced new games Rez Infinite, Ace Combat 7, The Modern Zombie Taxi Company, and 100 Foot Robot Golf at the event, and had a wide array of genres and experiences playable.

Marks says a lot of the mechanics of what to do in virtual reality are still being figured out with this first generation of titles.

“Some game developers have followed traditional gameplay mechanics from regular console games, but more and more in the future you’ll see them branching out into new kinds of gameplay that’s only possible in VR,” Marks says. “For example, being able to really reach into the world and have things feel like they’re close to you is exclusive to VR. Game developers can do a lot of things based around that.”

Marks says in addition to Sony’s internal studios, even external publishers working in virtual reality are sharing information.

“It’s a great time in VR because every new thing that somebody figures out that works is shared so that the VR experience can improve,” Marks says. “It’s a refreshing thing to see in the game industry.”

Bigger game publishers like Ubisoft, which announced its first cross-platform virtual reality game, Eagle Flight, at PSX, know that Sony has an installed base of over 30 million PlayStation 4 consoles worldwide to cater to. That number will be larger when PlayStation VR launches in the first half of 2016. (Sony has yet to announce a launch date or price, although the company has said the headset will be comparable to the cost of a console.)

“Our customers are already very aware of VR and are anticipating it,” Marks says. “Once the PlayStation VR goes out on the market, they’ll see so many in people’s homes that it will create this snowball effect.”

Marks believes Facebook’s $2 billion acquisition of Oculus VR was great for the entire virtual reality industry, including Sony, because the announcement penetrated through lots of levels that weren’t so tech or gaming focused.

All of the continued publicity around virtual reality will impact market growth. Piper Jaffray senior analyst Gene Munster forecasts sales of virtual reality headsets will grow from 12.2 million in 2016 to 100.2 million by 2020.

Travis Jakel, an analyst at Piper Jaffray, breaks down 2016 sales with the $99 Gear VR accounting for 5 million headset sales, Oculus Rift selling 3.6 million, HTC Vive moving 2.1 million units, and PlayStation VR selling 1.4 million.

Michael Pachter, analyst at Wedbush Securities, estimates Sony will sell 2 million PlayStation VR headsets in its first year, and 1 to 2 million additional headsets annually thereafter.

At the end of the day, the billions of dollars that companies like Sony, Facebook, Samsung% , Nvidia, Intel INTC, Microsoft, HTC, Valve, and AMD are investing in virtual reality will ultimately change the game—just as mobile touchscreen devices introduced new types of games like Chair Entertainment’s Infinity Blade and Imangi Studios’ Temple Run to the world.

“There will be a genre that didn’t exist that is created with VR,” Marks says. “I don’t think we’ve found it yet, but there will be something that just can’t really be done any other way. I just don’t know what it is yet.”

http://fortune.com/2015/12/09/sony-playstation-virtual-reality/
 
#6,366 ·
TV Notes
On The Air Tonight
WEDNESDAY Network Primetime/Late Night Options
(All shows are in HD unless noted; start times are ET. Network late night shows are preceded by late local news)

ABC:
8PM - The Middle
8:30PM - The Goldbergs
9PM - Modern Family
9:31PM - Blackish
10PM - Nashville
* * * *
11:35PM - Jimmy Kimmel Live! (Wanda Sykes; race car driver Lewis Hamilton; Band of Merrymakers perform)
12:37AM - Nightline

CBS:
8PM - Survivor: Second Chance
9PM - Criminal Minds
10PM - Code Black
* * * *
11:35PM - The Late Show with Stephen Colbert ("Downton Abbey'' cast members Michelle Dockery, Hugh Bonneville and Allen Leech; writer/director Adam McKay; Kurt Vile performs)
12:37AM - The Late Late Show with James Corden (YouTube personality Tyler Oakley; Hank Azaria; Rick Ross perform)

NBC:
8PM - Mat Franco's Got Magic (Special, 120 min.)
(R - Sep. 17)
10PM - The Illusionists (Special)
* * * *
11:34PM - The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon (Amy Poehler; Kevin Nealon; Lalah Hathaway performs with The Roots)
12:37AM - Late Night with Seth Myers (Adam Driver; Jesse Plemons; Aretha Franklin performs)
1:38AM - Last Call with Carson Daly (Amy Landecker; Miami Horror performs; musical group Wild Child)

FOX:
8PM - Empire
(R - Dec. 2)
9PM - Taraji and Terrence's White Hot Holidays (Special)

PBS:
(check your local listing for starting time/programming)
8PM - Nature: Fortress of the Bears (R - Jan. 25, 2012)
9PM - NOVA: Meteor Strike
(R - Mar. 27, 2013)
10PM - Time Scanners: Machu Picchu

UNIVISION:
8PM - Antes Muerta que Lichita
9:01PM - Pasión y Poder
10:04PM - Yo No Creo en los Hombres

THE CW:
8PM - Arrow
9PM - Supernatural

TELEMUNDO:
8PM - Celia
9PM - Bajo el Mismo Cielo
10PM - Señora Acero

COMEDY CENTRAL:
11PM - The Daily Show with Trevor Noah (Marion Cotillard)
11:31PM - The Nightly Show With Larry Wilmore (Actor and director Q)
12:01AM - At Midnight With Chris Hardwick (Randy Liedtke; April Richardson; Chris Fairbanks)

TBS:
11PM - Conan (Anna Faris; Deepak Chopra; Moody McCarthy performs)
 
#6,367 ·
TV Notes
Bianculli's Best Bets
By David Bianculli, TVWorthWatching.com - Dec. 9, 2015

THE GOLDBERGS
ABC, 8:30 p.m. ET

Every once in a while, a TV sitcom takes on the holiday spirit by coming up with a hybrid holiday of its own (yes, I’m talking about you, Seinfeld). Tonight on The Goldbergs, Beverly tries to concoct a more exciting holiday to compete with Christmas – and creates “Super Hanukkah.”

FROM HERE TO ETERNITY
TCM, 9:00 p.m. ET

TCM continues to celebrate the centenary of the birth of Frank Sinatra (perhaps you’ve heard?) by presenting another batch of movies and specials featuring him tonight. Chief among them, at 9 p.m. ET: 1953’s From Here to Eternity, which starred Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Deborah Kerr, Donna Reed – but counted as a major comeback vehicle for Sinatra.

TIME SCANNERS: MACHU PICCHU
PBS, 10:00 p.m. ET

This series uses some very modern technology – in this case, 3D laser scanning – to probe some very ancient wonders. In tonight’s new episode, structural engineer Steve Burrows and host Dallas Campbell try to figure out how the Incan city of Machu Picchu was constructed, and why. One of the things they learned had to do with where all the bodily wastes went – and their discovery, you might say, uncovers a veritable royal flush. Check local listings.

A CHRISTMAS CAROL
AMC, 10:00 p.m. ET
Made for CBS as a holiday telemovie in 1984
, this version of the Charles Dickens classic story is one of the best. It’s got Frank Finlay as Jacob Marley, and David Warner as Bob Cratchit, but really soars because George C. Scott is perfectly cast as the snarling, scowling Ebenezer Scrooge. Great Scott!

AMERICAN HORROR STORY: HOTEL
FX, 10:00 p.m. ET

Tonight’s episode title is “She Wants Revenge.” The exact identity of “She” is not made clear, and on this series, there are an awful lot of female suspects. One of them, clearly, is Ramona Royale, the latest femme fatale played on this anthology series by Angela Bassett..


http://www.tvworthwatching.com/

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Critic's Notes (TV-on-DVD)
'Danny Kaye — Legends' Returns to the Yesteryears of His Memorable Variety Show
By Ed Bark, TVWorthWatching.com's 'Uncle Barky's Bytes' - Dec. 8, 2015

Does the name Danny Kaye ring a bell?

Ring-a-ding-ding, it should during this holiday season.

Kaye, who died in 1987, is the guy opposite Bing Crosby in 1954’s classic White Christmas. Not that he wasn’t a star in his own considerable right. Kaye stood out as a singer, dancer, comedian and storyteller, with 1956’s The Court Jester, an all aglow Technicolor production that showcased all of those talents.

Then came the small screen and The Danny Kaye Show, initially in black-and-white, later in color and enduring from 1963 to 1967 on CBS. In its first year there were 15 other prime-time variety/comedy shows with the star’s name in the title. Kaye inched into the list of the top 30 most popular programs for his one and only time, tying for the last available spot with Bob Hope and trailing the likes of Ed Sullivan, Red Skelton, Jack Benny, Jackie Gleason and Walt Disney. All of them ran behind The Beverly Hillbilliies.

The Danny Kaye Show was his one and only stint as the star of a weekly television series. He threw himself into 121 episodes, with Harvey Korman his most frequent second banana before he went directly to The Carol Burnett Show. The recently released Danny Kaye -- Legends offers six full episodes on two discs ($24.95, from MVD Visual), with the guest list including Lucille Ball, Louis Armstrong, Tony Bennett, George Burns, Shirley Jones, Liberace and Imogene Coca, the old stalwart from Sid Caesar’s Your Show of Shows.

The black-and-white hour with Ball is a standout, particularly when they play multiple characters in a variety of costumes during an elongated sketch titled “Love Has Nine Lives.” Better yet is the post mortem. At the end of each hour, Kaye would sit down for a more intimate discourse with the studio audience. During the Ball show, he talks about the “madhouse” they’d just witnessed before asking, “Would you like to see what happens backstage?”

For the next several minutes, some of those frantic wardrobe changes are shown as seldom seen before or since, with a collection of stagehands trying their best to undress and dress the two stars. It’s a completely fascinating look at how the veritable sausage is made.

Ball and Kaye also combine skills on an ambitious production number that requires them to pop dozens of balloons until just one big one is left. Less successful is a sit-down bit in which they play a husband and wife whose maid has taken over their parenting duties. “I know who’ll fire her. The fire department,” Kaye ripostes. It’s more fun watching him mug his way through Ball’s recitation of the savory dinners the maid also contributes when not monopolizing their new baby.

Korman comes to the fore in the show with Bennett and Coca. A very lengthy maritime sketch ends with Kaye, Korman and Coca all cracking each other up in an appetizer for Korman’s subsequent sketch adventures with Burnett in general and Tim Conway in particular. Korman appeared in 82 Kaye shows, according to imbd.com. It proved to be an endurance contest with a moody and demanding host.

Like many gifted comedians, Kaye was a “very complicated man” prone to sharp mood swings and depression, Korman says in an Archive of American Television interview. “He was a perfectionist. And very hard on himself and very hard on all of us. Because it had to be perfect.”

None of this is evident in the finished product. Other high points of Danny Kaye -- Legend include his free and easy swinging with Armstrong, reminiscing at length with Burns and merely gazing upon Jones, who looks positively luminous in the collection’s first color episode.

The solo singing performances on The Danny Kaye Show invariably featured extreme closeups of the artists in full voice. Armstrong, Bennett, Jones, the Righteous Brothers and John Gary are among those on the receiving ends on these two discs. Kaye wasn’t big on the revolutionary pop music of the Sixties, preferring the sometimes dated song stylings of old. The Righteous Brothers were an exception. As is their notable performance of “You’ve Lost That Loving Feeling.”

The worst moments of The Danny Kaye Show are some cloying, closing interludes with a little girl he very much favored -- Victoria Meyerink. This collection features two of these get-togethers, with Victoria sitting on his lap while Kaye coos and sings. She seems somewhat although not entirely uncomfortable, whether singing in turn or telling a joke.

“How do you get down off an elephant?” Victoria asks. “You don’t. You get down off a goose.”

Throughout much of his career, Kaye was the foremost ambassador/fundraiser for UNICEF (United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund). So his fondness for kids is genuine. Still, the segments with Victoria come off as kind of creepy all these years later. Even the studio audience doesn’t seem to respond all that well to them.

Kaye is on far firmer ground as a sketch performer and dancer with talent to burn and the time to let it all air out. Broadcast network television hours of the 1960s had about 10 minutes more running time than they do today. So nothing seems to be in a rush, whether the host is delighted to be in the company of Burns or participating in that memorable outfit-swapping extravaganza with Ball. Well, that was done in a rush. But the sketch itself keeps going and going.

Kaye closed each show by dancing and skipping off into a bright blue yonder after cracking a climactic joke.

“If you’re one of those who can’t brush after every meal, have toothpaste for lunch,” he says after thanking guests Ball and Gary.

If you’re a student of television’s distant yesteryears, Danny Kaye -- Legends is worth your time and money. It showcases a truly unique individualist in times when variety shows were the norm not the exception. Kaye took full advantage, showing off his many talents, showcasing his guests and grooming Korman for all those best days ahead of him.

http://www.tvworthwatching.com/BlogPostDetails.aspx?postId=10934
 
#6,368 ·
TV/Nielsen Notes (Broadcast)
For ‘Empire’ stars, a white hot holiday indeed
The show's stars host a special on Fox with their favorite people
By Louisa Ada Seltzer, Media Life Magazine - Dec. 9, 2015

It’s been quite a year for Taraji P. Henson and Terrence Howard, the stars of Fox’s smash hit “Empire.”

Little wonder the network would give them their own holiday special, “Taraji and Terrence’s White Hot Holidays,” which airs tonight at 9 p.m.

It’s basically a way for Fox to fill up a night where “Empire,” which usually airs Wednesdays at 9 p.m., is on hiatus. The show aired its midseason finale last week, and now Fox’s top show is off until March.

By enlisting the drama’s stars to host a special, the network should draw better ratings than what repeats would otherwise air in the slot.

And it’s clear the stars, who have been dogged by rumors of on-set feuding, are simply having fun. The special is being billed as a variety program, with sketches such as Henson and Howard playing Kim Kardashian and Kanye West.

Musical guests will include Mary J. Blige, John Legend and Jamie Foxx.

The show will draw numbers well below “Empire,” which is averaging a 4.8 adults 18-49 rating this season, according to Nielsen, tops for any scripted broadcast show. But expect it to do decently on Twitter, where “Empire” is hugely popular.

http://www.medialifemagazine.com/empire-stars-white-hot-holiday-indeed/
 
#6,369 ·
TV/Nielsen Notes
Cat Owners Aren’t Into Empire, the Wealthy Love Modern Family, and Other TV Trivia
By Josef Adalian, Vulture.com (New York Magazine)

The big picture for ratings in 2015 can be summed up neatly in one word: down. Whether it’s networks or individual shows, the trend this year has been toward decline. Not everything is losing audience, of course, but the ever-exploding number of program choices and platforms has caused Nielsen erosion nearly across the board. Even new shows that explode onto the scene, as Empire did so spectacularly last spring, quickly lose steam as viewers either move on to something else or decide to watch in a different way, one not immediately captured in the ratings (like a Netflix binge). But not everything about Nielsen numbers is doom and gloom: Ratings can still be fun! With the help of some of our friends at various network research departments, Vulture dove deep into 2015’s Nielsen data, focusing on less frequently reported metrics and the quirkier side of the numbers. Read on to discover how race and gender shape viewing habits, what movies we watched on TV, and why cat and dog owners have very different opinions of Ryan Murphy.

The big picture for ratings in 2015 can be summed up neatly in one word: down. Whether it’s networks or individual shows, the trend this year has been toward decline. Not everything is losing audience, of course, but the ever-exploding number of program choices and platforms has caused Nielsen erosion nearly across the board. Even new shows that explode onto the scene, as Empire did so spectacularly last spring, quickly lose steam as viewers either move on to something else or decide to watch in a different way, one not immediately captured in the ratings (like a Netflix binge). But not everything about Nielsen numbers is doom and gloom: Ratings can still be fun! With the help of some of our friends at various network research departments, Vulture dove deep into 2015’s Nielsen data, focusing on less frequently reported metrics and the quirkier side of the numbers. Read on to discover how race and gender shape viewing habits, what movies we watched on TV, and why cat and dog owners have very different opinions of Ryan Murphy.

Boo Boo Kitty: Cat owners aren’t that into Empire.
Believe it or not, Nielsen actually issues a report on how shows do based on whether someone owns a dog or cat. And in a major upset, it turns out people with cats in their homes are much less likely to watch Empire than people with dogs (or the population in general). While Fox’s musical megahit is the No. 2 show on TV with adults under 50, and the No. 5 show with dog owners under 50, the show only comes in at No. 18 in HWKs (Homes With Kitties). It turns out cat owners would rather watch Supergirl, The Goldbergs, or Scorpions than Empire. Dog owners also have their quirks: American Horror Story is No. 9 with all viewers under 50, and No. 6 among cat owners. Fido lovers, however, don’t even rank Ryan Murphy’s scream thing in their top ten.

Being rich: It’s as easy as ABC (and AMC).
Advertisers understandably pay a premium to reach affluent viewers, the theory being that those with more money will buy more … stuff. This year, among younger viewers (ages 18–49) in homes with average incomes above $200,000 per year, series from two networks — AMC and ABC — dominate, claiming seven of the ten top spots. The Walking Dead is tops, of course, but ABC’s Modern Family is No. 2, and ranks as the most popular upscale show on broadcast TV. (It beats No. 3 The Big Bang Theory by nearly two ratings points.) AMC also snags the No. 4 slot with TWD spinoff Fear the Walking Dead, and lands a newcomer on the list at No. 7 with Better Call Saul. Meanwhile, Shonda Rhimes’s Thursday twosome of Grey’s Anatomy and Scandal also makes the top ten, and the network’s Monday staple The Bachelor comes in at No. 6 and ranks as the top-rated reality show with the one percent. By the way, if you look a bit farther down the list, to the top 20 shows with rich folks, you’ll find even more ABC shows (How to Get Away With Murder, Black-ish, The Goldbergs, The Bachelorette, and Quantico) and one other dearly departed AMC series (Mad Men).

I Scream, you Scream for VOD.
Given how massive its overall ratings are, it’s not particularly shocking that Empire is also a monster hit when it comes to video on demand. On average this year, just under 1.5 million people caught the show via VOD every episode — the only broadcast show to regularly pull over 1 million viewers through VOD. But even more impressive is how well some other low-rated Fox shows do on the platform. Scream Queens struggles to get 4 million viewers to watch on live TV or DVR, but it’s actually the No. 2 show in all of broadcast TV when looking at VOD audience. The first six episodes of Ryan Murphy’s horror comedy are pulling in an average of 825,000 VOD viewers, making up a (relatively) massive 18 percent of its total audience. The rest of the broadcast winners in VOD: Wayward Pines, Quantico, and The Big Bang Theory. Meanwhile, another Murphy creation — FX’s American Horror Story — is the most-VOD’d show on basic cable.

Among African-Americans, there’s Empire … and everything else.
We wrote last spring about Empire’s hegemony over all other TV shows when it comes to black viewers, and while its numbers have slipped this fall, its dominance here is breathtaking. The show’s audience this season among African-American adults under 50, for example, is 6.1 million viewers — or nearly as many black viewers in that demo as the next three shows (Scandal, How to Get Away With Murder, and Love & Hip Hop: Atlanta) combined. That 6.1 million figure is also bigger than the total adults under 50 audience (including people of all races) of all but five shows on TV this year. And it’s a whopping 12 times bigger than the most-watched scripted series on CBS among young African-American adults, Criminal Minds. That show averages 559,000 black viewers ages 18–49 airing Wednesdays at 9 — directly opposite Empire. Interestingly, despite dominating numerous demos, AMC doesn’t even crack the top ten with black viewers under 50.

Kids love Empire, too.
Not surprisingly, shows from Disney Channel (Bunk’d, K.C. Undercover) and Nick (Henry Danger, Bella and the Bulldogs) rank as the most popular weekly series with kids 2 to 11. It’s a bit more revealing, however, that Empire comes in at No. 11 with tots, while AMC’s decidedly adult horror show The Walking Dead is in the top 20, too. It’s not our job to judge America’s parents, so we’ll just leave this information right there.

White viewers are more into Mike & Molly than Cookie and Lucious.
No shocker: TV’s No. 1 show overall among adults under 50, The Walking Dead, also happens to be tops among white viewers, with nearly 10 million of its 13 million viewers in the demo identifying as Caucasian. Spinoff Fear the Walking Dead also wowed white folks, coming in as the No. 3 show in the younger demo, just behind No. 2, The Big Bang Theory. The rest of the top ten among whites, in order: Modern Family, Game of Thrones, Blindspot, The Voice, Grey’s Anatomy, Supergirl, and American Horror Story. While Empire is the No. 2 show in all of TV among viewers under 50, it’s no thanks to young white viewers: Among Caucasians, it doesn’t even crack the top 40 shows of the year, finishing below NBC’s now-dead Parenthood and so-so rated CBS comedies such as Mike & Molly and 2 Broke Girls.

Asian-Americans have rallied behind Fresh Off the Boat.
Before Boat sailed last spring, it had been 20 years since a major network built a sitcom around an Asian-American family. It’s paid off for ABC: Not only is Boat a hit overall, it also stands as the No. 1 show on broadcast TV among Asian-American adults 18–49. (AMC’s two scripted Walking Dead shows are Nos. 1 and 2 in both broadcast and cable.) Also cracking the top ten with Asian-Americans: Game of Thrones, Blindspot, Big Bang Theory, Supergirl, Modern Family, Quantico, and Empire.

Old movies are surprisingly popular.
While broadcast networks don’t air a lot of movies anymore, the few they do still pack a punch. ABC’s annual Easter telecast of 1956’s The Ten Commandments currently stands as this year’s No. 1 theatrical film broadcast of the year among adult viewers under 50. It wasn’t the only oldie to do well: NBC’s 20th-anniversary showing of Jurassic Park and a Disney Channel rerun of Finding Nemo also land among the most-watched feature films in the demo this year. As for more current films, FX’s decision to invest in movies is paying off: A February airing of Avengers was the top-rated recent theatrical of the year, while Twilight: Breaking Dawn — Part 2 and Taken 2 also landed in the top ten. HBO’s top movie of the year, original or otherwise, was Marvel’s X-Men: Days of Future Past. Not every big movie this year was an action blockbuster, though: ABC Family generated top-ten-level ratings with a showing of the original Pitch Perfect.

Whitney Houston was the Lifetime queen.
Lifetime movies are a genre unto themselves, and this year the format scored at least one big success: January’s Whitney Houston biopic Whitney was 2015’s No. 1 adult-targeted original with viewers under 50, easily beating the first installment of History’s tea-party love letter Sons of Liberty. And even though it was aimed at tweens, enough parents and older siblings watched July’s Descendants to make it the No. 1 movie overall among adults under 50 (and viewers of all ages).

Hispanic audiences love zombies, too.
AMC’s undead juggernaut is TV’s most-watched show in any language among Hispanic audiences under 50, albeit just barely. It’s averaging around 1.9 million Hispanic viewers under 50 this year, putting it just ahead of Univision’s top-rated telenovela Mi Corazón Es Tuyo, whose Tuesday edition is No. 2. Spanish-language programming on Univision and Telemundo dominate the annual ratings, but if you look at only English-language shows, Empire is TV’s No. 2 show in the Hispanic demo, ahead of Fear the Walking Dead, American Horror Story, and The Big Bang Theory.

Broadcast networks are losing the war for millennials.
For years, the Big Four networks dismissed their cable rivals by noting how the vast majority of big hits were on broadcast. While that’s still true among the population as a whole, it’s no longer the case with millennials. Among adult viewers under 35, eight of 2015’s top 20 shows — nearly half! — call cable home. The Walking Dead is tops, of course, followed by summer spinoff Fear the Walking Dead. HBO’s Game of Thrones, despite airing on a subscription network and thus being in far fewer homes, comes in at No. 5 overall among millennials, with FX’s American Horror Story franchise right behind at No. 6. Other cable shows in the top 20 with viewers under 35: Better Call Saul, Talking Dead, Teen Mom, and Teen Mom 2. (Expand the list to 30 shows, and both Love & Hip Hop Atlanta and Hollywood make the cut, as does South Park.)

… But a large number of under-35s believe in #ABCAndChill.
While the broadcast nets as a whole are losing their stranglehold on millennials, that statement doesn’t really apply to ABC. A full third of 2015’s 25 biggest shows among adults under 35 air on the Alphabet network, including Modern Family and all three Shonda Rhimes dramas (led by How to Get Away With Murder). ABC also has TV’s top reality show with the young (The Bachelor, which beats both Teen Mom and The Voice), while The Bachelorette, Quantico, and Once Upon a Time also score big in the demo. Fox, meanwhile, has some cause for hope, too: In addition to having the No. 1 broadcast show with millennials (Empire), three shows launched in the past two seasons — Scream Queens, The Last Man on Earth, and Gotham — are currently among the top 25 with adults 18–34.

CBS has more broad-based hits than any network.
Folks at the Eye network don’t like it when people joke about it being the “old people” network, but here’s the thing: A lot of older folks love CBS, and a lot of younger folks don’t know it exists. Among millennials, The Big Bang Theory is the only CBS show among this year’s 25 top-rated series. But if you measure by total viewers — audiences of any age — CBS is home to 14 of the 25 most-watched shows, including half the top ten. (Big Bang is No. 1 overall, followed by NCIS). And look just at senior citizens, and the stranglehold is simply stunning: The Eye boasts 90 percent of the top ten and 75 percent of the top 25 shows among those under 65. CBS also boasts six of the 25 biggest shows among adults under 50, so it’s not as if it’s devoid of shows with young-ish appeal. But if it seems as if all you grandparents watch is CBS, well, that’s because they do.

Shonda vs. superheroes: The dramatic differences between men and women.
When it comes to scripted dramas, men and women under 50 have a lot of the same tastes: The Walking Dead is tops with both genders; Empire is in the top five; and there’s common top ten love for Fear the Walking Dead, American Horror Story, Game of Thrones, and Blindspot. But there are some Mars-Venus distinctions, too. Led by Scandal, all three of ABC’s TGIT shows are top-ten-worthy with younger women but don’t even rank in the top 25 with guys. (A&E’s Vikings actually does better with bros than all of ABC’s Thursday shows.) Conversely, dominant dude dramas such as top-ten-ranked Better Call Saul, Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., and Gotham are way down on the female watch list: All three are relative blips, ranking below canceled series such as Stalker and Revenge.

Here’s what really old people watch.
Nielsen offers a handy way to measure just how much a show appeals to young or old people via a metric called median age: The bigger the number, the older the overall viewership. In general, cable shows skew younger than broadcast, but the rural-focused RFD network is a big exception. It boasts nearly two dozen regular series whose average viewer has a median age of 75 or older, and it aired one special earlier this year whose median viewer's age was 85. (It was about horse training, if you’re curious.) Another cable network super popular with the Mr. Burns crowd: Fox News Channel. Weekend staple Justice With Judge Jeanine, in which the host finds new and (not very) creative ways of calling President Obama the antichrist, has an audience whose median age is 70. That makes Monday through Friday prime-time anchor Sean Hannity a relative youth magnet: His screamfest has a median age of just 67.

Some housekeeping notes: This story is based on Nielsen data supplied to Vulture by multiple broadcast and cable networks. Except where otherwise noted, figures cited or referenced include both live viewing and viewing that takes place within seven days after a program airs. In most cases, numbers are for first-run broadcasts of shows (i.e., no reruns) and include telecasts through early November. Rankings generally only include shows that aired at least four episodes in 2015 by November 1 (sorry, Supergirl).

http://www.vulture.com/2015/12/wealthy-love-modern-family-other-tv-trivia.html
 
#6,370 ·
Technology/Business Notes (Ultra HD)
Samsung Leads 4K TV Charge: Study
By Jeff Baumgartner, Multichannel News

We’ll know more about the 4K TV market trends following the holiday buying frenzy, but through the middle of 2015 Samsung led the way among U.S. broadband homes, according to new data from Parks Associates.

Samsung, the firm said, accounted for 28% of 4K TV purchases made within the past year by U.S. broadband homes, while Best Buy was the top retailer, capturing more than 40% of 4K TV purchases.

Among other brands, 17% of consumers who bought a 4K TV in the past 12 months got one from LG Electronics, followed by Sony (13%), and Vizio (11%).

As for consumer pickup, 8% of U.S. broadband homes will buy a 4K TV this year, Parks Associates predicts.

Broken down further, 19% of U.S. broadband homes intend to buy a flat-panel TV by the end of 2015, and about 40% of that group are looking to score a 4K TV, while 42% of U.S. broadband homes indicate that they aren’t familiar with the new eye-popping platform.

“For both flat-panel purchasers and the subgroup of 4K TV purchasers, 44% made the purchase after seeing the product for a good price, so the major purchase motivator for flat-panel and 4K TVs was not substantially different,” Barbara Kraus, director of research at Parks Associates, said in a statement. “However, 11% of 4K TV purchasers were motivated to buy after learning about the TV’s features, compared to 3% of flat-panel TV purchasers.”

Kraus said content remains a “key inhibitor” for 4K adoption, noting that she also expects to see lower cost 4K TV technologies, including 4K-capable disc players and sets with on-board high dynamic range (HDR), emerge next month at CES 2016 in Las Vegas.

http://www.multichannel.com/blog/bauminator/samsung-leads-4k-tv-charge-study/395726
 
#6,371 ·
Critic's Notes
TV Top 10 of 2015: 'The Leftovers,' 'Fargo,' 'Mad Men' & more
These shows were the absolute peak of Peak TV in America
By Alan Sepinwall, HitFix.com - Dec. 8, 2015

From almost every angle, the idea that there will be over 400 original scripted comedies and dramas — many of them, particularly on the drama side, ranging from very good to great — airing in primetime this year, across the broadcast networks, cable, and streaming, is a high-class problem. The only people it really negatively affects are TV critics like yours truly, and even I'd rather people have far too many different viewing options than far too few.

Still, it's hard not to gnash my teeth a bit when December arrives, and top 10 season right along with it.

For the past week, I've been accepting ballots for this year's HitFix Television Critics Poll, which will be released tomorrow, and nearly every one of them arrived with an introduction saying something like, "This is harder than it's ever been to pick just 10," or, "I hate my list, even though I love all the shows on it, because I had to leave so many off." (Maybe we, like the Baseball Hall of Fame, need to start considering expanding the ballot past only 10 spots?) And that's more or less how I felt putting together my own ballot, which included my own overall top 10 for 2015, which you can enjoy in the video embedded above or the list below. I'm giddy that I get to review TV in a time that includes all of the shows on this list, even if several of them said their farewells in 2015, but I'm also really aggravated that I couldn't invent some additional numbers between 1 and 10 to include a "You're the Worst," or "Broad City," or "Veep," or "Show Me a Hero," or "BoJack Horseman." I'll be doing an Honorable Mentions list next week that features those shows and a bunch of others (even doing a Next 10 seems insufficient these days, so I'll be giving you at least 15 more). I could have made a list that just contained shows that debuted between January and April, or one starting only on Memorial Day, and there wouldn't be a clunker in the bunch. (One of the shows I selected won't even have its official debut until the end of this week, though I've seen all the season's episodes, the first of which sneak-previewed last week.)

If you still have last year's top 10 list memorized, you may not find this one incredibly surprising, as 7 of the 10 shows are the same, and an 8th has been a list fixture in year's past (including one year in the top spot) before finishing a bit outside the top 10 a year ago. But that's what happens when you have a trio of all-time great series saying farewell with style, and when a bunch of last year's best new shows found ways to be even bolder, crazier, and in many ways just plain better than they were in their debut seasons.

Like I said, 10 is an arbitrary, traditional number, and I like to think of these as just the first chunk of what'll be a nice top 25 or 30 by next week. But as I sweated over the list over the course of a few weeks — whittling down from a preliminary list of contenders that was around 50 shows long, none of them duds — these were ultimately the 10 I decided I would be most angry with myself for omitting.

[CLICK LINK AT BOTTOM FOR ADDITIONAL LINKS TO ALAN SEPINWALL INTERVIEWS WITH STARS, WRITERS AND PRODUCERS OF SHOWS LISTED BELOW]

10. "Rectify" (Sundance)

"Rectify" downshifted from 10 episodes to only 6 for its third season, but as usual, nothing felt rushed for one of TV's quietest, most thoughtful, and just plain beautiful dramas. As Daniel Holden prepared to leave his hometown forever as part of a plea bargain, the series continued to find the small and powerful details in the lives of the people around him, and even managed to move the overall plot forward a lot despite the leisurely pace. An unconventional show, and a great one.

My review of the "Rectify" season finale.

9. "Parks and Recreation" (NBC)

We said goodbye to some all-time TV classics this year, starting with "Parks and Recreation." The Amy Poehler comedy had seemingly lost a half-step in its advanced age, as even the best shows do, but its final season was more reminiscent of vintage "Parks" than any fan had a right to expect. It was funny, it was poignant, and it was joyful. Years from now, maybe after Chris Pratt has launched his 20th action movie franchise, people will look back at this wonderful series and ask how it wasn't a huge hit. But for those of us watching, we got more than a victory lap at the end, but a hilarious sprint.

All of my "Parks and Recreation" reviews and interviews.

8. "Master of None" (Netflix)

A good chunk of the "Parks and Rec" gang, including co-star Aziz Ansari and writer Alan Yang, moved over to "Master of None," the year's best new series. This comedy was so deeply personal that Ansari cast his real parents to play his characters parents, told stories about being the pampered children of immigrants and how hard it is to get more than one Indian actor on a TV show, and showed a deep and abiding curiosity about the world around him. This was a knockout debut, and I can't wait to see what Ansari, Yang, and company do next.

My review of every "Master of None" season 1 episode.

7. "Review" (Comedy Central)

In the first season of Review," the insane commitment of Andy Daly's Forrest MacNeil to his job as a "reviewer of life" led to the end of his marriage, the death in space of his father-in-law, a brief institutionalization, and a cocaine addiction, among other tragedies. Somehow, season 2 of this incredibly black comedy made things even worse for him, destroying lives, property, and even imaginary friends, and somehow always wringing enormous laughs out of the terrible, terrible things that Forrest can't stop himself from doing. It's one of the funniest shows on TV, and easily the scariest.

My interview with Andy Daly about "Review" season 2.

6. "Justified" (FX)

"Justified" was another departing classic that recaptured its former glory on the way out the door. At its best, the series was both a great drama and a fun one, and this final season was both at once, featuring an array of colorful villains new and old, but also a commitment to seeing the story of Raylan Givens and Boyd Crowder all the way to the end, no matter how bad things got between the cop and the crook who once dug coal together.

All of my "Justified" episode reviews.

5. "Transparent" (Amazon)

"Transparent" made clear that its great first season was no fluke within the space of its very first shot of season 2: a long, static take filled with information, comedy, and tragedy about the current state of the Pfefferman clan. It was intimate and knowing in a way that was true for the rest of the season, which debuts on Amazon on Friday. Though its main character is going through a gender transition, the series isn't just about trans issues, but about relationships in general, and all the problems that arise when you spend too much of your life not truly understanding who you and the people you care about truly are. Fortunately, the series itself, including an incredible cast led by Jeffrey Tambor, understands exactly what it is and how best to be about that.

4. "The Americans" (FX)

No good ever seems to come from adult TV dramas incorporating teenage characters. Except, that is, when "The Americans" is doing it. In season 3, Holly Taylor's Paige found out her parents were KGB deep cover agents, and it only made the series tenser and more tragic. Taylor was great, and her TV parents Keri Russell and Matthew Rhys continued to be as well. The episode "Do Mail Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?" not only had one of the year's best titles, but one of its most powerful sequences. Whether it's functioning as a spy thriller, a family drama, or an unexpected blend of the two, this remains one of the best-crafted and most entertaining shows you can find on your TV.

All of my reviews of "The Americans" season 3.

3. "Fargo" (FX)

Season 2 of "Fargo" was basically everything we so badly wanted "True Detective" season 2 to be. Here was a crime anthology which came back with more characters, more storylines, and more overall ambition, but made everything work, with actors Patrick Wilson, Ted Danson, Kirsten Dunst, Bokeem Woodbine and so many more bringing these new figures to such vivid life, with an amazing visual language and soundtrack that perfectly suited the late '70s setting, and with the story and character arcs prioritizing fun even as they stayed true to who all these people are.

All of my "Fargo" episode reviews.

2. "Mad Men" (AMC)

Like last year, "Mad Men" returned with a few episodes that seemed weirdly like throat-clearing, even though the series finale was only weeks away. But then Don Draper's ad agency disintegrated, and in the process "Mad Men" reminded us all why it's one of the greatest dramas ever made, with a quartet of rich, funny, and deeply poignant concluding episodes that gave all the major characters a satisfying ending, even if only some of them were happy enough to drink a Coke to.

1. "The Leftovers" (HBO)

A year ago, I chose "The Leftovers" as the best show on TV more with my heart, which was deeply moved by nearly every moment, than my head, which could see that there were some clear flaws with how Damon Lindelof and company told stories set in a broken world where millions of people recently vanished without explanation. If the show could be that powerful even with room to grow, then imagine how amazing it became in season 2, which was more consistent, more focused, much better-plotted, and even more audacious than before in its commitment to putting its audience in the shoes of its characters. "International Assassin," where Kevin Garvey either went to Hell or just had one hell of a drug trip, was a miraculous hour of drama on every level. This was an easy call for the top spot a year ago, and even easier this time, now that "The Leftovers" has produced a season that measures up to the best of what the vintage HBO series were doing in the early part of this century.

http://www.hitfix.com/whats-alan-watching/tv-top-10-of-2015-the-leftovers-fargo-mad-men-more
 
#6,372 ·
TV/Critic's Notes (Cable)
On FXX's 'You're the Worst,' clinical depression is the show's fifth character
By Libby Hill, Los Angeles Times - Dec. 9, 2015

Life's little complications are the lifeblood of the FXX comedy series "You're the Worst," created by "Weeds" alum Stephen Falk.

The show follows four aimless thirtysomethings fumbling toward middle age as they squeeze every drop of fun out of their alcohol-soaked lives in Los Angeles. A delicately calibrated portrayal of messy, modern living, the series offers a window into a generation often misunderstood and gets at what's driving an entire culture of aimlessness.

Adding to that, the gang lives in Los Angeles, which lends itself to endless in-jokes. When friends Jimmy (Chris Geere), Gretchen (Aya Cash), Edgar (Desmin Borges) and Lindsay (Kether Donahue) bet on the cause of a traffic snarl, answers vary from "It's sprinkling" to "Obama is on Kimmel again" to "Elmo fight outside the Chinese Theater." (Right answer: the L.A. Marathon.)

But what really sets the show apart is something that few other series have been able to do successfully: It tackles clinical depression in a comprehensible way.

Television has given more screen time than ever to matters of mental illness this season, from shows as diverse as "Homeland" and "Hannibal" to newcomers like "Mr. Robot" and "Unreal." But "You're the Worst" truly nails the balance required for discussing clinical depression.

"We called the depression the show's fifth character," says Geere, "because of the impact it has on everyone individually."

The show, which was just picked up for a third season, follows a toxic yet magnetic couple as they try to figure out how and why they might make a relationship work. Cynic Gretchen and narcissist Jimmy, both awful people in their own right, are somehow less awful together.

Their relationship reads like the ugly back story that lurks behind the scenes of all great sitcom couples. It's as if the pair are only a few years away from transforming into "Mad About You's" Paul and Jamie Buchman and naming their baby Mabel and their dog Murray. Maybe the more repellent aspects of TV couples have been the most interesting parts of sitcom relationships all along.

"You're the Worst," which had its premiere in summer 2014, may not generate high ratings, but it's critically acclaimed and resonates with a segment of the populace often dismissed as hipster millennials.

Well into the second season, which ends Wednesday, the show actively began developing a story line that showed romantic lead Gretchen struggling with depression. The reveal in the episode "There Is Not Currently a Problem" blindsided her boyfriend Jimmy and viewers alike. In the multi-episode arc that followed, Gretchen grew more mired in depression and Jimmy more stymied by his inability to help her.

The brilliance of this rarely told narrative is that it examines the idea that it's impossible to know everything about someone. Then, there's the thought that no one aspect of someone's life defines them. People are a collection of foibles, a clutch of specifics that make up a beautiful whole.

"I don't feel uncomfortable tackling anything," Falk says. "Having worked with Jenji Kohan [creator of "Weeds" and "Orange Is the New Black"], she taught me not to fear writing that you don't know first hand."

But Cash didn't always share Falk's confidence about what darkness lurked behind the her character's exterior.

"I had these moments of insecurity and worried that I wasn't honoring something that I felt was very important," Cash says, "and if I was honoring it, were people going to go with it or just be annoyed that their comedy had too much drama in it?"

Though valid concerns, part of the reason "You're the Worst's" examination of depression works so well is that it allows for every iteration of the illness, letting the humor of the situation to shine through when appropriate.

For all her concerns, however, and as much as the success of "You're the Worst's" depression arc depends on Cash's performance, she wasn't unprepared for the characterization.

"I tend to swing low. I'm familiar with that," she says. "I am not clinically depressed, but I have experienced depression as an outsider, and I felt like I understood it on an emotional level."

Beyond much-admired performances by Cash and Geere, "You're the Worst's" depression arc finds success the same way the series does everything else: through specificity.

"The thing that surprised me the most in researching clinical depression is how it manifests very, very differently in people," Falk says. "Once we found that out there are a wide range of behaviors and symptoms and coping mechanisms, it gave us an extra shot to dramatize Gretchen's depression in an interesting way."

As for why Falk chose this moment to introduce the plot, he attributes it to wanting to subvert story expectations, opting to more deeply explore the complications that define the show.

When, at the end of Season 1, Jimmy and Gretchen moved in together, it was the beginning of a new stage in their relationship, just not the one they had anticipated. The expected struggles of how to share space or divide chores suddenly gave way to much more significant complications in Season 2.

"The secondary function of the depression has really served as a reminder of when you get into a relationship and you have to navigate 'the thing,' " Falk says. "You have to deal with who you're actually shacked up with now and what are you going to do then?"

That idea of "what now?" as it pertains to suddenly dealing with a partner who's depressed is something Geere has thought about a lot.

"People's natural instinct, not just Jimmy's, is to run away because they're out of their depths," Geere says. "They don't know what they're doing."

But lack of understanding is not necessarily lack of trying, Geere clarifies.

"Jimmy asks Gretchen to explain it to him," he says. "Explain her depression and then maybe he can try and process it. But the truth is, Jimmy doesn't get it."

That a sense of confusion suffuses the conversation around mental illness, even within a person's own head, is not lost on Cash.

"We don't know what normal is anymore and what a normal level of sadness is," she says. "It's OK to be sad; you can feel that and deal with that, but sadness that's incapacitating is not. It's complicated."

It is complicated. Aging is complicated. Depression is complicated. Relationships are complicated. And "You're the Worst" understands that it's those precise complications that are the conversations worth having.

For the series' third season, Falk isn't worried about getting pigeonholed by his story choices.

"We're not just going to play the same note. We're going to try to show a different side," he says. "We're going to turn the crystal and show a different way the light bounces off that character."

And complications will ensue.

'You're the Worst'
Where: FXX
When: 10:45 p.m. Wednesday


http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/la-et-st-fxx-the-worst-depression-on-tv-20151209-story.html
 
#6,374 ·
Yes it's like Breaking News! Comcast "bundles" HBO with basic cable service!

But the misleading wording isn't Amazon's fault - the service could be worth a look for cord-cutters. Maybe even some cable customers interested in more time and place flexibility than they can get with their cable provider's STB and on-demand limitations...
It is just reciprocal co-marketing, folks. Nothing unusual or misleading here. These are industry practices that date back to the "Buy a Happy Meal and get a Star Wars souvenir cup" from the 1970's.

The AMC series Mad Men taught me a lot about marketing in the good old USA.
 
#6,376 ·
TV/Nielsen Notes
Cat Owners Aren’t Into Empire, the Wealthy Love Modern Family, and Other TV Trivia
By Josef Adalian, Vulture.com (New York Magazine)


Here’s what really old people watch.
... the rural-focused RFD network is a big exception. It boasts nearly two dozen regular series whose average viewer has a median age of 75 or older...

http://www.vulture.com/2015/12/wealthy-love-modern-family-other-tv-trivia.html
The "average viewer" has a "median age"? Don't magazines and web sites hire editors and proofreaders anymore?
 
#6,377 ·
I have trouble believing this.

Ads for traditional media (mainly linear TV) are priced at a massive markup compared to ads for digital content..
The terminology gets confusing. Aren't there a few streaming media services (on PCs and various devices) that deliver content in a linear fashion --- meaning that there is very little interactivity and the viewer has to watch the content, including the ads, as it is being delivered live?
 
#6,380 ·
TV Notes (Broadcast)
M. Night Shyamalan’s ‘Wayward Pines’ Renewed for Season 2 on Fox
By Linda Ge, TheWrap.com - Dec. 9, 2015

Fox has given a second season order to M. Night Shyamalan‘s “Wayward Pines,” the network announced Wednesday.

The second season will pick up in the wake of Season 1, when a new arrival in the town Wayward Pines finds himself in the middle of a serious rebellion, as the residents battle over how to preserve the endangered human race.

The first season, starring Matt Dillon, grew 33 percent with its season finale in the main 18-49 demographic. Its 1.2 rating tied a prior high.

“‘Wayward Pines’ was a huge hit for us this past summer,” said Fox Broadcasting Entertainment President David Madden in a statement. “We were absolutely blown away by the mysterious and surprising world that Night and his team created, and the twisting-and-turning storytelling that drew viewers in from day one. Season Two is going to take the suspense, the vision of the future and the haunting character drama to whole new levels, and we can’t wait for our fans to continue that ride next year.”

The original cast included Dillion, Melissa Leo, Terrence Howard, Carla Gugino, Shannyn Sossamon, Toby Jones, Reed Diamond, Tim Griffin, Charlie Tahan and Juliette Lewis.

There’s no word yet on which cast members will return for Season 2, which will debut in summer 2016.

http://www.thewrap.com/m-night-shyamalan-wayward-pines-renewed-season-2-fox/
 
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