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The Beatles bring down the Evil Empire
on 11/20/09 at 9:00 am | The Beatles racked up a lot of achievements in their musical career, but now we have to add one more: destroying the Soviet Union. How the Beatles Rocked the Kremlin (Saturday, 12:03 a.m., PBS) convincingly argues that the Evil Empire was brought down not by the West's nuclear arsenal or its many anti-Communist institutions, but by "I Want to Hold Your Hand." A wide range of Russian interviewees insist that Beatles music smuggled into the country gave them the vision to doubt their repressive government, along with the courage to resist it. |
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WWII in HD brings the battles into sharper focus
on 11/13/09 at 9:00 am | WWII in HD presents rare footage of World War II, found during a two-year global search through basements and archives. The footage was translated into high definition, then artfully edited to convey the sense that we're experiencing the events of 1939-45 as they happened. |
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SpongeBob SquarePants celebrates 10 surreal years
on 11/06/09 at 9:00 am | It's official: Everybody loves SpongeBob SquarePants. You can tell by all the stars who line up for cameo appearances in the cartoon's 10th anniversary special, including Robin Williams, Pink, Tina Fey, Will Ferrell, Craig Ferguson, LeBron James and Rosario Dawson. |
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Aliens are the new terrorists in V
on 10/30/09 at 9:00 am | Suspicious-looking aliens come to Earth in ABC's remake of the 1980s series V. They resemble humans and claim to have peaceful intentions. Ominously, their leader announces that her race doesn't believe in negative feelings. |
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Sexy nurses, swine flu, Michael Jackson and Twilight vampires top Madison’s list of favorite Halloween costumes
on 10/27/09 at 8:09 am | On the Sunday before Halloween, the toothpaste and aspirin aisles are deserted at cozy Mallatt’s Pharmacy, 3506 Monroe St. But the costume and makeup aisles are jam-packed with shoppers looking for the perfect bloody scar or fake teeth. As crowded as it is today, owner Mike Flint says it will be even harder to move around the store in the next week. “I’ll be at the point where I have to throw merchandise to people.” |
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A gorgeous pair save White Collar
on 10/23/09 at 9:00 am | No, White Collar is not set in the real world. USA specializes in this kind of crime-solving fantasy, but the new series lacks the magic of Monk or Psych. |
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NCIS: Los Angeles succeeds the old-fashioned way
on 10/16/09 at 9:00 am | The new spinoff NCIS: Los Angeles doesn't try anything fancy. No gimmicks, no strenuously original ideas -- just a pair of agents (Chris O'Donnell and LL Cool J) going undercover to catch the bad guys against a backdrop of L.A. skyscrapers, with a high-tech team assisting at HQ. |
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Kevin Henkes, Nancy Ekholm Burkert and other acclaimed illustrators discuss the art of children’s books at the Wisconsin Book Festival
on 10/12/09 at 10:32 am | To judge by the crush of people at the James Watrous Gallery Sunday, you’d think a famous rock band was giving a press conference. But no, it was just a half-dozen articulate artists discussing the ways in which they entrance children with images on paper. |
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Latin Music USA traces a remarkable progression
on 10/09/09 at 9:00 am | After all the dreadful series that have premiered in the last month, it's downright therapeutic to watch Latin Music USA. Here, finally, is a well-made production, full of humor and drama. |
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Curb Your Enthusiasm arranges a Seinfeld semi-reunion
on 10/02/09 at 9:00 am | Everybody dreams of a Seinfeld reunion, and this week we get one -- sort of. Seinfeld writer/co-creator Larry David stars in his own Seinfeld-like show, Curb Your Enthusiasm, and he brings on Jerry Seinfeld, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Michael Richards and Jason Alexander as special guest stars. |
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Cougar Town wallows in perversion
on 09/25/09 at 9:00 am | Courteney Cox was one of the funniest actors on Friends, one of the funniest sitcoms ever. So how can she be the least funny actress of the new TV season? |
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The Good Wife deals with a bad husband
on 09/18/09 at 9:00 am | The opening scene of The Good Wife is all too familiar: A politician ensnared in scandal faces reporters as his wife stands by his side wearing pearls and an ashen expression. |
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The Vampire Diaries hops on the fang fad
on 09/11/09 at 9:00 am | Pop culture has done wonderful things with vampires lately, from the Twilight movie to HBO's True Blood. Then there's The Vampire Diaries. The CW's new series is nothing more than a turgid teen soap opera -- Gossip Girl with sharper fangs. |
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The new Melrose Place is sleazier than ever
on 09/04/09 at 9:00 am | I didn't hear anybody clamoring for a new version of Melrose Place, but here comes another crop of beautiful young adults living and loving in an L.A. apartment complex. The remake wants very badly to be wicked. |
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Iraq vets fight their addictions in Intervention
on 08/28/09 at 9:00 am | A&E's Intervention is never easy to watch, but a special episode on addiction among Iraq War veterans is especially heartbreaking. We meet Marines who stood tall in a war zone and then crumbled as soon as they returned to the U.S., succumbing to alcohol and drug abuse. |
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Project Runway takes a long, strange route to its sixth season
on 08/21/09 at 9:00 am | The sixth season of the fashion series Project Runway had been in limbo for the past year. But it's hard to believe the rancor won't seep into the series itself. |
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2009 Madison's Favorites: Arts & Entertainment
on 08/20/09 at 9:00 am | The winners in the Arts & Entertainment category are a mix of old favorites and newbies, some of them in ripped fishnet stockings. Madison clearly likes to rock, but it also has a penchant for William Shakespeare, art movies and Latin jazz. Yes, we have a particular kind of taste in this town — and Lou & Peter Berryman have probably already written a quirky folk song about it. |
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Why Woodstock worked
on 08/14/09 at 9:00 am | Everyone knows that 1969's Woodstock festival was three days of peace and music. As MC/cook/nurse/mascot Wavy Gravy put it at the time: "We're gonna try to be groovy, and to spread that grooviness to everyone." |
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James Baughman steered UW School of Journalism through turbulent years
on 08/11/09 at 11:00 am | James Baughman is stepping down as director of the UW-Madison School of Journalism and Mass Communication after six years. And those weren’t just any six years. It was a period of tremendous upheaval for the mass media, with advertising revenue plummeting, daily newspapers downsizing or going out of business, and the Internet turning the industry on its ear. Has the UW journalism program kept up with these tumultuous events? |
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Monk begins its final season on a high note
on 08/07/09 at 9:00 am | I'm crushed that Monk will end after this season. As if to make me feel worse, the detective series begins its final run with a classic episode: funny, poignant and suspenseful. USA, you really know how to hurt a guy. |
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Michael Jackson is overrated
on 07/31/09 at 9:00 am | For the last month we've been hearing about Michael Jackson's greatness. It's all but settled that he's up there with the pop immortals in terms of musical artistry. With all due respect, I don't think that's true. |
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NBC destroys the world in The Storm
on 07/24/09 at 9:00 am | In the Great Depression of the 1930s, Hollywood pumped out screwball comedies to cheer us up. In the current depression, NBC takes the opposite approach, trying as hard as it can to create fear and anxiety. |
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Dark Blue goes where many cop shows have gone before
on 07/17/09 at 9:00 am | Tell me if you've heard this one before: A brilliant law-enforcement type with a tragic past and perpetual stubble leads a team of extraordinary undercover operatives outside the boundaries of police jurisdiction. |
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Antiques Roadshow returns to Madison and sifts through trash and treasure
on 07/12/09 at 3:00 pm | It looked like a mass moving day as Madisonians filed into the Alliant Energy Center on Saturday. PBS's Antiques Roadshow was in town to appraise our old stuff, and people walked through the parking lot with carts, suitcases and arms loaded with objects that might be worth a lot of money -- or a little, or maybe nothing at all. |
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A model switches souls with a lawyer in Drop Dead Diva
on 07/10/09 at 9:00 am | Drop Dead Diva is so enjoyable that I wished my own soul would migrate into the body of a plump, plain guy with no life to speak of. Wait a minute...I guess that's already happened. |
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The Great American Road Trip sends families cross-country
on 07/03/09 at 9:00 am | Many of us can't afford to travel this summer, but there's nothing to stop us from watching a travel series on TV. In The Great American Road Trip, families drive cross-country on Route 66, engage in a series of competitions and face weekly eliminations. |
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Entertaining tweens
on 07/03/09 at 9:00 am | My son is 12, and he's ready to put aside childish things. Swing sets and sandboxes don't cut it anymore. Chuck E. Cheese doesn't cut it anymore. On the verge of adolescence, he needs cooler places to play. |
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A well-endowed jock falls on hard times in Hung
on 06/26/09 at 9:00 am | In Hung, Ray Drecker (Thomas Jane) is one of those square-jawed men with huge ambitions and huge penises who used to own the world. But the old value system is crumbling, and so is Ray. |
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The Cleaner takes a unique approach to addiction
on 06/19/09 at 9:00 am | Back for a second season, The Cleaner follows William Banks (Benjamin Bratt) as he helps people overcome addictions. William takes a kind of Zen approach to his business, letting troubled clients find him and pay what they can. Why would he do such a thing? |
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When did True Blood get so good?
on 06/12/09 at 9:00 am | Last year, I bailed on the vampire series True Blood after the first episode. It struck me as contrived, straining after black humor, depraved romance and Southern gothic horror. But something must have happened while I was gone. |
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