TV loses a visionary showrunner

Despite the respectful, nostalgic nods that are occasionally afforded to television’s long-ago, black-and-white past, there is simply no disputing that we — the binge-watching, Netflix-and-chilling, various-device-viewing generation — are living in TV’s golden age.

Not only is more content being created now than ever before, but the best of what is available to viewers of conventional broadcast TV, cable networks and streaming services is being produced at a level of quality that continually pushes boundaries, raises standards and challenges viewers on an almost-weekly basis to reconsider what qualifies as great.

And it’s worth noting, in this week when television lost one of its most noteworthy and powerful creative forces, just how significant Steven Bochco was in the modern evolution of the medium.

Simply put, Bochco, who died Sunday at age 74 after a lengthy battle with leukemia, helped set the stage for the current wave of scripted-TV excellence, particularly in the drama-series realm. Whatever it is that you consider to be the small screen’s best, from Game of Thrones to Breaking Bad to House of Cards to This Is Us, the roots of its success can be found in Bochco’s primetime productions of the 1980s and ’90s.

When life imitates art, who gets a pass?

So, here’s a serious question about a funny TV show:

In the current social and political environment, in which bullies, abusers and assailants are being held to account and shown their too-long-endured toxic behaviour is unacceptable and will no longer be tolerated, is it still OK to laugh at Veep?

Humour, of course, is a decidedly subjective thing — what’s hilarious to one person can be ho-hum or, perhaps, hurtful to another. But by the most deliberate of measurements — the peer-voted assessment of the television industry itself — the HBO series has been recognized as TV’s funniest show for pretty much the past half-decade.

Veep has taken home the Emmy Award for outstanding comedy series for the past three years, and was nominated in that category three other times before that. Series star Julia Louis-Dreyfus has won the Emmy for outstanding lead actress in a comedy series an unprecedented six consecutive times.

TV documentary explores ‘catfishing’ scandal

It is, without question, one of the most unusual and puzzling cases in recent Manitoba judicial history.

A high-profile pro-basketball star, an ambitious teenage internet-age celebrity and a lonely but startlingly resourceful young woman from an isolated Manitoba community became the key players in an elaborate “catfishing” scheme that nearly ruined a couple of lives and landed its unlikely mastermind behind bars.

CBC Docs POV takes an in-depth look at the case in the new locally produced film Indictment: The Crimes of Shelly Chartier, which has its TV première Sunday at 9 p.m on CBC.

The documentary, written and directed by Lisa Jackson and Shane Belcourt, and co-produced by Winnipeg-based Jeff Peeler of Frantic Films and Chris McIvor of FRANK Digital, delves deep into the tangled history and misguided motivations that led Chartier, a reclusive 28-year-old who lived in her mother’s home on the Chemawawin First Nation in Easterville, to become the author of a complex, deeply mischievous and occasionally nasty scheme involving invented identities and relationships that were stage-managed from afar.

Humour from grief

It has often been said that comedy equals tragedy plus time.

Patton Oswalt applies the bare-minimum mathematics of this equation in his new standup special Patton Oswalt: Annihilation, which arrived on Netflix earlier this week.

By mining a recent personal tragedy that is clearly still very raw, the veteran comedian has created an extended passage of new material with on-the-edge daring and starkly honest brilliance that is something to behold.

The baseline measure of standup-comedy success is, of course, whether people laugh at it. And they most certainly do during this hour-long performance, which was filmed last June at the Athenaeum Theatre in Chicago, but the laughs do not always come easily.

Hall kept his word by constantly giving back

Monty Hall will be remembered by most North Americans as the guy who gave stuff away — sometimes big, exciting, expensive stuff, and sometimes disappointing, worthless, comically silly junk. It all depended on the recipients' willingness to take a chance, risk it all and make a deal, combined with plain old dumb luck.

In his hometown of Winnipeg, however, the co-creator and longtime host of one of television's most enduring game shows — Let's Make a Deal — will also be remembered as a guy who spent his life fulfilling a promise to give back.

Hall, who was 96, died Saturday of heart failure at his home in Beverly Hills. He had lived in southern California for more than half a century, but he held fast to his North End roots. It was in the iconic Winnipeg neighbourhood that Hall — who was born Monte Halparin on Aug. 25, 1921 — was the recipient of a life-changing kindness that would eventually fuel his tireless dedication to philanthropy.

As the oft-told story goes, as a young man Hall had dreams of attending the University of Manitoba to become a doctor, but his family lacked the means to send him there. While working at menial jobs in an effort to raise enough money for tuition, he was noticed by a man who took pity on him and offered to pay for his schooling.

Compelling characters drive this missing-child drama

CTV’s The Disappearance isn’t a horror story, but the premise that drives the six-part drama is as horrifying as they come.

The Canadian-made limited series, which premières Sunday at 8 p.m. on CTV, tells the harrowing story of an already-fractured family dealing with the disappearance — and presumed abduction — of a 10-year-old boy.

As such, it’s one of those TV-watching choices the viewer knows will be difficult from the outset; for the show’s producers, the challenge lies in crafting a story that is sufficiently compelling to keep people watching despite the necessary unease.

The Disappearance, which was shot in and around Montreal last year, does a credible job of locking viewers in by offering up a core group of characters whose various strained interactions and individual inner conflicts are allowed to develop at a steady tension-building pace.

Reaching for Canadian connection at the Emmys

Amid all the acceptance-speech dissection and red-carpet fashion reaction that followed last Sunday’s broadcast of the 69th Emmy Awards, there was another post-show postscript that felt, at once, as forced as the oft-repeated “What are you wearing?” query and as quaint as an old Hinterland Who’s Who video.

I’m referring, of course, to the inevitable north-of-the-border tradition that might best be described as “Let’s find something — anything — that connects Canada to this awards show.” It happens on Emmy night, just as it does after the Oscars, Tonys, Grammys, Golden Globes, People’s Choice Awards, ESPYs, Teen Choice Awards, VMAs, CMAs, and any other showbizzy spectacle that involves famous people handing trophies to other famous people.

After this year’s Emmy’s, Canada’s entertainment “news” programs were quick to fall all over themselves describing how Canada had just had a big Emmy night.

The Handmaid’s Tale, a TV-drama adaptation of Margaret Atwood’s like-titled 1985 novel, took home eight awards, including the Emmys for best drama series, best actress and best writing.

Veep ends as one of television’s great laughs

Reports this week that Veep’s seventh season will be its last will no doubt be hard for serious fans of TV-sitcom silliness to swallow.

The HBO series, winner of the past two best-comedy Emmys (along with five consecutive best-actress/comedy statues for star Julia Louis-Dreyfus), will air its final 10-episode run in 2018 and in so doing will cement its place among television’s best ever in the sitcom realm.

The news of Veep’s exit is sure to inspire a bit of comedy-inclined reminiscence and reflection — it certainly did for me, as I pondered just where to place this premium-cable gem in my personal list of funniest shows in TV history.

I haven’t quite sorted it out, but I did come up with a quick list of my all-time favourite TV comedies, which I’m happy to share in the interest of generating discussion and/or starting arguments.

CRTC introduces guidelines for TV providers

Ever been so mad at your cable- or satellite-TV provider that you caught yourself yelling at the television set?

Most likely, the outburst was driven by pure, pent-up small-screen frustration, coupled with the fact you didn’t know what or who else to shout at. Your family members had, no doubt, heard your complaints before, and it seemed pointless to scream into the canned-music-filled on-hold void that awaited if you decided to voice your displeasure to the provider’s customer-service line.

Well, shout aimlessly no more. Effective this week, the federal broadcast regulator has decreed that your complaints must be heard.

On Friday, the Television Service Provider Code came into effect, affording new levels of protection and a more effective dispute-resolution process to Canadians who are frequently fed up with the way cable and satellite TV is delivered in Canada. The code, established by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) in response to its long-running Let’s Talk TV public-consultation process, lays out several new initiatives aimed at ensuring consumers are given a somewhat fairer shake by purveyors of at-home screen entertainment.

Behind all of Jerry Lewis’s mugging and shouting was one of Hollywood’s key innovators

There’s probably an entire generation whose reaction to the passing of Jerry Lewis was something along the lines of “Oh, the guy from the telethons died.”

And there’s likely at least another generation beyond that one that paid no attention because it had simply never even heard of the guy.

But Lewis, who died Sunday at the age of 91, had a career in show business that is very much worth remembering. Mostly relegated to footnote mentions and French-culture punchlines during the past couple of decades, Jerry Lewis was one of the entertainment industry’s most influential and powerful stars in the 1940s and ‘50s.

After combining their middling nightclub acts in 1946 — one was a comedian doing a threadbare routine in which he mugged and flailed while lip-synching to records, the other a moderately successful crooner — Lewis and Dean Martin combined madcap humour with music became an almost-overnight sensation. Within a couple of years, they were the highest-paid entertainers in the world, even before they expanded their empire by becoming movie and TV stars.

Netflix puts its money where its medium is

Earlier this month, the attention of the TV world was on Los Angeles as U.S. broadcast networks, cable outlets and several digital-content providers spent nearly three weeks showcasing their programming at the semi-annual Television Critics Association (TCA) press tour.

It is, for people who cover the medium, a vast and valuable clearing house of information, a chance for media outlets from all over North America to gather TV-related insights and interviews that will drive their coverage of television programming and trends for the next six months.

The most significant TV-related revelations of the summer, however, did not take place at the TV press tour.

Netflix, which has appeared at the L.A. gathering in the past but did not take part in this summer’s TCA event, opted instead to solidify its status as the small screen’s 900-pound gorilla by issuing a trio of major programming announcements, each of which shook the very foundations of the television business.

The National’s quartet ends an era

It takes a village, they say, to raise a child.

If recent news in Canadian TV is any indication, it now also takes one to read a newscast.

CBC made its much-anticipated announcement about Peter Mansbridge’s replacement this week, and the new anchor of the public broadcaster’s flagship news program will be... Ian Hanomansing, whom most considered to be a leading contender for the job.

Oh, and Adrienne Arsenault, who was also considered to be in the running.

Amazon seeing even more stars

A lot has been written and said in the past few years about how good television is, and how the small screen is the place to go for actors yearning to work on top-notch material.

While Hollywood’s movie studios churn out mindless sequels to superhero movies and CGI-driven next chapters of mutating-toy brand extensions, TV is turning great, substantial scripts into the very best in screen entertainment.

Television is so good these days, in fact, that FX network president John Landgraf recently declared the medium has reached a point of “peak TV,” meaning there’s now so much great content spread across the various platforms bundled under the label of “television” that it’s impossible for viewers to watch all of it. What Landgraf is saying, in other words, is that there’s too much good TV for TV’s own good.

All of that makes a pretty good case for this being what some observers have taken to calling TV’s “platinum age,” but if you’re looking for definitive proof that television is THE venue for quality entertainment, consider this newsflash from earlier this week: Julia Roberts is doing a TV series.

Scared silly

It’s a long stretch from youthful fish-slap-dancing comedy to gut-wrenching geriatric horror, but Michael Palin has made the journey without so much as a stumble.

The founding member of perhaps the most important comedy troupe ever, Monty Python, has travelled many roads and routes in the years since the Brit-based sixsome (Palin, John Cleese, Eric Idle, Graham Chapman, Terry Jones and Terry Gilliam) turned TV comedy on its ear in the early 1970s and then redefined big-screen silliness in the late ’70s and early ’80s.

In addition to writing and acting in a variety of TV and movie projects (Ripping Yarns, A Private Function, Brazil, A Fish Called Wanda, You’ve Got Mail) and participating in a variety of Python-related reunions and collaborations, Palin has authored nearly two dozen books in several different genres (fiction, travel, children’s, memoirs) and produced and narrated eight TV series that documented his travels around the world, from pole to pole, along Hemingway’s trail and through numerous out-of-the-way destinations.

Despite all that diversity and longevity, however, 74-year-old Palin finds himself in a place he hasn’t visited before, and in a role few of his fans would have expected him to attempt — playing a lonely and perhaps slightly dangerous octogenarian in the Brit-import thriller Remember Me, which premières Sunday at 10 p.m. on PBS.

Tour de snooze fest

Anytime an actor is asked why he or she took a particular TV or movie role, the answer is always some variant of “I fell in love with the material” or “When I started reading the script, I couldn’t put it down.”

Which is to suggest, of course, that quality matters.

But as the HBO mock sports documentary Tour de Pharmacy proves, sometimes the quality that matters is nothing more than the opportunity to make some quick cash while having mindless, stupid fun.

And in this case, the fun available to a sizable roster of stars in featured or cameo roles is as dopey — in every sense of the word — as it gets.

CTV documentary takes a snapshot of a Canadian moment in time

If there were one word to describe the sesquicentennial-celebratory CTV documentary Canada in a Day, it would definitely have to be...

Aw, shucks. No doubt about it:

Canadian.

This two-hour TV event, which airs Sunday at 7 p.m. on CTV (and, for that matter, CTV Two and also streams online at CTV GO), adopts a widely used and infallibly effective format — compiling video clips submitted by the public to create a snapshot-in-time portrait of a place or situation, employed to great effect by feature-film director Ridley Scott on the acclaimed film Life in a Day — to create a coast-to-coast-to-coast portrait of Canada that is at once broadly expansive and intimately personal.

Baptism by fire: Megyn Kelly's new show debuts Sunday with Putin as guest

If the desire was to put all the chips on the table for an all-or-nothing bet on the very first spin of the wheel, Megyn Kelly seems to have succeeded.

The former Fox News host has her major-network primetime debut this weekend, with the 6 p.m. première of Sunday Night with Megyn Kelly, opposite CBS’s venerable 60 Minutes newsmagazine. And by featuring a one-on-one interview with Russian President Vladimir Putin on her first show, Kelly has pretty much turned her heavily hyped arrival on U.S. broadcast television into an all-in proposition.

Deliver a substantive, revealing conversation with the controversial Russian leader, and Sunday Night’s reputation could be set. Make a mess of the encounter, however, and it’s likely that many viewers will grab the remote, change the channel and never return. In terms of quality-brand reinforcement, a failure by Kelly could turn out to be one of the best things that ever happened to 60 Minutes.

NBC’s news division is banking heavily on Kelly’s potential as a major ratings draw. She comes to the network with considerable name recognition and a reputation for controversy, thanks in large part to her public feud with then-U.S. presidential candidate Donald Trump during the final months of her 12-year tenure at Fox News.

For a TV revival, how soon is too soon?

News that ABC is hard at work on a revival of American Idol brings a simple but significant question to mind:

Who in the world actually needs a revival of American Idol?

Except, perhaps, for the folks in the accounting department at ABC. And let’s face it — if they’re counting on a rebooted Idol being anything like the cash-spewing ratings juggernaut it was during its heyday over on Fox, they’re in for a disappointment of Muppets-revival-sized proportions.

Television is a business in which new ideas are a rarity. Mostly out of fear for their jobs, TV programming executives tend to favour the familiar, the derivative and the successfully-done-before when they assess the many “new” show pitches that come their way before each prime-time season. So when someone approaches one of them with the idea of bringing back a show that was successful in an earlier incarnation, it goes without saying that the pitch gets top-of-the-pile consideration.

Satirists riding high with Trump, but can they rely on his longevity?

Whether the first 100 days of the Donald Trump presidency have been good for Americans, or for politics, or for the world in general is the subject of heated and completely polarized debate.

Some believe Trump is absolutely phenomenal at doing a tremendous job of making America great again. Others — and these folks, presumably, would account for Trump’s historically low approval ratings after 100 days in office — would be more inclined to adopt such Trump-favoured descriptives as “complete disaster,” “the worst deal ever,” or simply his Twitter-outburst standby, “SAD.”

There are few folks who occupy the middle ground when it comes to America’s made-by-TV POTUS. But whether you love Trump or hate him, there’s no disputing this: the 45th president of the United States has been very, very good for television comedy.

Thanks to his long history as a self-caricaturing reality-TV star, his complete lack of a filter when it comes to written or spoken comments, his bizarre and forever monologue-friendly hairstyle and his easily mimicked physical appearance and demeanour, Trump has been pure gold for comedy writers since the moment he declared his intention to begin the unlikeliest of runs at the Republican presidential nomination.

CBS’s Good Fight gambit works out for Canadian fans

In addition to being a very good spinoff of an excellent primetime TV drama, The Good Fight has also turned out to be a pretty great deal for Canadian viewers.

The riveting and occasionally ribald spinoff of CBS’s acclaimed drama The Good Wife, which airs its first-season finale this Sunday at midnight on W network, is available to viewers on this side of the Canada-U.S. border as a weekly series on a readily accessible specialty-cable channel. Stateside, the series première of The Good Fight aired on conventional TV on CBS, but subsequent episodes have only been available to U.S. viewers who subscribe (for US$5.99 per month) to the network’s CBS All Access on-demand service.

It’s an interesting strategic choice for CBS — on one hand, it’s surely important to have a top-notch scripted property as an anchor tenant as it seeks to draw traffic to its relatively new Netflix-style streaming service; on the other hand, using a high-quality show such as The Good Fight as a lure to get viewers to sample CBS All Access pretty much guarantees that only a miniscule audience will ever see it.

The Good Fight maintains the smartly scripted style that made The Good Wife both a ratings winner and an awards-season contender throughout its seven-season run. But because it exists (in the U.S.) only as a digital-platform property, the new spinoff isn’t bound by the language and content restrictions that make broadcast-network dramas so much tamer than their made-for-cable cousins.

Veep's impossible new mission: create a comedy zanier than America's kooky political system

Satire, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, is defined as “The use of humour, irony, exaggeration, or ridicule to expose and criticize people’s stupidity or vices, particularly in the context of contemporary politics and other topical issues.”

Which, of course, begs a question: how does one create political satire in an era in which real-life politics has become so exaggerated, ironic, ridiculous, stupid and vicious that scripted topical humour seems superfluous?

That’s the challenge facing HBO’s Veep as it enters its sixth season with a set of new episodes that was in the process of being created when the American political process took a sharp right turn into The Twilight Zone. With the election of Donald Trump as the United States’ 45th president, art, life, reality television and sketch and situation comedy collided in a way that left all the familiar rules of made-for-TV humour in a tangled, confused mess.

Throughout its first five Emmy-winning seasons, the genius of Veep’s comedy resided mostly in its outrageousness — as a premium-cable commodity, it was not bound by the content restrictions that constrain traditional broadcast-network sitcoms, meaning Veep could be as daring and irreverent and profane as it pleased.

The Peacock producer who came from the ‘Peg

These days, most folks who hear the phrase This Is Us think of television’s hottest new major-network prime-time drama.

But the guy responsible for the marketing and promotional campaign that launched NBC’s most successful new series in years has another thought when he hears “This is us.”

For Dean McFlicker, the “Us” also means “us Winnipeggers.”

Despite having lived most of his life in the United States, McFlicker — who was recently elevated to the position of senior vice-president and creative director of live events and promotional programming at NBC Entertainment — maintains a firm and enthusiastic grip on his Manitoba roots.

New telling of Anne starts with dynamic lead

There’s a moment, very early on, when it seems that the producers of the latest TV adaptation of Anne of Green Gables might have stretched too far in their effort to create an updated Anne that distances itself from all the versions that precede it.

The series opens with a sweeping aerial shot that zooms in on a rider on horseback, engaged in a mad dash through the ebb-tide surf along a windswept coastline. There’s a sense of great urgency to the moment, and then, suddenly, at the one-minute mark, the opening notes of the Tragically Hip’s Ahead By a Century impose themselves over the moving picture.

It’s a wonderful song with haunting lyrics that hold particular resonance for Canadians these days, but its presence here is discombobulating, the decidedly anachronistic placement of a 20th-century song in a period-piece 19th-century tale. It leaves the viewer wondering if what follows will be an overreaching attempt to somehow modernize Lucy Maud Montgomery’s beloved tale — which, few would argue, is both unnecessary and ill-considered.

The musical moment passes, however, and what follows is a newly adapted-for-TV retelling of the Green Gables saga that is unique, respectful, insightful, challenging and contemporary, but still somehow traditional, and very, very wonderful.

Rink experience at home

‘You had to be there.”

It’s a phrase you no doubt have heard from friends and fellow fans throughout your lifetime, in reference to a special night or a special moment that occurred at a big game, a concert or some other public event that you didn’t attend but, in hindsight, really wish you had.

Hockey fans will get a handful of chances this year to experience you-are-there game action without leaving the comfort of their own sofas, as Rogers Media and Sportsnet become the latest broadcast entities to tinker with the addition of virtual reality to their NHL coverage.

Sportsnet, in co-operation with event sponsor Molson, are launching an immersive NHL experience called 360 Virtual Reality, which will allow viewers who equip themselves with some fairly simple technology to share in a VR experience during broadcasts of six upcoming NHL games.

For the stars of CTV's Cardinal, the elements play a key role

Winter has its own personality.

As any self-respecting Winnipegger can tell you, the temperatures of cold-weather months don’t just dictate how we dress. They insinuate themselves into our very being, affecting the way we think, the way we talk and even the ways in which we react to others’ behaviour.

Which is why the stars of the new CTV series Cardinal believe the season and setting in which the murder-mystery takes place are as important as any of the characters in the drama.

“For me, it’s like wearing the clothing of the character. It’s the same thing, in a way,” says actor Billy Campbell, who stars as Det. John Cardinal in the new series, which was shot in and around Sudbury, Ont. “I think being outside, in the Canadian Shield, was physically immersive and psychologically immersive, as well. I guess we could have done it in front of a green screen in a soundstage somewhere, but we wouldn’t have felt any connection (to the story).”

24 reboot is stupidly enjoyable

Hear that familiar beep-beep-beeping of a digital clock?

That’s the sound of pure, unadulterated nonsense.

It’s fast-paced, pulse-pounding, edge-of-the-seat-entertaining nonsense, but it’s nonsense, all the same.

Fox has revived one of its most successful dramas ever in the form of 24: Legacy, and whatever else is said about this preposterous but immediately addictive new spin on a reliable old format, it must be stated right up front that this reboot is entirely and faithfully true to the 24 blueprint, style and attitude.

Amazon Prime's new takes on old ideas hold up surprisingly well

There’s been a shift in the streaming-content current since our last edition of Life Is But a Stream — Shomi is gone, but a new provider of original programming, Amazon Prime, has entered the Canadian market.

Amazon, of course, is mostly known as an online shopping destination, but the recent worldwide expansion of its Amazon Prime service ($79 per year — after 30-day free trial — for free two-day shipping of online purchases) has also made its roster of original shows available to a global audience.

A few of Amazon Prime’s top titles, including Transparent and Mozart in the Jungle, were previously available on Shomi, but others in the shopping service’s stable are making their Canadian streaming-service debut.

With that in mind, here’s our latest binge-worthy bundle of fun:

Not the Archie of your childhood

Here’s the first thing you need to know, particularly if you’re part of the over-40 crowd:

Riverdale is not a live-action version of the Archie comics you read when you were a kid. In fact, other than a few familiar names and trademark physical-appearance elements it employs, this ambitious new CW Network drama has almost nothing to do with the wacky antics of the oddly timeless teen gang featured in the pages of comic books and pocket-sized Double Digests for three-quarters of a century.

Riverdale, which premières Thursday, Jan. 26, at 8 p.m. on the CW, is anything but wacky. It’s dark, sexy, slightly dangerous and current in its awareness of pop-culture attitudes and events, and given its core storyline element — a grisly, unsolved murder — it’s safe to say that the endless but eternally innocent Archie/Betty/Veronica love triangle that drove the comics’ narrative will never be more than a secondary storyline as Riverdale continues to unfold.

Based on the mood established in its first couple of episodes, it’s fair to imagine that this version of small-town Riverdale lies somewhere on the twisted road that runs between Dawson’s Creek and Twin Peaks. It’s a place filled with poorly kept secrets and deeply conflicted characters, and the prevailing sentiment among its inhabitants seems to be dread.

Two made-in-Canada television dramas debut Wednesday

It’s an unusual day on the Canadian TV landscape.

This country’s private broadcasters populate their primetime lineups mostly with imported U.S.-network titles, so it’s always a noteworthy event when a new homegrown series is added to the schedule.

Tonight, however, brings the premières of two new domestic productions in the same night — Global’s sure-to-be-controversial medical thriller Mary Kills People and CTV’s distinctly Canadian cop drama Cardinal.

The “Mary” in the title of Global’s new offering (which debuts tonight at 8 p.m.) is Dr. Mary Harris, portrayed by Canadian actor Caroline Dhavernas. She’s a talented emergency-room physician and an overworked single mom, who also finds time in her jam-packed schedule to moonlight as an “angel of death” who helps people with terminal illnesses end their lives on their own terms.

Funny time to be Canadian

These are heady days for the Canadian television industry.

And, perhaps more significantly, these are funny days for the homegrown-TV biz.

The 2016-17 prime-time campaign finds Canada’s TV networks riding an unprecedented wave of success in the situation-comedy realm, a genre that has been a staple of the medium since its invention but had, in this country, somehow remained a mostly unsolvable puzzle for the better part of half a century.

Up until the past couple of TV seasons, one could tally up the total of truly remarkable Canadian sitcoms on the fingers required to flip someone the bird and then make the fist that might be required to defend the action.

Intrigue surrounding young leaders propels new shows

Too young. Too inexperienced. Too innocent.

And, because of all that… easy to manipulate?

That’s the mistaken set of assumptions that drives both of this weekend’s high-profile TV-series premières, and in each case, the unfortunate souls looking to exploit innocence and inexperience for their own power-hungry gains soon find — in these very watchable dramas, at least — youth must be served.

Fisher-Reynolds doc pulls at the heartstrings

Had events not unfolded as they did late last month, Bright Lights would likely have been celebrated, and then perhaps quickly dismissed, as a captivating documentary about a couple of grand old Hollywood dames.

But the fact its subjects, Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher — mother and daughter, best friends and iconic figures in two different generations of show-business royalty — died within a day of each other last week adds a hard-to-quantify level of poignancy and emotional punch to this HBO documentary presentation.

The film was originally scheduled to air in March, but HBO understandably adjusted its schedule in response to the sudden and decidedly sad timeliness Bright Lights had assumed. The documentary, co-directed by Alexis Bloom and Fisher Stevens, airs today on HBO Canada at 9 p.m. CT, and if you have any interest at all in popular culture and/or showbiz history, you really should watch.

Bright Lights spends a lot of time with Reynolds and Fisher at home, in the side-by-side Beverly Hills houses dubbed “The Compound” by their family. Fisher cooks a soufflé, then carries it over to Reynolds’ place and the two sit together on stools and eat it in the company of their beloved dogs. Their banter is both adorable and revealing; despite a lifetime of differences and frequent disputes, they have arrived at a place in their lives where the predominant emotion is shared adoration.

Earth fails to shake over pick and pay

The era of pick-and-pay TV is officially upon us, and...

Meh. Whatever.

The second phase of the federal broadcast regulator’s effort to make cable-TV service more affordable and attractive to Canadians came fully into force on Thursday, and to say it’s a shift that will cause absolutely no ground to shake is something of an understatement.

As a result of its extensive Let’s Talk TV hearings, the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission launched an ambitious effort to require this country’s TV service providers to give their customers more choice when it comes to how they access TV channels and how much they pay to do so.

Small-screen advent calendar keeps on giving

Well... that’s a relief.

Up until a few days ago, there was reason to believe the phrase “It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas” might not apply to this festive season. But finally — and, one must concede, inevitably — the white stuff has arrived in Winnipeg, giving our northern Prairie town an appropriately and satisfyingly snow-blanketed look.

The festive-season feeling has also returned to our indoor lives, from the arrival of the mystery-arm-stoked Holiday Fireplace in the cable-TV lineup to the appearance of a seemingly endless list of season titles in the December television listings. Which means, of course, it’s time for our annual clip-and-save-and-magnetize-to-the-fridge Christmas TV calendar, which offers a day-by-day look at some of the festive small-screen fun that awaits viewers between now and Santa’s big night.

Given the staggering volume of holiday programming these days (hello, W and Lifetime movie lineups), it’s impossible to list every title. So think of this as a best-of guide that will, hopefully, show you where to find your favourites and perhaps introduce you to a few new titles for your seasonal much-watch list. As always, please check the latest listings to confirm airtimes.

Prime time's alive with the sound of musicals

With the early-December arrival of Hairspray Live! to NBC, it’s pretty safe to say musicals, particularly of the live variety, on prime-time network television have officially become “a thing.”

Hairspray Live!, which airs Dec. 7 at 7 p.m. on NBC and City, marks the Peacock Network’s fourth foray into the live-musical format in recent years, with previous airings of The Sound of Music, Peter Pan and The Wiz having turned in favourable ratings over the last couple of years. Fox has also jumped aggressively into the musical arena, first with Grease and more recently with The Rocky Horror Picture Show (which was not a live presentation).

ABC has also signalled its intention to join the fray, scheduling an as-yet-unidentified live event a network executive said will be in keeping with the network’s Disney ownership.

So why has the musical — a genre mostly associated with live theatres, decades-past movies and a decidedly older-skewing audience demographic — suddenly become a go-to form of event programming for major TV networks?

Lessons from Trump’s TV career

It’s a long way from Mr. The Apprentice to Mr. President...

Or is it?

Barring any unforeseen judicial/constitutional challenges, recounts or audits, imaginative pre-emptive impeachment proceedings or other as-yet-undefined interruptions, Donald Trump will take the oath of office to become the United States’ 45th president in January. It’s an achievement few would have thought possible, or even imagined as the most flimsily whimsical of notions, back in January 2004 when Trump arrived in NBC’s prime-time lineup as the central figure in a mid-season reality/competition show that would become one of the American network’s biggest hits.

(In fairness, it should be stated here that the writers of another prime-time show, The Simpsons, jokingly predicted a Trump presidency back in a 2000 episode titled Bart to the Future — but it’s also worth noting that this mischievous moment of cartoon prescience cited Trump as the commander in chief who bankrupted the country before gifted Simpson offspring Lisa took over as the U.S.’s “first straight female president,” so one hopes the prediction doesn’t turn out to be too accurate).

Tim Gray is doing comedy old-school

In the age of online content distribution, multi-platform digital delivery and limitless lists of YouTube videos, it seems like a quaint notion:

An “album recording.”

But for Winnipeg comedian Tim Gray, creating such an old-school rendering of his standup set list feels like the right thing to do.

“Part of the charm of a comedy album is that it’s an audio experience,” says Gray, an eight-year veteran of the city’s standup scene and also a member of the hugely popular H.U.N.K.S. sketch troupe. “I’m not hiring a bunch of camera crews, and I’m not going to put something up on YouTube; I want something that’s strictly an audio experience.

The Girls are back in town

‘Where you lead, I will follow, any-anywhere that you tell me to…’

That’s the siren-song sentiment of the original Gilmore Girls theme song, and it’s clearly what Netflix is hoping the show’s fan base will be feeling as the streaming service revives the quirky-but-beloved WB/CW-network series for a four-pack of movie-length episodes that will bring the story of mother/daughter BFFs Lorelai and Rory Gilmore to the conclusion the show’s creator always intended.

Which, of course, prompts a simple question: is it worth the trip? By relaunching the franchise with a binge-ready assembly of four 90-minute instalments, Gilmore Girls: A Year in the Life is asking a lot from its fans, in terms of both time and emotional investment. And while it’s fair to say devotees will be pleased by much of what of what series creator Amy Sherman-Palladino is offering in terms of final farewell-to-Stars-Hollow closure, it’s equally appropriate to suggest there are several passages in this extended Gilmore goodbye that amount to an overindulgent, sideways-meandering mess.

Canadian cop drama goes out with a bang

MONTREAL — It’s 10-24 for 19-2.

In the radio shorthand commonly employed by police departments, 10-24 stands for assignment complete, and for the cast and crew of the Canadian-made cop drama 19-2, all that was left this month was to shoot the final scenes of the show’s fourth and final season, do one last round of press interviews and wait for the series’ closing set of eight episodes to air next year.

And for a fortunate few in the group, wrapping up production also included jetting to New York this weekend to see whether 19-2 can add one last major award to its list of accomplishments.

Organ donation doc strikes powerful chord

It’s a decision no one ever wants to be forced to make.

But the wrenching experience of losing a loved one can deliver hope — and a second chance at life — to someone else.

And if the subject of organ and tissue donation is something you haven’t considered and, perhaps, would rather not think about, the new documentary Vital Bonds is something you should see.

The film, directed by Niobe Thompson (The Perfect Runner, Tipping Point: Age of the Oil Sands), has its TV première tonight at 8 p.m. on CBC’s The Nature of Things.

NatGeo launches Mars miniseries

It’s a bit of a stretch to suggest it goes where no TV show has gone before, but there’s no question that National Geographic Channel’s six-part event series Mars goes boldly toward wherever it’s heading.

The ambitious and heavily promoted project — which premières Monday at 8 p.m. on NatGeo — puts a new twist on the oft-employed genre description “docu-drama” by employing both of the storytelling techniques suggested by the term, but keeping them separate, rather than blurring the lines between the two.

Most often, docu-dramas layer fictional storylines over historical facts to build mostly made-up stories that are — at least in their creators’ minds — more compelling than a retelling of straight history could ever be.

Mars, on the other hand, keeps the “docu-” and the “drama” apart, flipping back and forth between narrative platforms to create a fast-paced and occasionally thrilling hybrid that seeks to educate without ever scrimping on the entertainment value.

Frontier drama tries hard but feels tame

There’s this thing about wild-frontier dramas in the age of specialty-cable TV and streaming-service content:

To be noticed and embraced by ever-more-discerning viewers, they have to be really, really wild.

Canadian TV’s Discovery channel gives it a pretty good try with its first foray into homegrown original-scripted programming, but the ambitious fur-trade-era drama Frontier falls slightly short of the standard set by the genre’s best in recent years.

Frontier, which premières Sunday at 8 p.m. on Discovery, is a sweeping historical drama set against the wilderness struggles and greed-fuelled political double-dealing of the 1700s fur trade. The series sets a very high bar for itself, employing a massive cast and filming in multiple locations — both urban and rural — while seeking to spin an intricate web of interconnected stories.

Netflix series may fill Downton Abbey-shaped hole in viewers' hearts

There’s plenty of pomp, no small amount of circumstance and, on top of all that, a very watchable and consistently entertaining regal tale in The Crown.

Viewers in search of a properly compelling across-the-pond class drama after the departure of Downton Abbey will be redirecting their TV tuners to Netflix this week, where the new 10-part series The Crown offers the opportunity for a rousing bit of British-accented binge watching.

The Crown, which arrives to Netflix on Friday is a scripted drama that chronicles Queen Elizabeth II’s ascension to the throne and early reign. Arriving as it does on the heels of this year’s celebration of the monarch’s 90th birthday, the series serves as a fitting tribute to the determination and devotion to duty that have defined the Queen’s (almost) 65 years as ruler.

Claire Foy (PBS’s Wolf Hall) delivers a riveting performance in the series’ central role, portraying Elizabeth as a young woman who would much rather have lived a life of relative anonymity as a second-level “ordinary English countrywoman” but found herself thrust into the regal succession line after her uncle, Edward VIII, abdicated to marry the divorced American socialite Wallis Simpson and left the throne to her father, who became King George VI.

Canadian comedy gets another boost from Citytv's sharp sitcom

Every now and then, the arrival of a new TV series prompts a very specific reaction:

“Well, this makes sense.”

Second Jen, the new Canadian-made comedy that debuts tonight at 7:30 p.m. on City, is one of those shows.

Sharp, funny, slightly cheeky and smartly in tune with this country’s diverse demographic mix, Second Jen has been touted in some quarters as groundbreaking because it features two young Asian-Canadians in its lead roles.

Singer Gord Downie's final project gives voice to a Canadian tragedy

There’s a lot to be said for making a dignified exit.

And there’s much more to be said — and admired, and applauded — about a farewell filled with passion and purpose and poetic beauty and a desire to make a difference.

Gord Downie accomplishes all of that, and more, with the CBC special The Secret Path, which airs Sunday at 9 p.m., and is the companion piece to a like-titled graphic novel and album release.

The animated special, which will air commercial-free, tells the story of 12-year-old Chanie Wenjack, who died half a century ago while trying to walk home to Ogoki Post in northwestern Ontario after fleeing the Cecilia Jeffrey Indian Residential School in Kenora.

CBC drama mixes crime, politics and media culture

The new CBC drama Shoot the Messenger is about crime, politics and media culture. And Ari Cohen thinks it’s a crime that TV-industry politics are destined to make far fewer shows like this part of Canada’s pop-culture landscape.

The Winnipeg-born actor, one of two local products in Shoot the Messenger’s ensemble cast, says a recent decision by the federal broadcast regulator to diminish the amount of Canadian talent required to classify a series as Canadian content will damage the domestic television industry at a time when TV production elsewhere is at an unprecedented creative peak.

“I think the decision by the (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) is nothing short of catastrophic and absolutely mind-boggling,” Cohen says of the decision to change the Canadian-talent criteria required for producers to be able to access funding from independent production funds.

“As a body, (the CRTC’s) sole purpose is supposed to be the promotion of Canadian creators, so to come out with a ruling that severely diminishes that is absolutely mystifying.

New technology allows scientists to glean answers about life in ancient Pompeii

There are ghost towns, and there are ghost towns.

And then there’s Pompeii.

CBC’s The Nature of Things opens its 56th season with a visit to the ancient Roman city, which was destroyed in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in AD 79 that buried Pompeii under a mountain of volcanic ash.

It’s a journey that has been a long time coming for series host David Suzuki, who first visited Pompeii 43 years ago on his honeymoon and has been fascinated by its story ever since. But this trip turns out to be much more than a tourist-oriented walking tour through the excavated ruins; instead, what Suzuki and TNOT present is a detailed and fascinating examination of how emerging technology is being used to bring Pompeii’s history back to life.

Modest man here to work, not bask in media glow

The thing I remember most about interviewing Jimmy Carter in July 1993 is it was a conversation he would rather not have been having.

It isn’t that the former U.S. president was impatient or abrupt; rather, Carter was gracious and polite, and open and friendly and kind throughout the brief lunch-break chat we had on the site of the first Habitat for Humanity Jimmy Carter Work Project to take place in this city. But it was clear he viewed such interviews as a necessary distraction from the work he was really here to do.

As part of the Free Press’s coverage of the ’93 Jimmy Carter Work Project, I was assigned to one of the home-construction crews for the week and filed daily reports about the Habitat build. The former president and I met for our interview during the Wednesday lunch break.

“If I had my first preference, I would get into a house and do nothing but work side by side with my wife and a few other volunteers from Monday morning right through to Friday night,” he said as we spoke, for about 15 minutes, in the shade of a modest elm tree behind one of the houses on the Habitat building site.

Documentary series follows trials and tribulations of Kamloops secondary school students and staff

O.M.G.

School. Is. Hard.

In the age of smartphones, social media and cyberbullying, the educational experience of Canadian teens is more complicated and challenging than ever before.

And those intricate difficulties are fully on display in the new CBC docu-series This is High School, which premières Sunday at 8 p.m.

One-man show a journey through the life and mind of Bruce McCulloch

For many who sampled it during its Canadian-TV run (first on Citytv, and then CBC), Young Drunk Punk is a TV sitcom. To its creator and star, however, Young Drunk Punk is a state of mind.

“Young Drunk Punk is a concept that, for me, embodies all my weird points of view,” says Bruce McCulloch, the writer, producer and actor responsible for launching YDP across various entertainment-media platforms. “The TV show is about a very specific slice of my life in 1980; the stage show is a partly about my formative years — growing up disenfranchised and wanting to beat up my dad in Alberta — and partly about this guy in this weird house in Hollywood who’s trying to raise children. There’s a lot that I do onstage that is very different from the TV series.”

McCulloch — who, of course, is best known to Canadians as a founding member of sketch comedy group the Kids in the Hall — is bringing the live-on-stage version of Young Drunk Punk to Winnipeg for a single performance on Monday, Oct. 3 at the Park Theatre (tickets are $25 at ticketfly.com).

Accompanied by musician and lifelong friend Brian Connelly, McCulloch will present a 90-minute show that combines standup, storytelling and songs to create a portrait of a unique drunk-punk-to-pyjama-clad-dad journey through life.

HBO's intricate western/fantasy likely TV's next big thing

In this age of “peak television,” in which the number of hours of exceptional programming far exceeds the number of hours available to view them, there’s a question often asked about the premium cable network responsible for much of the best of the best:

What will the next great HBO series be?

The latest answer might be found Sundays, with the première of the ambitious and immediately addictive western/fantasy drama Westworld (Oct. 2, HBO Canada; check listings for time). Beautifully crafted, intricately plotted and flawlessly performed, this reimagining of the like-titled 1973 Michael Crichton feature film is sure to grab and hold viewers in search of a new and challenging show in which they can become immersed.

The “world” suggested in the title is an elaborate (and, according to descriptions within the first episode, extremely expensive) virtual-reality experience that allows paying “guests” to visit an authentic Old West environment in which a huge cast of artificially intelligent and fully lifelike “hosts” play out a complex narrative that can be twisted, through plot-direction choices and occasional subtle improvisation, into almost any direction and outcome the customer chooses.

Shomi failed content contest

What Shomi’s demise comes down to, simply, is not being able to deliver on the implied promise in a cutely crafted corporate identifier.

The content-streaming service jointly owned by media giants Rogers and Shaw is being shut at the end of November. A brief statement released Monday by Shomi’s top executive thanked those Canadians who embraced the service during its brief run, but cited a “fast-changing business climate and online-video marketplace” for making the streaming-service effort “more challenging to operate than we expected.”

In a follow-up release, David Asch, Shomi’s vice-president and general manager, said the service had attracted nearly 900,000 subscribers, adding the figure “would likely make Shomi a Top 10 service in North America.” What it clearly didn’t make Shomi, however, is a business that is considered financially viable by its owners.

Which brings us back to the unfortunate irony of the service’s name: Shomi. As in “Show me the content,” or “Show me the programs I want to watch, when I want to watch them,” or “Show me that your option is an equal or better investment of my streaming-service dollars than Netflix, or than Canada’s other cable-giant-owned alternative, CraveTV.”

Seven actors lead a new wave of characters appearing on your TV this fall

Ever been at a big, fancy party where you hardly know a soul, and it’s so crowded and chaotic that it’s almost impossible to meet and get to know anyone?

Well, the fall TV schedule is a lot like that, crammed as it is with new shows, returning titles, familiar faces and never-seen-before stars. Introductions are required if we’re going to have any chance whatsoever of remembering who’s whom, and in what. With that in mind, here’s a look at some of the new faces that will be in the spotlight as the new primetime season unfolds:

brad.oswald@freepress.mb.caTwitter: @BradOswald

Remake of horror classic possesses spirit of the original

Doing a TV remake of a successful feature film is always a dicey proposition. But doing a small-screen version of a movie that stands as the best ever in its genre? Well, some might think that’s just crazy.

Which is why there’s no small amount of skepticism attached to the arrival of Fox’s TV series version of The Exorcist, a project “inspired by” the 1973 William Friedkin-directed film that is regarded by many as the greatest horror movie ever made.

Why, the skeptics and purists and, let’s face it, older audience members will ask, would you even bother? The only thing a TV spinoff of The Exorcist can possibly do is disappoint.

But here’s the thing: it has been more than four decades since Friedkin’s adaptation of William Peter Blatty’s spooky novel was released, which means there are several generations of potential viewers who might never have seen — or, perhaps, even heard of — the film version of The Exorcist. And for them, the only meaningful measuring stick for this new TV series will be whether it’s genuinely and joltingly scary.

Predictions could be a house of cards

Let me just start by saying this: there’s really only one way this thing can go from here.

In years past, the annual flail-a-thon known as Oswald’s Fearless Emmy Predictions has been a festival of failed feelings, a bad-bet bonanza, a parade of poor prime-time prognostications and an educated exercise in extended entertainment errata, all bundled into one.

But then, last year... wham! Nailed it.

Instead of the usual array of figurative swings, followed by an almost equal number of metaphorical misses, the 2015 Emmy-picks page produced a staggering four-for-six success rate (in baseball terms, a first-ballot Hall of Fame batting average), and the only two incorrect predictions were footnoted by the winners being mentioned as “should win” even though they didn’t get the “will win” nod.

Friday’s lineup a tale of two remakes

There isn’t a lot of “new” in Friday’s fall lineup, but what there is represents a tale of two remakes — one a revival of a TV series from the past whose out-there action-adventure antics inspired pop-culture jokes, a running SNL gag and even a big-screen parody, and the other is a small-screen reinterpretation of the 1970s movie that basically set the template for modern horror cinema. You might be a bit freaked out by which turns out to be a better idea. 

MacGyverCBS/Global — Sept. 23, 7 p.m.

Starring: Lucas Till, George Eads, Sandrine Holt, Justin Hires and Tristin Mays

Premise: A reboot of the popular 1980s-’90s action drama about a secret agent with a knack for improvisational gadget-based problem-solving.

Thursday's TV lineup has more potential hits than strikes

In the TV biz, it’s all about the pitch meeting — the crucial few minutes in which show creators try to convince a roomful of network/studio executives theirs is a show worth making. The pitch for Pitch must have been simple, concise and as straight-down-the-middle as a well-thrown fastball: “First female big-league pitcher.” Not a spinoff, not a remake, not a re-imagining; just an original idea with a very appealing young star. If you’re looking for an out-of-the-park hit in this year’s new-show roster, it probably lives on Thursday night.

NOTORIOUSABC/CTV/Sept. 22/8 p.m.

Starring: Piper Perabo, Daniel Sunjata, Sepideh Moafi, Kate Jennings Grant, Ryan Guzman and Kevin Zegers

Wednesday has a few gems and one dud

Ah, the remake — it’s always the subject of debate and “What were they thinking?” questions when TV brings another scaled-down version of a big-screen favourite into primetime. And this fall, much of that discussion will be focused on Fox’s revival of Lethal Weapon as a TV drama.

The betting here is that it won’t be a lengthy debate, and that viewers’ attention will soon turn to the new Wednesday titles that are actually worthwhile conversation-starters.

Lethal WeaponFox/Citytv — Sept. 21, 7 p.m.

Starring: Damon Wayans, Clayne Crawford, Kevin Rahm, Jordana Brewster and Keesha Sharp

Tuesday shows plenty of promise

There are many ways a new series can succeed and Tuesday’s lineup demonstrates three: by simply being a good show; by being a good show scheduled between two hugely successful shows; or by being a good show that appeals to fans of a similar, recently departed show.

Any way you look at it, there’s a lot to like about this night’s collection of newcomers.

BullWhen & Where: CBS/Global — Sept. 20, 8 p.m.

Starring: Michael Weatherly, Freddy Rodriguez, Geneva Carr, Jaime Lee Kirchner, Annabelle Attanasio and Chris Jackson

TV's Monday mix middling

Monday’s six-pack of new shows includes a heavenly comedy, a time-warped drama, a couple of brand-new sitcoms that are already past their best-before dates, a format-faithful legal drama and a homegrown thriller that’s a bit too overdone to be believed. All in all, a very mixed bag of TV offerings:

KEVIN CAN WAIT

Where and when: CBS/Global - Sept. 19, 7:30 p.m.

Starring: Kevin James, Erinn Hayes, Taylor Spreitler, Mary-Charles Jones and James DiGiacomo

Sunday's TV animated and investigated

And so it begins — with the silliness of a sword-swinging cartoon conquerer trying to make it in the suburban human world, and the uncomfortable re-examination of a real-life case that has already been the subject of extended tabloid-style exploitation.

The new television season is upon us, which means it’s time for our annual Fall TV Preview, a weeklong examination of everything that’s new and intriguing (or worth completely ignoring) in the 2016-17 prime-time lineup.

The preview starts today, with capsule previews of the weekend’s new programs (newsflash: once again, there’s nothing new to report on Saturdays) and a rundown of when all your returning favourites will arrive.

And from Monday through Friday, we’ll take a day-by-day look at all the major networks’ new shows, in an effort to help you cut through the clutter and pick a few new must-watch titles to add to what’s surely an overcrowded TV-viewing menu.

Louie C.K fans should fall for new comedy he co-created

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. And if it ain’t around anymore, replace it with something that works just as well.

FX Network had a very good thing going, comedically, with Louie, the brilliantly nuanced and deeply insightful sitcom created by Louis C.K. But Louie isn’t in the FX lineup at the moment, and there’s no telling when — or even if, depending on its star’s creative impulses — it will return.

So when FX needed another comedy to take its place, it wisely chose to stick with a winning formula, choosing a new series that has Louis C.K. as co-creator, executive producer and occasional writer and director, and frequent Louie co-star Pamela Adlon as its lead actor and principal creative force.

The end result of this don’t-fix-the-unbroke collaboration is Better Things (which premières Thursday, Sept. 8, at 9 p.m. on FX Canada), a smart, emotionally grounded and generally lovely new comedy that has Adlon playing Sam Fox, a moderately employed L.A. actor who’s struggling to maintain her sanity while playing single parent to a trio of headstrong and day-in-day-out challenging daughters.

Mansbridge’s exit bookends an era already over

The most-asked question, in the wake of Peter Mansbridge's announcement Tuesday that he will leave The National next year, concerns who will replace the anchor/chief correspondent of CBC's flagship nightly newscast.

Several names — led by Wendy Mesley, Ian Hanomansing and former CBC Winnipeg anchor Diana Swain — were immediately placed at the top of the list.

But the more pertinent question about Mansbridge's replacement is this: does it really matter?

Mansbridge, who will have served three decades as the public broadcaster's news-department figurehead by the time he steps away next year — an exit timed, in what feels like a bit too much of grab at an extra-special place in history, to coincide with the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation — is the last of a breed whose importance and relevance in popular culture and public discourse have been on a steady and inexorable decline for a couple of decades.

Morning show leaves half of us in the dark

Question: When is a flagship national TV show not a flagship national TV show?

Answer: When it’s presented in a way that discourages half the nation from watching it.

That’s the odd situation created by last week’s launch of CTV’s heavily hyped new a.m. program, Your Morning, which arrived with much fanfare on the network’s stations in eastern Canada but was relegated to second-tier afterthought status in western markets whose CTV affiliates carry the locally produced CTV Morning Live program instead.

In Toronto, Ottawa, Montreal and all points east, the première of Your Morning — a light and breezy, Today-style show featuring co-hosts Ben Mulroney and Anne-Marie Mediwake, news anchors Melissa Grelo and Lindsey Deluce and meteorologist Kelsey McEwen — was treated as a very big deal, an obvious attempt to create a major Canadian morning-TV presence in the wake of the recent and somewhat controversial cancellation of Canada AM.

A call from Zach Galifianakis gets comedian on TV, back on stage

Martha Kelly is a different kind of comedy performer, which probably explains why she’s spent much of the last few years living in a different kind of comedy place.

Kelly, a veteran of nearly two decades on the standup circuit who became more widely known last year after her stellar turn as a hapless insurance adjuster and reluctant friend to Zach Galifianakis’s failing-clown character in the offbeat FX comedy Baskets, has opted to make her home far outside the U.S. showbiz capitals of New York and Los Angeles, in Austin, Texas, a city mostly known for music.

“I’ve lived here a few different times, and I have a lot of friends here,” Kelly says during a telephone interview from her home in the Texas state capital. “For comics, there’s a really great scene here right now — you can get lots of stage time in front of real audiences and work on new material. It’s a great place to work on comedy. I think the reason it’s so great is that there’s a bunch of young, newer comedians who are really funny and have started their own shows and have really built an audience for comedy, and everyone kind of benefits from that.”

Austin’s growing reputation as a centre for up-and-coming “alternative” comedy mirrors its emergence as a music hotbed in the early 1970s after Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings packed up their outlaw attitudes and headed out of Nashville and toward Texas.

Despite off-the-wall premise, new series feels overly familiar

Sometimes, weird TV can be really great TV.

From The Twilight Zone to Twin Peaks (the first half-season, at least), from Northern Exposure to Due South, and from Monty Python’s Flying Circus and Boston Legal to Lost and Buffy the Vampire Slayer, television history has been filled with scripted shows that found their own unique brand of success by venturing far outside normal narrative territory.

Other times, however, weird TV is just weird TV.

The latter applies in the case of Four in the Morning, an ambitious but ultimately unsuccessful attempt to tell strange stories, in even stranger ways, about the bizarre and occasionally beyond-reality things that happen to a group of friends during the latest of their late-night hangout hours.

Comedian Todd Glass likes knowing where the haters are hiding

It’s a pretty simple principle: stupidity exposed is better than stupidity concealed.

It also happens to be one of the driving forces behind Todd Glass’s comedy, as well as the filter through which the Philadelphia-born, L.A.-based performer views a world that often seems overwhelmed by information, polarized opinion, readily accessible hatred and politically incorrect idiocy.

“I kind of equate Donald Trump with Twitter, and I think they’re both good because they’re exposing all these people for what they really are,” Glass says in a telephone interview during a recent stop at his neighbourhood gym in Los Angeles. “Maybe it’s good that these people finally have a leader who will speak and make them feel heard — I think everybody should be going, ‘Wow — this is what’s really out there!’

“I mean, a lot of people are prejudiced, but they’re smart enough to keep it a secret from the rest of the world. Among their friends, there’s a lot of hate festering, but they keep it to themselves. But now (thanks to Trump and Twitter), we know who they are.…

The odd kids on the block

All it took was one show, and John B. Duff knew.

When the first performance of last August’s inaugural Oddblock Comedy Festival took the stage, Duff and fellow festival founders Erick Casselman and Kevin Mozdzen breathed a huge sigh of relief, joined in the laughter, and shared in the knowledge that Oddblock was here to stay.

“I’m not surprised at all that we’re doing a second one,” Duff says of this year’s event, which runs Aug. 25 to 28 in a cluster of venues on or near the South Osborne Street strip. “Of course, before the very first show, there were some jitters, and we wondered if this was going to tank horribly. Ticket sales were pretty good but not stellar before that first show, but then once the ball was rolling and we saw how all the hard work we’d done was coming to fruition, we knew it was viable and we knew that we’d be doing it again.

“Before (last year’s fest) was even finished, Erick (Park Theatre owner Casselman) was giving us the thumbs-up to start planning for Year 2.”

One-man comedy mission

Many standup comedians are praised for being inventive. Nemr basically invented standup comedy in the region of the world he calls home.

Inspired by the comedians he saw on TV during a few brief, but formative, childhood years in the United States, Nemr — a native of Lebanon whose full name is Nemr Abou Nassar — decided about a decade ago humour might be a useful tool for easing cultural tensions in his often war-torn Middle Eastern homeland.

Before he took the stage for his first professional gig in Beirut, standup was non-existent as an entertainment form in Lebanon. Ten years later, Nemr is one of the globe’s biggest comedy successes, playing to sold-out audiences throughout the Middle East and releasing seven full-length comedy specials along the way.

He has now set his sights on conquering the rest of the comedy world, working his way around North America, hoping to win over audiences one city and one club at a time. The latest stop is Winnipeg, and Rumor’s Comedy Club, for a five-night stand that runs Aug. 23 to 27 (tickets range from $15 to $30, available at Rumor’s).

The eyes of the world are on Rio

This one’s a bit of a no-brainer.

If the purpose of this sort-of-regular crossover between the Free Press’s Life & Arts and Sports departments is to discuss the way sports are covered on TV, there’s only one possible topic for this instalment: the Summer Olympics.

Despite all the controversies associated with Brazil’s preparations for the Rio 2016 Olympic Games, as well as the numerous predictions pollution, corruption, doping scandals, construction shortfalls and crime were going to turn this latest version of the international sporting event into an unmitigated disaster, the Games have gone on. And as they reliably have been for every broadcaster that has shelled out millions and/or billions for the rights to carry them in the past few decades, the Olympics have once again been a ratings winner during the first week of competition.

The numbers are solid: south of the border, NBC’s prime-time Olympics coverage Wednesday drew more than 26-million viewers; the second-place U.S. network for the evening was CBS, which attracted 3.7 million with its combination of reality TV (Big Brother), scripted-series reruns (Criminal Minds) and summer fill-in drama (American Gothic). ABC’s lineup of sitcom reruns had two-million viewers, and Fox’s MasterChef doubleheader had less than 1.8 million.

Netflix rap series mashes up too many genres, but it's got a good beat

It’s fitting that a TV series exploring the early evolution of rap — a musical form that grew out of a youth-driven combination of other styles — should itself be a mash-up of multiple cinematic styles.

The Get Down, a wildly ambitious but only partially successful drama that has its Netflix release on Friday, Aug. 12, is at various times in its initial six-episode run a historical exploration, a classic love-triangle yarn, a gangster movie, a musical comedy and even a martial-arts epic.

That it does none of these things exceptionally well is a bit of a disappointment, but the sum total of this stylistic experimentation is likely entertaining enough to inspire some summer-weekend binge-watching.

The Get Down is set in 1977, during New York City’s most desperate era of crime, corruption, poverty, urban decay and civil unrest. It’s the height of the disco craze, but in the darkest corners of the Big Apple’s most downtrodden borough — the Bronx — young people are rejecting the flash and sequins and mirror balls, and finding their voices in a new musical genre that showcases repetitive beats and rapid-fire poetry.

Doc follows Canadian synchronized swim team on hopeful road to Rio

It’s a fascinating Olympic story that, sadly, won’t have its conclusion on the medal podium in Rio de Janeiro.

The new documentary Perfect offers viewers an inside look at a Canadian team’s quest to qualify for the Summer Olympics in Rio, following the athletes as they endure months of gruelling training and pre-Olympic qualification events only to fall short of the singular goal that has driven their efforts for the past four years.

That the sport in the film’s focus is synchronized swimming — an aquatic discipline whose more glittery aspects have often been mocked while its pure athletic difficulty has been ignored — does not diminish the effectiveness of the story.

If anything, it makes the competitors’ dedication to their sport all the more admirable.

Like AC for your brain

It’s the August long weekend — the unofficial midpoint of an always-too-short summer, which means it’s time to grab onto all the sunshine and heat we can before the hard meteorological truth of our unfortunate geographical reality forces us inside for another eight months of blanket-warmed binge-watching.

So maybe — and nobody would blame you if this is the case — television is the last thing on your mind. But even during our fleetingly flurry-less four-month break from winter, there will be times when it’s too hot, too wet, too cool, too muggy or too buggy to be outside. And that’s where our semi-regular feature Life Is But a Stream comes in, with another six-pack of binge-worthy titles that can be found on this country’s streaming-content services.

Here’s what’s worth watching when you’re not wearing sunglasses:

Would we lie to you?

When you’re facing danger, you need information. And who’s better at providing information than experts?

That’s where the new online CBC Comedy series The Whole Truths comes in — right in the middle of the most treacherous, perilous, frightening collection of threats our planet has ever known, where the insights and advice of actual “knowledge experts” might just save your life.

Front and centre in the digital-platform series (which can be streamed at www.cbc.ca/beta/comedy) is library-scented intellectual Truck Weldon, played by Winnipeg-born writer/performer Scott Montgomery. With the help of fellow experts Gordon Fipp (Jim Annan) and Bruce Lapierre (Kurt Smeaton), Weldon offers whole-truth information that might just prevent you from meeting a grisly end at the hands (or paws, or jaws, or crushing weight or otherworldly menace or razor-tipped thrust or incessant march) of such dangers as wolves, swords, ghosts, books, time, dogs, sleep or South America.

If it sounds odd and more than a bit absurd, well, that’s the point of The Whole Truths, according to Montgomery. The eight-episode collection of digital mini-sodes — each of which is three to four minutes in length — is intended to mine laughs from the grey area that exists in contemporary pop culture between actual facts and loudly expressed (but not necessarily useful) opinion.

New Netflix offering captures eerie '80s thriller vibe where kids take the lead

It’s a TV show set in the 1980s and, in a very appealing way, feels very much like it could have been made in the ‘80s, too.

The new Netflix series Stranger Things is both a throwback to a more innocent time and a respectful, delightful homage to the simpler kind of spooky/scary entertainment that drew ‘80s moviegoers to the multiplexes in droves.

Mashing up elements and attitudes from such ‘80s classics as E.T. the Extraterrestrial, The Goonies and Stand By Me, this eight-part thriller (which arrives on Netflix on Friday, July 17) is an instantly addictive tale in which a handful of preteen pals are a small town’s best hope for solving a very grown-up mystery.

Set in the backwoodsy little hamlet of Hawkins, Ind., Stranger Things opens with a decidedly ‘80s scene involving four young friends — Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin) and Will (Noah Schapp) immersed in a rousing game of Dungeons and Dragons.

New HBO series a gripping crime-and-punishment tale

Bad judgment. Bad timing. Bad luck.

Each of these things can quickly turn a pretty good day into a very bad day. And on those rare occasions when they all happen at once, it’s an instant recipe for the worst day of one’s life.

In the new HBO series The Night Of, an average New York college student from an ordinary immigrant family hits the fateful-trifecta jackpot, and the horrendous payoff it brings him makes for one of the best dramas the U.S. premium-cable network has produced in several years.

The Night Of, which premières Sunday on HBO Canada (check listings for time), is actually a this-side-of-the-pond re-imagining of a successful BBC series called Criminal Justice, but executive producers Steve Zaillian (who directed seven of the eight episodes) and Richard Price (who wrote — or co-wrote — all eight instalments) have taken that Brit story and transformed it into a crime-and-punishment yarn that oozes New York attitude out of every scene and syllable.

Hockey in July fails to score on TV

Thursday night's Blue Bombers game was a barnburner — an exciting, action-packed live sporting event filled with big plays and capped by a thrilling, nail-biter ending that brought great relief and a glimmer of hope to local fans.

And paired with the second half of that night's CFL doubleheader, it created six hours of live programming that were exactly what cable-sports programming should be. Fast. Fun. Fabulous football.

But enough with the happy talk. Let's chat for a few moments about what sports-network programming shouldn't be — as in dull, static, talky, uneventful, seemingly interminable and pretty much pointless.

Coverage of the opening of the National Hockey League's free-agency period — dubbed "Free Agent Frenzy" by TSN, with not even a whiff of sarcasm — provided yet another demonstration of why it's a lousy idea for sports networks to try to turn the back-room business dealings conducted by agents, accountants, general managers and owners into hours-long "event" programming.

Inspiring, entertaining, educational

When it comes to managing kids’ screen time, there are a lot worse things parents can do than getting their youngsters interested in what’s on Discovery Channel.

Like all specialty networks, Discovery does have its share of reality-TV clutter (hello, Naked and Afraid, Canada’s Worst Driver and Bitchin’ Rides) that deviates from the channel’s original science/nature mission and, from a family-viewing perspective, is generally best avoided, but when Discovery focuses on what it does best, it’s still capable of inspiring and entertaining while it educates.

The new nature-focused effort Hello World! doesn’t rank among Discovery’s truly epic series, such as Life, Planet Earth and Walking With Dinosaurs, but thanks to some impressive filmmaking and the involvement of several high-profile music-industry stars, this six-part look at animal life should be an easy sell for parents trying to entice youngsters into a shared TV-watching experience.

Hello World!, which premières Sunday, July 10, at 7 p.m. on Discovery, employs the music of Usher, Christina Aguilera, Ellie Goulding, Steven Tyler, Joan Jett and Dave Matthews as its soundtrack, with each artist contributing a theme-appropriate song to the episode that he/she narrates. Aguilera’s instalment, titled Don’t Mess with Mama, was provided for preview; if its tone and content are indicative of the entire series run, it’s probably fair to say Hello World! leans more toward kid-friendly cute than real-world ruthlessness in its depiction of animals in their natural surroundings.

Rom-com series gives polyamory a chance

From the title alone, it’s obvious this isn’t a standard-issue romantic comedy:

You Me Her.

This new made-for-cable sitcom, which premières Sunday on HBO Canada (check listings for time), puts a rather unexpected spin on the conventional TV rom-com and, in so doing, challenges a few of the commonly held assumptions about what love and marriage — in the scripted-TV context — are all about.

You Me Her is an odd amalgam of cross-border elements — produced by Toronto-based Entertainment One and shot in Vancouver, with Canadians in two of its three lead roles, the series is nonetheless set in Portland, Ore., and feels like a show produced with the export market as its top priority.

Head into the living room

During the winter, it’s mostly the cold that drives our desire to Netflix-and-chilly our way through the months that lead, ever so eventually, toward spring’s slow-opening screen door.

In summertime, it’s only the occasional nuisance that drives us indoors and toward that comfy, sheltered spot in front of the TV set — you know, rainstorms and floods, wildfires and smoky, smothering haze, plagues of blood-sucking insects... hey, wait a minute — that pretty much describes every day of our summer so far.

Which, I suppose, makes this the perfect time for another instalment of Life Is But a Stream, the semi-regular feature in which we offer up a few noteworthy titles from the streaming-content services (Netflix, Shomi, Crave TV) that are worth a few hours of marathon viewing during those portions of the day (read: all of them?) when we’re trying to avoid being dampened, drowned, choked, buzzed or bitten.

Here, in no particular order, are six worthy additions to your indoor-recreation schedule:

Documentary explores First World War devastation of Newfoundland

July 1 is a pretty big day — Canada Day — for folks in these parts.

But for many Newfoundlanders, celebrating Canada’s nationhood is an afterthought. For them, July 1 will always be Remembrance Day.

The reasons for this differing interpretation of what makes the first day of July important are explored in rich, colourful, and emotionally wrenching detail in the new documentary Newfoundland at Armageddon, which has its TV première Thursday, June 30, at 8 p.m. on CBC.

The film, directed and co-written (with Newfoundlander Michael Crummey) by Brian McKenna, employs a multidisciplinary approach — documentary, dramatization and interviews — to create a broad-focused assessment of Newfoundland’s involvement in the First World War and the devastating impact participation in “the war to end all wars” would have on the island nation’s future.

By George, Rogers fanned on the shot!

I know what you're thinking: "What's this guy from the Arts and Life section doing in over here in the sports pages?"

Then again, if you're a hardcore fan, it's entirely possible that your thoughts are more along the line of, "What? The Free Press has an Arts and Life section? I only read the sports. And who is this guy, anyway?"

"This guy" is the TV guy. Most days, you'll find my name and mugshot alongside columns on the entertainment pages, where I spend the majority of my time writing about television. Yes, I get paid to watch TV. Yes, it's a very good gig.

And since television is the medium through which we access nearly all of the sports we watch and follow, we thought it would be interesting — and, perhaps, even a bit of fun — to do a bit of a newspaper-sectional crossover and create a column that focuses on the intersection of TV and sports.

Out of tune

It’s one of the unshakable truths about rock ‘n’ roll music — it might be flashy and loud and outrageous, but if it doesn’t feel authentic, nobody’s going to buy it.

The same might be said about depictions of the rock world in movies and TV shows — and it’s the too-frequent intrusion of false narrative notes and flat-out phoney moments that keeps the heavily hyped, made-for-cable series Roadies from being as great as its stylish preview trailer led viewers to hope it might be.

Roadies, which was created for U.S. cable’s Showtime network by music journalist-turned-filmmaker Cameron Crowe (Almost Famous, Jerry Maguire), is an inviting premise set in a behind-the-scenes world that has long been the subject of music fans’ curiosity: the realm of the vagabond crews of technicians, tradespeople and minimum-wage labourers who travel from town to town, setting up and tearing down the massive and elaborate concert stages of the world’s greatest touring acts.

Roadies, simply put, had the potential to be epic. What’s presented in the series’ first three episodes, however, suggests it’ll never rise above the level of pretty good TV.

It’s all too easy

If it’s true summertime TV shows tend to be lightweight, disposable, easily watchable and just-as-easily forgettable off-season diversions, CBS’s American Gothic might be the perfect summer-television concoction.

This rather formulaic murder mystery, which premières Wednesday at 9 p.m. on CBS and Global, makes an earnest effort at being creepy and compelling, but despite across-the-board decent efforts from its large ensemble cast, it never quite lifts itself beyond the level of sombre, stuffy, and overreachingly clumsy.

The premise is fairly simple: a well-to-do Boston family is in the midst of dealing with an ordinary tragedy when a chance, unrelated event reveals information that might link one of them to a long-unsolved string of murders.

The patriarch, Mitchell Hawthorne (Jamey Sheridan), built his fortune in the construction industry, and it’s clear from the outset he has worked hard to shield his offspring from the messier aspects of an always-dirty business. Daughter Alison (Juliet Rylance) is a successful city councillor in the midst of an aggressive run at the mayor’s chair, so it’s she, more than any of her three siblings, who is intensely protective of the family name.

Been there, seen that

For decades, it was the most anticipated and exciting week of the TV year.

Now, not so much.

These days, the U.S. networks’ annual sales presentations create more of a business-as-usual feeling, in a business in which the conventional broadcasters have been forced to take a back seat to the buzz, critical acclaim and awards-show hauls of cable, specialty-network and streaming-service programs.

The recently completed “upfronts” still produced some staggering financial numbers, with as much as US$9 billion in advertising expenditures being committed to U.S. commercial networks — ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and, to a lesser extent, the CW — based on the 2016-17 prime-time schedules unveiled over four days at a series of presentations in downtown Manhattan.

We've got a half-dozen streaming shows you need to see… and the outdoors is overrated anyway

With the “official” prime-time season officially behind us for another year, it’s time for TV watchers in this often frosty part of the world to turn off the ol’ boob tube, take a deep breath and head outside into the too-brief summer sunshine.

Or, at least, it would be, if this were 2006.

But we’re living in the age of Netflix, Shomi and Crave TV and year-round streaming content, so there’s really no reason for anyone to make that hazardous-to-your-health stroll out into the sunburn-risk zone, is there? Seriously, fellow couch spuds, we’ve got a whole lot of catching up to do, and the fall TV season is only a few weeks away.

In this new monthly feature — to which we’ve attached the too-cute-for-words title Life Is But a Stream — we’re going take a quick look at some of the noteworthy titles available on the aforementioned streaming-content services, and offer up a few suggestions of shows that might be worthy of a few marathon viewings as the summer months zip past.

Good chemistry between leads gives by-the-book caper drama added spark

Charm can only carry you so far.

But sometimes, that limited distance might turn out to be just enough to give you a running start.

The new Global TV drama Private Eyes arrives in prime time with a boatload of good-humoured charm, a pair of well-matched stars and an unapologetically Canadian attitude, all of which add up to a first episode that’s very easy to like.

After the series première, however, it’ll be substance, rather than style, that determines how far the show can go.

Have faith in Preacher

With the likes of Mad Men, Breaking Bad and The Walking Dead already on its roster, it isn’t as if AMC has to do much to cultivate true believers in its original-content efforts.

But its latest drama series, Preacher, is certain to attract an entirely new and deeply faithful Sunday-night following.

Preacher is an ambitious, action-packed and addictively creepy and gruesome comic-book adaptation that deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as AMC’s most successful prime-time series.

Based on the like-titled ’90s comic-book series by Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon, Preacher is a show that challenges viewers with a story that operates on several levels at the same time, mixing deadly earnest drama with wild, sci-fi/supernatural weirdness and occasional outbursts of blunt-force violent action.

Exploring Scientific Mysteries for Dummies

Big questions require big answers. But it doesn’t take a super-brain such as the one inside Stephen Hawking’s head to produce them.

The renowned theoretical physicist enlists the aid of rather ordinary people to explore some of science’s most perplexing mysteries in the new six-part PBS series Genius by Stephen Hawking, which premières with back-to-back episodes on Wednesday at 8 p.m.

“Anyone can think like a genius,” Hawking declares in the opening segment of the first instalment, which focuses on the elusive subject of time travel and asks a team of three curious volunteers to work through a series of challenges that will demonstrate whether time travel is really possible or just a notion more suited to sci-fi speculation.

And what makes Genius by Stephen Hawking worth watching is that the exercises carried out by the volunteers succeed in allowing them — and, therefore, us — to wrap their heads very easily around some daunting scientific principles.

Ashamed? Why? Everyone watches terrible TV

Oh, brother. Big Brother?

Really? Yes, really.

In the aftermath of last weekend’s TV column about guilty viewing pleasures — which included a request for submissions from readers — it seems a lot of you had a whole bunch of TV-watching secrets to get off your chest. And, as it turns out, a lot of those secrets have something to do with Big Brother.

The long-running reality-competition show — in all its various international mutations, including Global’s successful Big Brother Canada spinoff — received more mentions than any other program in the dozens upon dozens of titles that were submitted via email by readers clearly eager to finally shed the burden of keeping those furtive TV favourites concealed.

Canadian comedy's second season finds nuance in mid-life struggles

As we age, change becomes difficult to contemplate and even harder to achieve.

Sometimes, the only kind of change we can entertain is that which is forced upon us.

For Davina Jackson, the central character in the HBO series Sensitive Skin (played by Kim Cattrall), change is as uncomfortable as it is unavoidable. And as this clever Canadian comedy returns for a second season (Sunday, May 15, HBO Canada; check listings for time), change is also the most necessary element of her life.

Margulies masterfully maintained mystery

At first glance, it seems we are right back where we started.

But really, we are anything but. On every level that really matters, TV’s The Good Wife is a series that has evolved and advanced, moving its characters and storylines ever forward through seven seasons and continually challenging the stereotyped notion its slightly mischievous title conveys. If it’s at all possible, the celebrated CBS drama has come full circle without returning to Square 1.

As The Good Wife comes to a close Sunday (8 p.m., CBS and Global), with an episode simply and appropriately titled End, it’s true the show’s central character, Alicia Florrick (played with Emmy-winning efficiency by Julianna Margulies), is once again standing beside and behind husband Peter (Chris Noth) as he faces imprisonment for political misdeeds and scandalous lapses in judgment.

But who she is, and how she has reacted to Peter’s most recent fall from grace, is very different from the heartbroken and startlingly betrayed woman we saw when the series première aired on Sept. 22, 2009. For proof, look no further than the scene in last week’s penultimate episode, in which rival/colleague Louis Canning (Michael J. Fox, wrapping up a brilliant recurring-character arc) informed Alicia that the star witness against Peter in his most recent legal wrangle was lying, motivated by fury over Peter dumping her after a years-long affair.

Viewing pleasures that are more guilty than gilded

OK, TV fans — it’s fess-up time.

What are you watching on television that you don’t really want anybody to know you’re watching on television?

 That’s right, today’s topic is guilty TV pleasures, those shows that earn no critical acclaim, deserve no credit for adding to TV’s current level of programming excellence, and do little to enhance the intellect or emotional well-being of the TV audience, and yet somehow you just can’t help watching them.

When the great philosopher Homer (in this case, Simpson) said, “Television gives so much, and asks so little,” these are the kinds of shows he must have been describing.

How the MTS-BCE deal will impact local TV viewers still unclear

It's a huge, complicated deal for the telecommunications industry, but exactly what the pending acquisition of Manitoba Telecom Services by industry giant BCE Inc. will mean for local television viewers who subscribe to MTS TV remains something of an out-of-focus picture.

The full impact of the deal, both in the larger industry context and in terms of how it will affect individual cable subscribers, won't be known until late this year or early in 2017, after all the necessary regulatory approvals have been granted and MTS's shareholders have formally endorsed the transaction.

Early Monday afternoon, MTS chief customer officer Heather Tulk was unable to say whether MTS TV will be rebranded, or how the deal might eventually affect pricing and channel-roster availability for customers currently subscribing to MTS TV services.

"The first step is to get all the necessary regulatory approvals for the transaction, and then, of course, shareholders will have to vote on the plan," said Tulk. "There are a lot of steps down the road; as we get through some of those steps, there may be some information available prior to closing, but most of it will really be closer to the actual closing date or after."

The game is (predictably) afoot

Maybe some mysteries just aren’t meant to be solved.

Take, for instance, this prime-time puzzler: who would think it a good idea to take two genuinely intriguing real-life historical figures — Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Harry Houdini — and fictionalize them into roles as reluctant partners in a far-fetched, buddy-cop TV concept that is only fleetingly intriguing and nowhere near genuine?

Welcome to the TV schedule, Houdini & Doyle. Enjoy every moment of what’s likely to be a rather short stay.

This lightweight new crime-solving drama, a Canadian/British/American co-production, has its North American première Monday at 8 p.m. on Global and Fox. It stars Stephen Mangan (Episodes) and Michael Weston (House) as the titular sleuthing tandem who in this highly imaginative version of circa-1901 London are something between casual acquaintances and ready-to-feud high-society rivals.

Game of Thrones season première sets stage for mayhem to come

WARNING: THE COLUMN BELOW CONTAINS SPOILERS ABOUT THE GAME OF THRONES SEASON PREMIÉRE. READ ON AT YOUR OWN DVR-DELAYED RISK.

It’s not as if anyone who watches Game of Thrones really needed reminding, but the epic HBO drama’s sixth-season première certainly reinforced the notion that one must always be aware things are not as they seem.

The hour-long season opener, which was preceded by a lengthy and detailed “Previously on...” recap, delivered a few minor surprises and emphatically bloody demises but mostly went very efficiently about the business of setting the stage for the mayhem that will inevitably follow in the weeks and episodes to come,

Of course, the BIG question from last season’s finale was dealt with, as the opening moments of the instalment titled The Red Woman returned viewers to a hovering-in-space view of a betrayed and bleeding Jon Snow lying in the snow, breathing what must very logically — based on the ruthlessness of the attack — be his last.

Predictable revenge tale no challenge for viewers

Mention a show whose title begins with “Game of ...” is premièring, and a lot of TV fans will get excited.

Well, curb your giddiness. That show doesn’t arrive for another couple of weeks.

Game of Silence is a new NBC series that is as simple, contained and single-focused as that other show is complex, far reaching and ambitious. It’s a revenge drama whose good guys and bad guys are clearly delineated from the moment they first appear.

Based on a Turkish television series, Game of Silence focuses on a group of friends who survived a horrible shared ordeal during childhood and are forced to revisit the trauma when a chance event brings the ugly past into their grown-up lives.

PBS filmmaker Ken Burns delivers hall of fame-quality Jackie Robinson documentary

It’s history.

It’s America.

It’s baseball.

How could anyone doubt that the combination of these three topics, when handled with expert care by PBS’s in-house documentarian, Ken Burns, would result in a program that is, at once, beautiful and formidable and essential?

West Coast performer wrings laughs from the phone book, so imagine what else he can do

Being from Vancouver has done at least a couple of things for Graham Clark’s comedy career.

First, it made him a natural choice for the roster of a show called Coast to Coast Comedy.

And second, and much more importantly, it helped to define who he is and what he does as a standup comic.

“Actually, (Vancouver) influences it quite a bit,” says Clark, a native Calgarian who moved to the West Coast 16 years ago, partly to attend film school, but mostly to escape the snow. “What I hear from a lot of comics who tour through town is that Vancouver audiences are very sensitive, very... for lack of a better term, politically correct. And I think having learned to really defend my point of view is a result of being in front of Vancouver audiences.

Canadian TV networks need buzz-worthy shows

It was all hugs, handshakes and heartfelt acceptance speeches last weekend in Toronto as Canada’s TV industry celebrated its best at the Canadian Screen Awards.

But here’s the question: when it comes to homegrown television production in 2016, how much is there to celebrate?

The answer, in a word, is “some.”

If we were presenting this discussion as a great literary tome titled A Tale of Four Networks (and Some Cable Channels), the opening line would probably be, “It wasn’t the best of times, but it wasn’t the worst of times...” The best of Canadian TV these days really is very good, but the amount of high-quality, made-in-Canada scripted programming still leaves a lot to be desired.

Spoiler alert! Follow our simple rules to avoid ruining TV

How soon is too soon? How much is too much? And who knows when it’s OK to say who did what to whom?

These are among the most vexing questions facing TV fans — or, if you’d rather, consumers of content — in the age of DVR-delayed viewing, streaming-service binge-watching and ceaseless multiplatform social-media interaction.

Long gone is the time when television was a universally shared experience involving “must-see” shows that had to be experienced as they aired in their traditionally scheduled time-slot, and when weekly episodes were followed by frantic next-day discussions with friends and co-workers about what happened in prime time the previous night.

These days, TV watching is an individually tailored enterprise, with many people opting to employ technology — DVR recording, online streaming, Netflix marathon viewing — allowing them to enjoy their favourite shows when and where it best suits them.

Cut-rate cable packages unlikely to win converts

The slimmed-down, bargain-brand version of cable television has finally arrived — and the big question about TV's smallest new bundle is whether anybody will care.

Dubbed "skinny basic" by the federal broadcast regulator that shepherded it into existence in the wake of its extensive Let's Talk TV hearings, the new package, which all of Canada's cable-TV providers are required to offer, must cost no more than $25 per month and must include local TV stations, "public interest" channels such as CPAC and APTN, educational channels and community channels.

Major U.S. networks — ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and PBS — are optional, but not mandatory, inclusions in the budget-conscious package, which cable providers were to make available by March 1.

The $25 maximum price, as determined by the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission, does not include the cost of set-top digital boxes or other associated cable-TV equipment, which means access to the $25 monthly package could cost more than $25.

HBO series a no-holds-barred look at the gritty, grimy, glamorous music scene of the '70s

The through-line to HBO’s new ’70s-era drama Vinyl might be “it’s only rock ‘n’ roll,” but this turns out to be a down-and-dirty, gritty music-industry story that soars to the epic, operatic heights of a Shakespearean tragedy.

Both aurally and visually, it’s a yarn that somehow manages to be blunt and ugly and intricate and beautiful all at the same time.

Created and produced by an impressive team that includes Martin Scorsese, Mick Jagger, Boardwalk Empire creator Terence Winter and author Rich Cohen, Vinyl takes viewers inside the world of Richie Finestra (Bobby Cannavale), a street-smart New York City hustler who built a record empire from the ground up during the 1960s. Now, as punk and funk collide violently with the old-school rock of the early 1970s, is trying to unload his bloated company before it collapses under the weight of its own out-of-touch dysfunction.

The two-hour series première, masterfully directed by Scorsese, opens with a scene in which Richie, wasted and clearly at the end of his rope, is in his parked car on a dingy downtown street, trying to score some coke from a passing dealer.

Crave crude comedy? Streaming show up your alley

It’s a tricky business, turning a one-joke premise into a full-length scripted comedy.

Just ask the Saturday Night Live writers who tried to transform such popular-but-limited sketches as Coneheads, It’s Pat and MacGruber into feature films — the results can be (and in all three of these cases, were) both disastrous and painfully unfunny.

That’s why there was cause for legitimate concern when Bell Media announced it was adapting Letterkenny Problems, the popular online series of comedy mini-sodes, into a half-hour comedy that would serve as a marquee attraction for the Crave TV streaming service’s nationwide launch (it will later become part of Comedy’s springtime schedule).

Letterkenny Problems, which was created by rural Ontario-born actor Jared Keeso (19-2, Keep Your Head Up, Kid: The Don Cherry Story), is a series of short (90 to 120 seconds) segments in which a couple of fast-talking farm-country tough guys spew rapid-fire insults and observations about the people and things that annoy them.

Comedy festival finally lands Canadian legend Walsh

To celebrate the Winnipeg Comedy Festival's 15th anniversary, Lara Rae thought it would be a good idea to land a big-time, old-school Canadian comedy legend to top the milestone event's roster.

As it turns out, the artistic director was able to double up on marquee talent, signing "Eh"-list headliners Mary Walsh and Brent Butt for this year's fest, which runs April 3 to 10.

"I've waited 15 years for this," Rae says of the inclusion of This Hour Has 22 Minutes alumna Walsh in this year's festival. "We've had Cathy Jones here a few times, but Mary has never been, and Rick (Mercer) has never been. I've wanted to have Mary at the festival since Day 1, but we've never been able to work it out until now.

"I had a few goals for this (anniversary) year, and one of them was to bring in at least one Canadian comedy institution, as we did in our first year with David Steinberg, and I think Mary Walsh certainly checks that off the list. And I would certainly put Brent at the same level."

Dramas depict stories of O.J. Simpson and Bernie Madoff

It's an interesting question: which is the more despicable villain -- the murderer who takes the lives of two people, or the swindler who ruins the lives of thousands?

Two different brands of criminality are showcased in a pair of new dramas premièring this week -- the 10-part "event" series The People v. O.J. Simpson, which arrives Tuesday at 9 p.m. on FX Canada and Citytv, and the two-part miniseries Madoff, which airs Wednesday and Thursday at 7 p.m. on ABC.

The Simpson series, produced by Ryan Murphy and Brad Falchuk (Glee, American Horror Story), fully lives up to all the flash and extravagance and celebrity-driven ridiculousness that were the hallmarks of the events it depicts. Populated by an all-star cast and filled with meticulously detailed behind-the-scenes drama, The People v. O.J. Simpson is likely to capture viewers' attention in much the same way the O.J. trial transfixed the TV-watching public and essentially launched the era of reality TV.

The large ensemble cast is led by John Travolta, who plays the head of Simpson's "dream team" of attorneys, Robert Shapiro, and Sarah Paulson, who portrays lead prosecutor Marcia Clark, who watched as a seemingly airtight case came unravelled during a trial that became a referendum on race relations in America rather than a simply a high-profile murder case.

CRTC hearing examines troubled local television stations

The discussion, much of the time, has focused on high ideals, such as the health of democracy and journalistic integrity and the value of an informed public.

But the bottom line, as it always has been, is money.

Or, more specifically, the absence of enough of it to sustain local television stations and local TV news in this country in an age of shifting media-platform preferences and diminishing advertising revenue.

Since last Monday, the federal broadcast regulator has been holding a public hearing on the future of local TV in Canada, listening to submissions from major media conglomerates, smaller regional broadcast outlets and various interested advocacy groups and individuals with a stake in the declining financial fortunes of local television businesses.

Half of Canada’s local TV stations could fade to black, lobby warns

So, here’s the question of the day: how much does local television matter?

You might think this is a big, important question, or you might think it’s an irrelevant question whose answer has no bearing whatsoever on your day-to-day life and the way you watch TV (or consume content on your preferred mobile device).

In a conference room in Gatineau, Que., this week, a long discussion is taking place among people who feel the local TV question is one of the most crucial that we, as Canadians, face in the modern media age.

On Monday, the federal broadcast regulator began a public hearing that will examine the current state and future viability of local TV programming, with an emphasis on the health of local TV stations and local news programming.

New X-Files revival picks up after clunky first episode

The enduring message of The X-Files is the truth is out there.

When it comes to Fox’s highly anticipated six-episode revival of the beloved paranormal-adventure drama, the truth is the real fun of renewing acquaintances with Fox Mulder and Dana Scully lies out there somewhere just beyond the TV series reboot’s first episode.

The first hour of this new-look X-Files, which airs Sunday, Jan. 24, at approximately 9 p.m. on Fox and CTV (after the NFC championship game between the Arizona Cardinals and Carolina Panthers), will undoubtedly be a big disappointment to fans who’ve waited through weeks of endless promotional spots for a chance to finally reunite with their favourite TV-series conspiracy theorists.

Part of the problem is the show’s producers — probably quite rightly, given it’s been more than a decade since the series disappeared, not all that mysteriously, from Fox’s schedule in 2002 — clearly felt the need to provide new viewers with an explanation of just exactly what the heck The X-Files is all about.

Comedy troupe veteran Thompson puts heart into solo show

Let’s make one thing clear: Scott Thompson is not dabbling.

He’s not an actor assuming the role of a standup comedian for a few fleeting onstage moments; nor is he a sketch-comedy performer taking a brief creative detour while on hiatus from his regular ensemble-comedy enterprise.

When he arrives at the Park Theatre this week for a pair of shows (Friday, Jan. 22 at 8 p.m. and 10:30 p.m.; tickets $25 at Ticketfly.com; early show is sold out), the performer who takes the stage will simply and specifically be Scott Thompson, standup comedian.

It has taken more than five years of writing and performing, comedy-club sets and open-mike drop-ins and confidence-building solo gigs, but Thompson is ready to say he has arrived.

Galifianakis a Baskets case in cringe-worthy new comedy

The traditional line of thinking when it comes to clowns is that they’re funny. But the truth of the matter is that many people find clowns, in all their costumed, grease-painted, floppy-shoed, pratfalling glory, to be weird, sad and even a little bit disturbing.

If you count yourself among this clowns-are-creepy constituency, the new FX-network series Baskets might be your kind of TV show. Created by Zach Galifianakis, Louis C.K. and Portlandia director and writer Jonathan Krisel, the new comedy, which premières Thursday at 9 p.m. on FX Canada, stars Galifianakis as a would-be clown whose deluded dreams of a life of sad-faced comedic artistry come unglued in a way that is in equal measures hilarious and pathetic.

Galifianakis plays a dimwitted but determined Californian named Chip Baskets (yes, that’s his real name), who has invested his life’s meagre savings in a trip to Paris to study at L’Académie de Clown Français, which turns out to be a disaster because he can’t speak or understand a word of French and is dismissed and/or ignored by every one of his classmates and teachers.

His clumsy response to a classroom challenge posed by a stereotypically snarky instructor results in a barrage of insults whose meaning is very clear to Chip, despite the fact the only words he understands in the venomous in-his-face diatribe are “Ronald” and “McDonald.”

Over-hyped financial industry drama falls short of expectations

As a showpiece for two heavyweight actors trading an endless series of vicious verbal haymakers, Billions is definitely worthy of a ringside-seat investment of a few TV-watching hours.

But as a series that satisfyingly meets all the requirement of a great scripted drama, this new premium-cable offering is something less than a decisive knockout.

Given the relentless promotional push being given to Billions by Bell Media as a signature property for its streaming-content service (Crave TV, slated to become available nationwide by month's end), it's entirely possible the series (created for U.S. cable's Showtime network) might turn out to be a bit disappointing to those who, based on what feels like billions of Billions promo spots in the past few weeks, were expecting greatness.

Now, none of this is to say Billions -- which has a premium-TV Canadian première Sunday, Jan. 17, on Movie Central -- is bad. It isn't. In fact, it's pretty good and generally quite entertaining, and its central core of actors is often terrific.

British series suffers from split personality

The problem with Dr. Jekyll, in the literary tale concocted by Robert Louis Stevenson, is that he can't control who he is.

The problem with Jekyll and Hyde, the latest screen adaptation of the oft-revisited story, is that it has no idea what it wants to be.

This new British import, which has its Canadian première on Monday at 9 p.m. on CBC, suffers a personality crisis much more complex than the original, on-the-page version of its subject could ever have imagined.

Rather than a straightforward battle between good and evil, darkness and light, this Jekyll and Hyde is jerked hither and yon among conflicted genre identities -- is it a horror drama? A dark comedy? A ridiculous farce? A love story? A CGI-driven live/cartoon hybrid?

Sitcom’s father-son team really know their Schitts

Imagine the pressure.

Imagine the pride.

On one hand, you’ve got a relative newcomer to the TV business trying to produce one of showbiz’s most elusive entities — a successful and genuinely funny Canadian sitcom — who has saddled himself with the roles of creator, producer, writer and actor. He has included in his cast two of this country’s most revered TV-comedy figures — whose talents one wouldn’t want to squander and whose reputation one certainly ought not to tarnish — and it happens one of the beloved funny Canucks also happens to be his father.

On the other, you’ve got the aforementioned living comedy legend, who has quite naturally lent his unconditional support and unquestionable star power to this project by entering into a creative and business partnership with his offspring, and has discovered, in the course of the series’ first-season run, his son really is quite good at this TV-comedy thing.

PBS is going to have a tough time replacing Downton Abbey

Just how big a deal is Downton Abbey to PBS? Well, consider this: in the leadup to the première of the beloved British drama's sixth and final season, the U.S. public broadcaster took to running promotional ads on that nation's commercial broadcast outlets.

In an unprecedented move that is a clear indicator of Downton Abbey's broad-audience appeal, PBS crossed the great ideological divide that has traditionally separated it from its ad-revenue-driven competitors; viewers of CBS's The Good Wife and other strategically selected commercial-network series were reminded last month, in the most non-PBS-ish manner possible -- 30-second spots nestled among other product-pitching ads -- that Downton's final campaign is about to begin.

Combine that with the fact members of Downton Abbey's cast were seen Friday perched on a float in this year's Rose Parade in Pasadena, Calif., and what you've got is a TV series that has ventured more aggressively into the pop-culture mainstream than any PBS offering before it.

The series' impact on the public broadcaster has been massive -- Downton Abbey is, by a good measure, the most popular and highest-rated series in the network's history, averaging 12.5 million U.S. viewers during its fifth season (The Good Wife, by comparison, has averaged slightly more than 8.5 million viewers during its current campaign).

These are the 10 things that made TV special in 2015

You know how it goes in the television world: the more things change, the more things... well, change.

Even for a medium in which new technology, new platforms and new content arrive and evolve at a breakneck pace, 2015 was a year of tremendous upheaval. Here’s one TV-watcher’s look back at 12 fascinating and fast-moving months, as well as a quick look ahead to what 2016 might bring:

Still StandingThis offbeat new CBC offering took comedian/actor Jonny Harris (Murdoch Mysteries) to struggling small towns across Canada, where he would meet with locals, learn about the communities and then create an all-new set of locally themed comedy to be performed for the townsfolk at a local venue. It is, thanks to Harris’s best-possible-guest charm, brilliant. Without question, TV’s most pleasant surprise of the year.

David LettermanLate-night TV’s elder statesman called it quits in 2015, bringing an end to the era in which “talk” was the primary ingredient in the talk-show formula. Dave’s final show, on May 20, hit all the right notes and delivered a perfect balance of sentiment and silliness.

Ten-hour Netflix documentary series a nail-biting true-crime tale

Stories of wrongful conviction are a staple of the true-crime genre of TV storytelling, inevitably featuring descriptions of justice denied, justice delayed and justice finally delivered.

In the new Netflix documentary series Making a Murderer, that familiar series of events is only the beginning of a much longer, even more harrowing and fully engaging story.

The 10-part series, released in its entirety on the streaming-content service Friday, is a meticulously crafted tale in which the familiar elements of a wrongfully convicted person's ordeal are laid out in the first hour, and then what follows in the next nine takes viewers into uncharted territory.

Written and directed by Moira Demos and Laura Ricciardi, Making a Murderer examines the case(s) of small-town Wisconsin misfit Steven Avery, who ran afoul of local law enforcement as a young man and spent decades of his life suffering the consequences.

Winnipeg teen producing local TV series with all-volunteer cast

For most 16-year-olds, the notion of creating, writing and producing a television series seems highly unlikely, at best.

For Winnipegger Joshua Hood, however, bringing a TV project to life was more of an inevitability.

"I've always wanted to do something like this; I've been working at it for years," says Hood, the creative force behind the locally produced Shaw TV series Millworth, which takes a comedic/dramatic look at life inside Winnipeg's worst (fictional) high school. "Ever since I was four, when I first picked up a camera -- and I basically haven't put one down."

Millworth is a six-episode series that premièred Nov. 30 and is currently airing twice weekly (Tuesdays at 8 p.m. and Saturdays at 6:30 p.m.) on Shaw TV. Inspired by Hood's interest in -- and concern about -- the public education system, the series features an all-volunteer cast of nearly 30 actors who play the students, teachers and administrators at Millworth, the fictional school.

Best! Christmas! Present! Ever!

If you’re like me, you remember the moment as if it were yesterday.

The excitement. The anticipation. The almost-sleepless night. The stealthful, silently joyful discovery that there were, as hoped, presents piled under the tree.

The way-too-long wait for siblings and parents to rouse themselves and take their gift-opening positions. Finally, the frenzy of ribbon-and-bow removal, wrapping-paper ripping, and then...

There it was. The. Greatest. Christmas. Present. EVER.

Netflix holiday special delivers old-fashioned fun, mirthful Murrayness

In an oddly refreshing display of truthful advertising, the new holiday TV offering A Very Murray Christmas delivers exactly what its title promises.

It’s a Christmas special. And it’s very, very, VERY Bill Murray.

It’s fair to say, in fact, that A Very Murray Christmas — which arrives on Netflix on Dec. 4 — is a show that only a Bill Murray fan could love.

But here’s the thing: is there anybody who’s not, on some level, in some secretly tickle-susceptible corner of their being — head, heart, funnybone, feet, whatever — a Bill Murray fan?

Even a shlub can be a star in new TV landscape

Comedian Jim Gaffigan has carved out a very nice career by being an average, dopey, chubby, clean-talking, white American male.

It should come as no surprise, then, that a new sitcom called The Jim Gaffigan Show doesn't inspire the use of such oft-employed descriptors as "edgy," "dark," "nasty" or "raunchy."

Gaffigan's made-for-U.S.-cable series, which has its Canadian première tonight on Comedy (check listings for time), is based directly on his life and career as a successful standup comedian living in New York City. Because of that, it arrives as a clever, solidly amusing show that focuses on family, food and faith and is unlikely to venture into the realms of controversy and confrontation.

The Jim Gaffigan Show is the latest in a recent string of sitcoms featuring comedians playing semi-fictional versions of themselves -- think of Louis C.K.'s Louie on FX, and Aziz Ansari's Master of None on Netflix. It's a trend that seems to indicate the ongoing expansion of TV channels and streaming-content platforms is providing more opportunities for comedy performers to make the coveted standup-to-sitcom transition in a way that allows them to capitalize on their own stage material and play characters that don't require much of an acting stretch. They can also maintain creative control, ensuring the integrity of the comedic vision that inspired the TV project in the first place isn't destroyed by micro-managing and unwelcome suggestions from network executives.

A guide to the season’s festive TV offerings

Yes, that’s right, seasonal-special surfers — the holiday TV season is upon us. And it should come as no surprise, given the way some U.S. cable networks — led by Lifetime and the Hallmark Channel — have basically turned themselves into year-round Christmas-movie production factories, that the coming month’s listings are filled with more festive-themed titles than ever before.

On the chillier side of the Canada-U.S. border, Lifetime and W have already eased into an all-Christmas, all-the-time movie schedule, while other specialty nets such as Showcase, AMC and ABC Spark are including one or more seasonal titles in every night’s lineup.

If you’re into holiday programming, you needn’t look far to find it. Among this year’s highlights are a brand new offering on a new streaming-content platform — Bill Murray’s Netflix special A Very Murray Christmas (Dec. 4) — and a half-century celebration for one of the tube’s most beloved festive titles, A Charlie Brown Christmas (ABC, Nov. 30).

With all that in mind, our annual fridge-magnet-friendly festive TV calendar offers a selective guide to Christmassy viewing, including new seasonal titles and where-to-watch tips for your favourite must-see classics.

Is Grey Cup weekend bacchanal a thing of the past?

It was once the biggest event on Canada’s sports-TV calendar. It was also the biggest darned basement party of most north-of-the-border sports fans’ year. For decades, it was known — both affectionately and disparagingly — as the Great Canadian Drunk.

But as Winnipeg plays host to the 103rd Grey Cup game and TSN’s crew prepares to beam its Sunday-night broadcast across the country, a question looms: is the old-fashioned, rec-room-ready, chips-and-dip and beer-fuelled Grey Cup house party even a thing any more?

Sunday’s game is sure to attract a decent-sized audience for TSN, but the Canadian Football League’s marquee event is neither the must-see TV nor the cultural touchstone it was a couple of generations ago.

Consider this: when then-fledgling CTV acquired the broadcast rights for the Grey Cup in 1962, there were concerns that the new network’s limited range might leave some parts of Canada unable to watch the game. The issue was raised in the House of Commons and it was decided that because the Grey Cup was “an event of national interest,” it would be carried by both CTV and the publicly funded CBC.

Shift of the gab

We need to talk... about talk.

Specifically, we need to have a discussion about TV's late-night hours, and whether the term "talk show" is an appropriate description for the current versions of the medium's most enduring post-prime time programming genre.

Jack Paar hosted a talk show. Johnny Carson hosted a talk show. David Letterman, Craig Ferguson and even Jay Leno could fairly be described as talk-show hosts.

But now that they're all gone, and a new generation -- Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel, James Corden and Seth Meyers -- has taken up residence behind the desks of the major U.S. networks' after-hours staples, talk seems to have become one of the least important elements of their shows.

Unconventional Marvel series strips away comic-book conventions

There's a natural tendency, given the overwhelming presence of under-performing superhero titles at the box office these days, to react to the release of yet another Marvel Comics adaptation with rolled eyes and muffled, resigned sighs.

It isn't hard to transform the phrase "another Marvel adventure" into a plaintive "Not another Marvel adventure," but in the case of the new Netflix series Marvel's Jessica Jones, such a please-make-it-stop sentiment is completely unjustified.

Simply put, this most unconventional of comic-book-inspired TV creations is very different, very intriguing and very, very good.

Marvel's Jessica Jones, which is released in a 13-episode Netflix bundle on Friday, Nov. 20, strips away many of the genre's most overused conventions and instead presents a version of that fantastical world in which "heroes" view their powers as either an afterthought to daily pursuits or a generally irritating set of attributes whose benefits and detriments are, at very best, a saw-off.

There will be blood, not to mention gore and more

The term “bone-crunching” is mostly used to describe collisions and contact situations in sports — hard tackles in football, impactful bodychecks in hockey, pretty much everything that happens on a rugby field.

It transfers well into the realm of TV reviews this week, however, because the sound of bones being crunched — not to mention twisted, snapped, compressed and shattered — is the overriding audio element in the action-amped new AMC drama Into the Badlands.

The futuristic, martial-arts-driven adventure — set in a dystopian, post-apocalytic world in which mechanized weaponry has been banned, and justice and vengeance are meted out with swords, knives, spears and flying fists and feet — is AMC’s latest attempt to bring an underserved genre to prime time in hopes of creating an unlikely hit.

The U.S. cable outlet succeeded beyond its wildest dreams with the zombie-apocalypse serial The Walking Dead, and has enjoyed solid but less spectacular results from its western adventure, Hell on Wheels. With the energetic and entertaining Into the Badlands, the network stands a better-than-even chance of staking its claim to another niche audience that will flock to a series that showcases the kind of action they’ve seldom seen on the small screen in recent years.

Edwards a sly comic with sharp observations

Let's face it -- it's all just a bunch of baloney.

But that's the nature of standup comedy, an art form that by its own definition is strictly for laughs. And Derek Edwards is OK with that -- so much so, in fact, that he named his latest cross-Canada comedy tour Baloney and Wine.

"I'm always put upon to try and name the tour, because it gives it a little bit of individuality," says Edwards, who brings the western Canadian leg of the tour to the Burton Cummings Theatre on Saturday, Nov. 14. "So I picked a couple of words that seemed odd by juxtaposition. And I think, maybe, that people are self-conscious about getting up to relieve themselves in the middle of the show, so they drink wine instead of beer -- even the guys -- and they're sitting there listening to baloney, so it seemed appropriate.

"It just seemed to have levity built right in. I wish I could say it was deeper than that, but... "