Great debates: 'Sopranos' vs. 'The Wire'

Today, HBO is arguably the most respected and critically acclaimed network on television. But back in January 1999, when The Sopranos debuted, that certainly wasn't the case. Not that HBO didn't feature original programming pre-Sopranos: There was the terrific Dream On, which told the story of the lovably single Martin Tupper, and ran from 1990-96. And The Larry Sanders Show (1992-98) might be the funniest sitcom of all-time. Yet The Sopranos, which was in the simplest definition a small-screen version of Goodfellas, clearly raised the stakes for HBO and cable as a whole. Suddenly, it wasn't just about the big networks anymore.

  The Wire premiered to rabid critical praise almost immediately upon its premiere in June 2002. But viewership never came close to Sopranos numbers. It was grittier, to be sure—focusing on inner-city Baltimore, and with a far more racially diverse cast. And oh, what a cast it was. While The Wire's universe revolved around deeply flawed street cop Jimmy McNulty, the drama could still put him in the background and not miss a beat. The Wire had more solid characters than any show this side of Twin Peaks.

Golden Globe nominees: hits and misses

There's much chatter this week about the Golden Globe nominations and what the Hollywood Foreign Press Association got wrong in its annual list of top movies and TV shows. So, let's pile on, shall we?
  Just dealing with television—because there's not enough time in the day to pick apart that Burlesque nod for best picture, musical or comedy—I have some major bones to pick. On the drama front, the Globes overlooked the real HBO gem, David Simon's Treme, in favor of the vastly overrated Boardwalk Empire. (I wanted desperately to love the Prohibition-era bootlegger tale, but after sticking with the entire short-run series, I found it to be a (highball) glass half empty.) I love that AMC's zombiepocalypse The Walking Dead is in the mix, but my jaw drops that Breaking Bad was left out. Whuck?

Adult Swim ready to parody police dramas

This looks way better than MacGruber, and by that I mean the ill-fated movie, not the chuckle-worthy Saturday Night Live skits. (At least the late-night bits are only a few minutes long.) Adult Swim has ordered 12 episodes of a cop parody called NTSF:SF:SUV that's stuffed with more clichéd dialogue, intentional overacting and melodramatic tropes than you can wave a .44 Magnum at. When the show launches (date still TBA), it'll move the young-guy-targeted programming block further into straight-faced send-ups of TV's well-worn formats. Childrens Hospital, an over-the-top medical satire from comedian Rob Corddry, has already proven to be a hit. If NTSF follows, it'll be because creator Paul Scheer and crew deliver on the promise of the clip above. The show began its life as a mock commercial during Childrens Hospital, says Deadline.com, and leaped right to a series. Since none of the crime procedurals that dot the network schedules seem to realize they're already a parody of themselves, there should be plenty of inspiration for these guys.

Starz greenlights its own 'Mad Men' clone

What has the stylish, smoke-filled world of Mad Men wrought? Holiday parties where Boxcars are served, Joan Harris wannabes sporting skin tight dresses, and men being men (whatever that means). On television, the Emmy-winning AMC series is just beginning to show its influence, with other networks starting to put swingin'-'60s-themed projects into the pipeline. Premium cable channel Starz, dipping deeper into original programming, has given the greenlight to a series called Magic City, based at a Miami Beach hotel at the height of the Rat Pack era. The network has ordered 10 episodes of the drama, described as a peek into a place that was once America's Casablanca, for launch in 2012. This comes on the heels of an ABC pilot order for a Catch Me If You Can-reminiscent show about Pan Am stewardesses in the '60s. This is probably the tip of the iceberg and not necessarily a sign of good things to come. Hits beget clones, but few of them are successful. The outfits and scenery alone might make these shows sample-worthy, though. With a good stiff cocktail, that is.

Showtime getting ready for 'The Borgias'

For anyone who's been jonesing for a bloody bodice ripper since The Tudors finished its four-season run earlier this year, Showtime has a fix for you. At this point, it's only three minutes long, but it'll have to do. The premium cable network has started to tease its upcoming series The Borgias, starring Jeremy Irons as the patriarch of the Renaissance-era power broker family known for its murders (preferred method: poisoning) and incest (brother/sister and maybe some other tragic combinations).
  Filmmaker Neil Jordan is the creator, and Michael Hirst, who wrote the entire Tudors series, is a writer/producer. Since the series was announced, Showtime has promised a dark and twisted tale with historical roots and contemporary parallels. Judging from the extended trailer, there's likely some truth in that claim. Plus, miles and miles of red velvet!
  The tagline, "The original crime family," is a clear play on The Sopranos, but the look and feel of The Borgias has the Showtime period-drama stamp all over it, in a brutally good way. Just don't ask why the characters, who are Italian, all have British accents. You can't have everything. (But please, Showtime, can you give us a premiere date already?)

Old junk's worth plenty on TV these days

The last time I went pawing through piles of junk, it was in my own storage space, and not surprisingly (but really unfortunately), I didn't find a single thing of value in the whole mess. Old glass vases and worn-out sneakers definitely do not count. It's a different story for the folks at Spike's Auction Hunters and A&E's Storage Wars.
  Both shows, which are early entrants into what's becoming a hot reality subgenre of domestic treasure hunting, have hit milestones. Auction Hunters, which has averaged 1.1 million viewers since its early-November launch, just got picked up for a 20-episode second season. That's the largest second-season order Spike's ever made for an original show, which is credited with bringing new viewers to the cable network and bumping up its age demo. (That's the opposite of what most networks want, but it's been part of Spike's mandate to age up beyond its core of 18- to 34-year-old men.) And Storage Wars, from reality maven Thom Beers, scored A&E's best numbers so far this year for an unscripted show. Its premiere last Wednesday drew an average of 2 million viewers during the hour.

'The Walking Dead' recaps: season 1, episode 4, 'Vatos'

Tim Nudd, the co-editor of this blog and the fellow who wrote the previous recap, lives in Maine, where the unofficial food of the masses is the red-and-white-meat lobster roll, slathered in butter, because, well, it's delicious (last time I was there, I downed one in, like, 10 minutes). The Walking Dead's overflowing zombie population, "living" in the Georgia/Floria area, on the other hand, eat red-and-white meat in the form of human flesh, slathered in blood and gore, because, well, they're evil dead people roaming the Earth with a hunger for live people (maybe they'd enjoy Soylent Green?).
  Anyhow, in the fourth chapter of this six-episode mini first season, our hero, Rick Grimes—flanked by trusty sidekick in training (and former pizza deliveryman) Glenn and some other forest survivors, including racist Merle's younger, crossbow-wielding brother Daryl—has ventured back into Zombie City (aka, Atlanta) to rescue the handcuffed-to-the-top-of-the-department-store Merle, who we found had hacksawed off his own hand to free himself from his fetters. So begins the search for the violent racist, as Grimes & Co. follow his blood trail, stopping along the way to see where he cauterized his stump with a hot meat press.

'The Walking Dead' recaps: season 1, episode 3, 'Tell It to the Frogs'

As the esteemed Mr. Levith noted last time, episode 2 brought our hero, Rick Grimes, closer than ever to the walkers. He was literally smeared with the innards of one of them, becoming truly Grimey in his attempts to flee Atlanta with his department-store refugees. The episode ended on an upbeat note, as Grimes and his compatriots managed to finally leave town in a van, while Glenn—who risked his life as a decoy—flies down the highway shouting with glee in his red sports car, its alarm blaring a mad racket of victory.
  But of course, the triumph is short lived. Any decent horror movie or series is full of false hopes and hollow successes. As we learn in episode 3, Grimes decides he's going to go right back to Atlanta—having had second thoughts about leaving Merle Dixon on the roof, and also needing to collect the walkie-talking (left in his gun bag) that he needs in order to warn Morgan and his son against coming into the city. Even Glenn's ebullience quickly evaporates, as the survivors in the hills lambaste him for attracting walkers with the blaring car—a vehicle that is itself quickly stripped for parts. Don't feel too good about anything, the show is telling us—these people may have dodged a few dozen zombies, but millions more are waiting for their free lunch. Not to mention, the humans aren't to be trusted much, either.

'The Walking Dead' recaps: season 1, episode 2, 'Guts'

The name of the episode says it all.
  Rick Grimes, our fearless leader and policeman-turned-vigilante, who's set out in search of his wife and kid amid a zombie-ridden apocalypse, must have the stomach—the guts—to continue his assault on the "walkers" and finding strangers/allies to help him on his (con)quest. (We, the audience, also know that Rick's former partner, Shane, is shtupping Rick's wife. As I said in my first recap, when Rick finds out, guts are gonna fly. At least, the fanboy/comic-book geek inside me hopes so.) Rick still doesn't seem all that sure of himself—in other words, he's not sure if he has the guts to do this all. It was traumatic enough that the poor guy wound up in the hospital following a car chase and shootout—it's got to be completely unnerving to have to run around clubbing and shooting zombies all the livelong day. Think on that for a sec, I say.
  The meaning behind this splendidly titled episode is the actual use of guts. To blend in to zombie city, where Rick found himself stranded at the end of the first episode, he and a new ally, Glenn, have to baste themselves like Thanksgiving turkeys in the blood, gore and guts of a zombie—to get the "human smell," which attracts the zombies, off them. The guts—mostly large and small intestines—are a revolting sight (straight out of the twisted mind of some middle-aged special-effects guy) and swing from Rick and Glenn's necks like sausage links. (It's safe to say I'm not going to be making any major purchases at any of the Polish butchers that line the main thoroughfare in my part of Brooklyn anytime soon.) 

'The Walking Dead' recaps: season 1, episode 1, 'Days Gone By'

As you can imagine, AMC's new series The Walking Dead is right up this TV geek's alley: I have already tackled Lost's final season and am currently rewatching the entire X-Files series. Plus, in this show, there's a dude capping a child zombie in the opening sequence; gratuitous blood and violence; and sexy sexpots in sexy side-plots, which are sure to become full-on sackfests.
  The first episode follows an ordinary, average police officer (Rick Grimes) in small-town America, who gets shot in the line of duty and winds up in the hospital. When he wakes up from his painkiller/drug-induced haze, he finds himself in the midst of a zombie-filled apocalypse.
  Now, I'm not entirely sure what the timeline is between when he wakes up in the hospital and when zombieland went down, but either way, when we see that eaten-up body in the hospital hall, it is both frightening and ridiculous at once (like the whole Shaun of the Dead conundrum—should we laugh or should we be totally grossed out?). I haven't seen gore like that since The Hills Have Eyes (the original, not the shitty remake).