Midseason TV To Look Forward To

This week, my sister and I came to the conclusion that 2011 was a horrible movie year. I mean, really bad. Good luck to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as they attempt to find ten Best Picture-worthy nominees this year. Think about it: can you think of ten films that deserve special recognition alongside classics like (for instance) On the Waterfront, Gone with the Wind, Chariots of Fire, and Schindler's List? That's what I thought.

TV, on the other hand, had a banner year. In spite of the fact that both Big Love and Friday Night Lights ended their excellent runs this year, both delivered stellar final seasons: in BL's case, erasing the tepid memories of a super-weird fourth season; and in FNL's case, giving fans the perfect, sweet, nostalgic farewell that they hoped for. At midseason, ABC cautiously introduced the hilarious Happy Endings and NBC rolled out a shortened, but pitch-perfect season of Parks and Recreation. The summer brought a new slew of charming cable dramedies for us to enjoy, such as USA's Suits and Necessary Roughness (for which Callie Thorne just scored an excellent WTF? Golden Globe nomination). But best of all, the fall season introduced us to Homeland, Once Upon a Time, Suburgatory, and (yes I'm including it) The Secret Circle, while still promising an imminent end to Desperate Housewives! Yessirrie, things are alright in TV land these days.

You know what the best part is, though? The start of 2012 promises even more fun! Here's what I'm looking forward to as the new year kicks off.

The return of 30 Rock and Cougar Town! The former is happening this month, while the latter is still TBA, but with at least a few episodes in the can already, I don't fear an untimely end to Cougar Town just yet. While I don't relish the idea of trading Happy Endings (e.g., instead of Modern Family, of which I've grown to be a little bit of a hype-hater) for Cougar Town's survival in mid-March, I can't wait to welcome the Cul-de-Sac Crew back to my TV. 30 Rock replaces Whitney on NBC's Thursday night comedy block. Win-win.

Southland's fourth season! With Homeland going on hiatus, TNT's brilliant Southland should fill the serious-minded drama void nicely. Odds are pretty good that Michael Cudlitz, Shawn Hatosy, and Regina King will each find new ways to be freakishly good at their jobs.

NBC's Smash. NBC has been holding this one out on us, hopefully because they think they've got a hit on their hands. It's a terrible shame that Prime Suspect wasn't a hit, because NBC's scrambling desperately for a scripted TV hit (they've got The Voice and the NFL, after all), and if Smash doesn't live up to expectations, we might lose what looks like another quality drama. I'm really interested to see what happens, though. The show itself looks like the kind of meta-showbiz thing I love to watch (don't even get me started on Studio 60), and it features one of my favorite shunned [American] Idols, Katherine "McPheever" McPhee in her first major starring role (I love to see the Idols succeed!), along with Debra Messing and Angelica Houston. Come on, y'all, this show looks cool.

Speaking of former Idols (segue alert), American Idol returns at the end of January! Has America's fascination with singing reality shows finally peaked? If the whole Voice-X-Factor-Sing-Off overload has finally set in, will viewers continue to tune into Idol? Frankly, I hope Idol still emerges as the favorite. I like The Sing-Off, but The Voice and The X-Factor were both unsettling for me in their first seasons. While watching the latter for a while this season, I found myself craving the simple joys of the Idol way: a capella auditions for the "judges", the shy contestants who take a little while to get used to performing for a crowd (I'm looking at you, Carrie Underwood), the out-of-nowhere semifinal surprise (Allison Iraheta's "Alone"; David Cook's "Happy Together"; even Alexis Grace's "I Never Loved a Man [the Way that I Loved You]). Neither The X-Factor nor The Voice (which is only watchable because of Blake Shelton) allows any room for this kind of reality show magic. Come on, Idol: you've got this.

Pretty Little Liars is returning, and they've promised to tell us who "A" is before the March 19 finale! [This news does not require an explanation because it is objectively awesome.]

Chuck's series finale. It'll be sad to see Chuck go, but it seems like the right time. The show has been in perpetual cancellation limbo since its 2007 debut, so it's nice to see it go out on its own terms, with a full season to tie up loose ends. With [SPOILER ALERT!] Chuck and Sarah finally getting married at the end of last season, it's the perfect season to give Casey a chance at romance. I predict a saccharin, but not sickening happily ever after for everyone in the gang. Awww, I love Chuck.

FOX's new JJ Abrams show, Alcatraz. DON'T read the description of this show before you watch the trailer. You'll think it's ridiculous. As any JJ Abrams fan knows, though, the man who invented Felicity (that's right: I chose Felicity to illustrate why he's awesome) can make almost anything (last year's Undercovers was...off) awesome, and this show looks like no exception. It falls right into the Abrams sweet spot -- e.g., realist, sci-fi fantasy that doubles as a character drama -- and it's got Sam Neill acting spooky. I can't wait to see how it turns out.

The inevitable early cancellation of ABC's offensive-looking drag comedy Work It. Any show that manages to simultaneously piss off LGBT advocacy groups, "family" media watchdogs, and critics who think it's "duuuuummmmb" doesn't deserve a healthy TV run.

NBC's Awake. Even though its premiere date is still TBA, this trippy Jason Isaacs thriller actually has the makings of a niche hit for NBC. I wrote briefly about the cool trailer here, and after watching it again, I stand by my initial fangirl excitement. Let's see it, NBC!

I hope 2012 turns out to be an awesome TV year!

TNT Renews "Southland"!

In a decision that makes the end of Big Love more bearable, TNT has, like the superhero network it has become, renewed its brilliant cop drama Southland for a fourth season!

Southland seems like the kind of show that would normally have a pretty short, but amazing run, so it's a wonderful surprise that TNT has stuck by it. I really can't laud this show more, and I think there are very few dramas on TV right now as compelling as Southland. Win!

Southland's "Code 4" and TV as Art

I know I wave the flags of certain shows more than others. Dramas like Friday Night Lights, Big Love, and Southland have been rocking my world for at least a couple of years now, and I am unashamed of buying wholly and happily into the dramatic illusions created by these shows. Where one (slightly too cynical) person may see in a show a contrived storyline, some kind of emotional manipulation, and obvious "character types", I like being able to see beauty in a redemptive narrative, the extremes and lulls of representing changing human emotions, and characters that make decisions I believe human beings would actually make.

In short, scripted TV shows are capable of conveying the shades of black, white, and gray found in life, and like with any good piece of narrative art, I get excited about consuming it.

It is with this in mind that I have to once again sing the praises of the best cop show on TV right now (and maybe ever), TNT's Southland. A few weeks ago, an episode called "Code 4" premiered, and, seemingly out of nowhere, shocked and unnerved me in a way that few TV shows ever have. I remember a couple of ER episodes having a similar effect on me, as well as an episode of Millennium called "A Room with No View", LOST's series finale, and The X-Files' infamous "Home" episode. I'm sure there have been others, but I'd rank this episode right up there with some of the best TV I've seen. If you're a fan of the show, you know what I'm talking about, and if you're not, this episode is worth a download or online viewing. Seriously, I dare you to not be affected by the last five minutes.

[CAUTION: SPOILERS!!]
I don't want to write a recap here because I think that would do a disservice to an extremely well-constructed teleplay, but I want to point out a couple of things that struck me. The A-story, that of Nate (Kevin Alejandro) and Sammy (Shawn Hatosy) trying to track down the killer of a man gunned down in front of his kids, was a perfect lead-in to Nate's final scene. In last week's episode ("Cop or Not"), Sammy sentimentalized Nate's ability to see gang members simply as kids who were capable of reasoning with him if they were shown respect. Throughout the episode, we saw Nate living by this creed, but from a story-telling standpoint, the best part was that Nate seeking justice for a seemingly innocent victim and showing respect to the men who had killed him did not seem like a sentimental send-off for the character. On the contrary, it seemed like just another day. The tragedy here was that the character didn't die being heroic or extreme: he died suddenly and unexpectedly (for the characters and the audience) doing what he always did.

The B-story, an unrelated run of the mill procedural, in which Lydia (Regina King) was tracking down the killer of a drug dealer, was also executed with excellent precision and clever story-telling. Interestingly, the writers managed to make a PlayStation an effective dramatic tool first by using it to help construct the characters of a couple of detectives we don't know very well, next by using it to ostensibly create a comically fractured relationship between an uncle and his nephew, and finally as the motive for the uncle's murder. Clever, right?

The story of the episode was Nate's murder and the harrowing way Sammy fought for him, and that's what stuck with me, but I thought it was worth noting that even the B-story was told with intelligence and careful attention to detail. This season of Southland hasn't missed a beat. "Code 4" is an example of TV as art, displaying rhetorical modes of persuasion with remarkable balance. If you haven't been watching this show, you really should.

Southland Returns!

The best cop show on TV returns from its long hiatus tonight. TNT's eleventh hour save of Southland a year ago from the recesses of NBC cancellation oblivion proved to be one of the best TV moves of the year, and in spite of its short second season (only 6 episodes!), the show managed to improve on its excellent first year. I know the idea of "another cop show" turns a lot of people off, but I would argue that this is a procedural that makes you forget it's a procedural. The character drama is first rate, as good as or better than anything on cable right now, and it doesn't try to over-sentimentalize the "gritty reality of the job", if you know what I mean. I also think Regina King is doing the best work of her career on this show.

In short, I know I talk about a lot of silly shows on here, but I would never seriously recommend One Tree Hill or Pretty Little Liars to anyone. I recommend Southland, though.

Movie Stars Transitioning to TV

Entertainment Weekly, my personal entertainment news addiction site, came up with a wish list of movie stars that they'd like to see starring in a TV show next fall/winter/summer (cable does it all!). You have to admit, cable and premium networks having been pulling more than their own weight creatively in the last few years, and the move to TV is looking much less stigmatized than it did in the 90s. HBO seems to hire its own cavalcade of movie stars every season, with actors like Anna Paquin, Steve Buschemi, and Bill Paxton committing to star in multiple seasons on their respective shows.

I've said many times that I think TV is experiencing a bit of a creative golden age right now. There are many quality shows on cable right now that have been given a chance to thrive because they're not competing for one of the twenty-one coveted hours (it's really only eighteen hours because Saturday programming is still a joke) of primetime that any of the Big Four networks have available any given season. I love that the current TV climate allows shows like In Plain Sight to have already guaranteed fourth and fifth seasons after they've only wrapped three seasons. I also love that NBC could cancel a show as heart-stopping and gut-wrenching (in a good way) as Southland, only for TNT to come to its rescue in the eleventh hour. Suddenly being rejected by the Peacock isn't an automatic funeral for a good show. (Where were you when My So-Called Life and Once and Again needed you, cable?)

Since cable networks are now spending more money producing scripted original programming, the shows have shorter seasons, often running somewhere between eight and thirteen episode. While I'm a fan of TV seasons lasting as long as possible so I can enjoy them longer, I'd be silly not to admit that there are some wonderful advantages to shorter seasons. The best, in my opinion, is that because the shows are only in production for six months or so out of the year, the actors have time to pursue other projects for part of the year. They don't have to give up starring in movies or theatre altogether. They can play interesting roles on TV, playing characters that take several seasons to develop, but they can still pursue other things.

To go back to my entry point for this post, I'm nuts about the idea of movie actors starring in TV shows! In a lot of cases, TV is the beneficiary. The medium of TV is developing in fascinating ways right now, and I for one am excited to see the blurring of the lines between film and television.

What do you think? Are you a fan of "filmic TV", or annoyed with it? Are there any film actors you'd like to see become regulars on a TV show? The comments section is your friend!

The Martyrdom of "Lone Star"

So the show I just lauded as the best of the new season, a little gem on FOX called Lone Star is the first of the year to get the premature axe. Sound the sad trombone, kids, because we've just lost a good one. I maintain that this show had the most compelling new characters and the most potential to prove that network TV is not a place where excellent TV shows go to die, but I have once again been proven wrong (on the latter point, that is). A little fatalist perhaps, but this show was too good for network TV, and would have found a much more nurturing home on HBO or even the USA network. Southland is another show that was too quality for network TV, and it was prematurely canceled, only to be saved at the last minute by TNT, a better fit for its gritty, character-driven style than NBC could have ever been. Lone Star really could have been a great show, too. It's a shame to see it go so quickly. I'm going to pout about this one for a little while.