All of us love TV, but who’s to say that because you love Criminal Minds and wont watch Life On Mars - that you are missing a truly superb movie? Well, some people really are stuck on what they watch while others simply don’t know anything about other shows - so they choose not to take the dive to watch them. What if you hate it? TV is all about being in that comfort zone. You know. You come home from a hard days work and you can count on Steve Carell from The Office to make you laugh or Lawrence Fishburne from CSI to make you think. You are comfy on your couch, your in the zone, and your enjoying it. Why mess with perfection? Because! You could really be missing out on an awesome show all because of your comfort zone. There are a ton of shows out there. Think of it like a buffet. You don’t go up and get the same thing every time do ya? Well you shouldn’t! Lets check out a few other shows you could toss into your TV nights, you never know if you will like them unless you try them!

My Name Is Earl is set in the fictional Camden County. The series stars Jason Lee, Ethan Suplee, Jaime Pressly, Eddie Steeples and Nadine Velazquez. Lee stars in the title role as “Earl J. Hickey”, a petty crook with occasional run-ins with the law, whose newly won $100,000 lottery ticket is lost when he is hit by a car. Lying in a hospital bed, under the influence of morphine, he develops a belief in the concept of karma when he hears about it during an episode of Last Call with Carson Daly. He decides he wants to turn his life around and makes a list of all the bad things he’s ever done. After doing his first good deed, he finds his $100,000 lottery ticket. He sees this as a sign and, with his new lucky money, he proceeds to cross items off the list, one by one, by doing good deeds to atone for them.

Kath & Kim is a Logie Award-winning character-driven Australian television comedy series, created by Jane Turner and Gina Riley. The series revolves around the family matters and relationships of the title characters, a dysfunctional mother and daughter. Kath & Kim stars Jane Turner as Kath Day-Knight, a cheerful 50-something divorcee currently in a happy relationship with her fiance (and then husband), the prissy Kel Knight. She deals with her spoilt, ever complaining, 20-something daughter Kim Craig; Kim’s unlucky, sports obsessed second best friend Sharon Strzelecki; Kim’s estranged husband Brett Craig; and their baby daughter Epponnee Rae Craig. The series is set in the fictional suburb of Fountain Lakes, in Melbourne, Victoria, but is primarily filmed in and around areas of Patterson Lakes, Melbourne.

The Office is an Emmy-Award winning American television sitcom airing on NBC and developed by Greg Daniels. It is an American adaptation of the BBC series with the same name and depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. Unlike many American sitcoms, The Office is shot in a single-camera setup, without a studio audience or a laugh track, and is made in the form of a documentary. Although fictional and scripted, the presence of the camera is openly acknowledged by the series’ characters.

CSI: Crime Scene Investigation is an American crime drama television series. CSI premiered on CBS on October 6th, 2000. The ninth season began airing on October 9th, 2008 and currently airs in the United States on Thursdays at 9:00 p.m. The show was created by Anthony E. Zuiker and produced by Jerry Bruckheimer. It is filmed primarily at Universal Studios in Universal City, California. CSI Las Vegas is produced by Jerry Bruckheimer Television and CBS Productions, which became CBS Paramount Television in the fall of 2006. Formerly a co-production with the now-defunct Alliance Atlantis Communications, that company’s interest in the series is now owned by investment firm GS Capital Partners, an affiliate of Goldman Sachs.

Flashpoint is about the dramatic portrayal of an elite tactical unit, called the Strategic Response Unit (SRU), within a Canadian metropolitan police force (styled on the Toronto Police Emergency Task Force, Toronto being where the series is filmed). The SRU are tasked to resolve extreme situations that regular officers cannot handle including hostage-taking, bomb threats and heavily armed criminals. Even though they’re backed with high-tech equipment with an arsenal of explosives, tasers, sub-machine guns, assault and sniper rifles, the SRU operators use intuition and judgement to resolve the situation.

The Mentalist is an American crime procedural television series which debuted on September 23, 2008 on CBS. Golden Globe Award nominee Simon Baker stars as Patrick Jane, an independent consultant with the California Bureau of Investigation (CBI), who has a remarkable track record for solving serious crimes by using his razor sharp skills of observation. He also makes frequent use of his mentalist abilities to lead witnesses or offenders into offering the actual facts of the case, as known only to them. Within the Bureau, Jane is notorious for his blatant lack of protocol and his semi-celebrity past as a psychic medium, whose paranormal abilities he now admits he feigned. Jane’s role in cracking a series of tough high-profile cases is greatly valued by his fellow agents.

Tags: 2009, ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC, Television, TV, TV Shows

For a lot of us - TV shows are like important appointments. We usually don’t forget them unless something more important comes along. So in the case of the missing TV show you might be wondering if it got discontinued or if you really forgot all about it! In a lot of cases shows do get canceled. And yes, it does stink. But hey what are going to do? Call the TV channel? Put out a petition? That’s a no go! In a lot of cases your favorite show really may have gotten canceled and there is not a darn thing you can do about it - except latch yourself on to a new show! One thing I would suggest you do is to check out a few blogs for TV schedules. This will allow you to see if your show really did get canceled or if it just switched nights or times. This has happened to me a lot. It happened with CSI and I was dumbfounded as to how a show that awesome could get canceled. Here it just switched its schedule. So searching for your specific schedule would be a really smart thing to do. This one is a little outdated but nonetheless you will get an idea about what these lists look like:

MONDAY
8:00 The Big Bang Theory
8:30 How I Met Your Mother
9:00 Two and a Half Men
9:30 Worst Week
10:00 CSI: Miami

TUESDAY
8:00 NCIS
9:00 The Mentalist
10:00 Without a Trace

WEDNESDAY
8:00 The New Adventures of Old Christine
8:30 Project Gary
9:00 Criminal Minds
10:00 CSI: NY

THURSDAY
8:00 Survivor
9:00 CSI
10:00 The Eleventh Hour

FRIDAY
8:00 Ghost Whisperer
9:00 The Ex List
10:00 Numb3rs

SUNDAY
7:00 60 Minutes
8:00 The Amazing Race
9:00 Cold Case
10:00 The Unit

Another thing I would suggest doing - if you cant find your TV show is to look online and do a search. Chances are if you have a rift over why your show went missing - others will be talking about it as well. In this case you will find a website or wen page that is pretty much guaranteed to have ALL the canceled shows listed on it. So it might look something like this:

Masters Of Illusion (MNT)
Ending after one season, final episode on 5/18/2009

The Middleman (FAM)
Ending after one season, final episode on 9/1/2008

Mind Of Mencia (COM)
Ending after four seasons, final episode on 7/23/2008

Everything should be in alphabetical order, this is the easiest way to find your poor show that did or didn’t get canceled. If after all that you still cant find your show, the very last thing you can do is either visit the network online and look on their speciality TV schedule or just go ahead and email them and ask what happened to your show! They should email you back in a few days, and then you will finally know what happened! Good luck. I hope your show didn’t get canceled because that puts such a damper on things, doesn’t it?!?

Tags: ABC, CBS, Episodes, Television, TV, TV Show

Comedy is one of my favorite types of TV shows. Not stuff like the Funny Bone or anything like that. But shows like 30 Rock, According To Jim and The Big Bang Theory. Not really slap stick but still gets a few giggles out of you every few minutes. This is the stuff that life is made out of. Ya know what they say - laughter is the best medicine. And who doesn’t love being able to sit down and watch a nice comedy after a long day or a bad day at work? Maybe you got stuck in traffic and your stressed out. This is the best way to feel better and let all your problems melt away. I think it’s really great how a 30 minute show can simply remind me to not take everything so darn serious. TV shows like The Family Guy are a great way to escape reality - even for 30 minutes. If you like comedies, then you should definitely, without a doubt check out the follow shows (available now):

The Office is an Emmy-Award winning American television sitcom airing on NBC and developed by Greg Daniels. It is an American adaptation of the BBC series with the same name and depicts the everyday lives of office employees in the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of the fictional Dunder Mifflin Paper Company. Unlike many American sitcoms, The Office is shot in a single-camera setup, without a studio audience or a laugh track, and is made in the form of a documentary. Although fictional and scripted, the presence of the camera is openly acknowledged by the series’ characters.

The New Adventures of Old Christine is an Emmy Award winning comedy series starring Julia Louis-Dreyfus as a recently divorced single mother. The series debuted as a mid-season replacement on March 13th, 2006 on CBS and is currently broadcasting it’s fourth season, which debuted September 2008. Old Christine, as it is often more conveniently called, is a Warner Bros. Television production and was created by writer Kari Lizer, who is also the shows executive producer.

My Name Is Earl is set in the fictional Camden County. The series stars Jason Lee, Ethan Suplee, Jaime Pressly, Eddie Steeples and Nadine Velazquez. Lee stars in the title role as “Earl J. Hickey”, a petty crook with occasional run-ins with the law, whose newly won $100,000 lottery ticket is lost when he is hit by a car. Lying in a hospital bed, under the influence of morphine, he develops a belief in the concept of karma when he hears about it during an episode of Last Call with Carson Daly. He decides he wants to turn his life around and makes a list of all the bad things he’s ever done. After doing his first good deed, he finds his $100,000 lottery ticket. He sees this as a sign and, with his new lucky money, he proceeds to cross items off the list, one by one, by doing good deeds to atone for them.

King of the Hill is an American television animated series created by Mike Judge and Greg Daniels, for the Fox Broadcasting Company. It centers on the Hills, a small-town Methodist family proud of its Texas heritage. It attempts to retain a realistic approach, seeking humor in the otherwise conventional or sometimes even mundane. Judge and Daniels conceived the series after a successful run with Judge’s earlier Beavis and Butt-head on MTV, and the series debuted on the Fox Network on January 12th, 1997, becoming an early hit. The series’ popularity has also led to syndication by many local affiliates, the FX network, Adult Swim, as well as a number of international networks. The show has risen to become one of FOX’s longest-running series, and the second longest-running American animated series, behind The Simpsons. In 2007, it was named by Time Magazine as one of the greatest television shows of all time.

How I Met Your Mother is an American situation comedy that premiered on CBS Broadcasting on September 19th, 2005. The show was created by Craig Thomas and Carter Bays. As a framing device, the main character, Ted Mosby, in the year 2030 recounts to his son and daughter the events that led to his meeting their mother, which explains the title and allows for a narration in the past tense. How I Met Your Mother’s other main characters are Marshall Eriksen, Robin Scherbatsky, Barney Stinson, and Lily Aldrin. Thomas and Bays drew from their friendship in creating the characters, with Ted based loosely on Bays, and Marshall and Lily based loosely on Thomas and his wife.

Kath & Kim is a Logie Award-winning character-driven Australian television comedy series, created by Jane Turner and Gina Riley. The series revolves around the family matters and relationships of the title characters, a dysfunctional mother and daughter. Kath & Kim stars Jane Turner as Kath Day-Knight, a cheerful 50-something divorcee currently in a happy relationship with her fiance (and then husband), the prissy Kel Knight. She deals with her spoilt, ever complaining, 20-something daughter Kim Craig; Kim’s unlucky, sports obsessed second best friend Sharon Strzelecki; Kim’s estranged husband Brett Craig; and their baby daughter Epponnee Rae Craig. The series is set in the fictional suburb of Fountain Lakes, in Melbourne, Victoria, but is primarily filmed in and around areas of Patterson Lakes, Melbourne.

Tags: ABC, CBS, Comedy, NBC, Television, TV, TV Shows

When it comes to TV “viewers”, well over 1 billion people around the world watch TV every single day! In fact, according to a report done by Nielsen ratings the US is one of the highest locations of people that watch TV and next to that is Japan! This is why it makes total sense when you look on TV and there are so many different shows in different categories about different things. There has to be in order to make everyone happy! It doesn’t matter if you like comedy and watch shows like 30 Rock, How I Met Your Mother or The Office or you like Drama and your addicted to shows like Lost, Prison Break and 24, there is going to be something very fun and exciting you should be looking for when it comes to spending time online.

Recently I found some really nice sites online that are all about television shows and I wouldn’t doubt it if they even had some of your favorites! They have things like preview videos, out takes, TV show descriptions, and TV show schedules. One of my favorite things about sites such as these is the fact that they are so diverse, its crazy! Not only will you find all of your favorite shows, but you can also find shows that you haven’t ever seen before but always wanted to know a little bit more about. For example, I haven’t ever watched 30 Rock, not because I dint want to but because its on the same time as one of my shows. But I hear that it is absolutely hilarious. Unfortunately when it comes to repeats, they just aren’t available yet.

So the next best thing? Websites like this! I can find video reels, a synopsis for the show and even character biographies! So, even though I have never watched the show before, I know all about the show and honestly I wish it was on when one of my other shows wasn’t on. Well hey, at least I can look forward to the summer time when all the televised repeats come on! Then I can finally be in the “loop” when it comes to all my friends - they all are 30 Rock freaks not Grissom (CSI) or Ziva (David from NCIS) freaks! If you want to check up on your shows for scheduled viewings, new preview videos or information about some of your favorite celebrities from the show or if you want to check out something different altogether, these sites are definitely your best bet for information, entertainment and pure fun!

MEDIA METROPOLIS 

Tags: 30 Rock, ABC TV, CBS TV, How I Met Your Mother, Lost, NBC TV, The Office

NBC’s lineup in prime time is good. Their shows are watchable, enjoyable and have that touch of quirky that audiences are looking for but something keeps the NBC show schedule from dominating the ratings game. Not even Jay Leno and the perennial Tonight Show could dominate after the news spot. NBC hopes moving the extremely quirky Conan O’Brien to the Tonight Show time slot will help the Peacock TV Network beat the once quirky but now cranky David Letterman. They may be right.

Courtesy of NBC

The Super Bowl pushed their ratings to the top but this secular holiday only comes, like Christmas, once a year and unfortunately NBC doesn’t get to be Santa Claus every year since the Super Bowl is shared with two other networks. All in all, their lineup for each evening is good but it is “watchable good” or “DVR good”? If there was a network with the most shows on a DVR then NBC might win.

NBC brought back Knight Rider with celebrity stars so hot they melt the pixels on the HDTV. Deanna Russo makes us glad that HD has arrived but her piercing eyes can’t beat the all-time favorite, American Idol. The DVR needs to work overtime to get both shows on it.

NBC’s biggest winner is The Office and rightfully so. It is well-done and a sign that a great sitcom can make it against the toughest of odds. 30 Rock fits into the same mold of an excellent sitcom. Both have critical acclaim and both have and will endure. In order for NBC’s line-up to lead the ratings it needs to see what America wants to watch. Heroes started strong and has influenced movies, books and even comics. Plot twists and the lack of character underpinning makes it difficult to follow. It too is a top DVR choice simply because it goes head to head with the best drama on TV in Fox’s 24 and it takes several viewings to understand the latest twists.

What does NBC need to do to grab the ratings? It certainly isn’t producing better shows (so My Own Worst Enemy could have used some tweaks). It does quirky better than most with My Name Is Earl and Kath and Kim but is quirky enough to win the ratings race? Both shows are like watching Jerry Springer sneaking through a trailer park with his candid camera.

One of the NBC Schedule’s highest rated shows is The Biggest Loser. Why is it so popular? It is simple, we are an obese nation obsessed with food that wants to desperately lose weight while we eat pizza and watch people on TV struggle to lose weight. It is a vicarious weight loss that allows us to be a part of it while feeling none of the pain from it. The Biggest Loser is reality at its secondhand best. And isn’t that way TV is all about?

MEDIA METROPOLIS

Tags: 24, Media Metropolis, NBC TV, NBC TV Ratings, The Office

Entertainment Weekly has answered the question on everybody’s mind (ok - it’s on my mind).  Now that the writer’s strike is over, when will my show come back, and how many new episodes can I expect?

Of note (again, to me, maybe not you)

• 24 - Early ‘09 - 22 episodes (just kidding, of course 24)
• 30 Rock - April 10, 5-6
• Bones - April 14th, 4+
• CSI: Miami - March 24, 8
• Desperate Housewives - Late April, 4-5
• Heroes - Fall 2008
• House - TBD, 4-5
• How I met your mother - March 17, 9
• Lost - They’ve got 10 episodes done, will take a break in mark and finish up the 16 episode season in 13 episodes
• The Office - April 10, 5-6

What about Supernatural?  Hoping they don’t cancel it, like Prison Break.

Tags: 30 Rock, Lost, Prison Break, Television, The Office

Courtesy of ABC

ABC has the series monster lineup tonight starting at 8pm:  Ugly Betty, Grey’s Anatomy, Private Practice.  

Tags: 30 Rock, Grey's Anatomy, My Name is Earl, NBC, The Office

Well, this more compelling American adaptation of the series elucidates usual flip flops of individual office staff in a paper supply company in Scranton, Pennsylvania. In certain, with compare to the British version, Steve Carell [Michael Scott] as boss, failed to imprint the footprints as Gervais was done in its British version. Steve Carell here is a soundly con and rudely numb chief who plant his own whirl on company plans and make everyone pretend his care for subordinates. 

The Office (Courtesy of NBC)

David Brent [Ricky Gervais] is the general manager of the Slough offices of the Wernham Hogg paper merchants; Tim Canterbury [Martin Freeman] is a sales rep with a funny and natural humor; Gareth Keenan [Mackenzie Crook] is Tim’s oblivious associate and arch-rival with a somber and less striking persona; Dawn Tinsley [Lucy Davis] is a pretty looking front office babe who habitually has to put up with Brent’s attempts at hilarity and social interaction.

The office is equipped this time with a number of vibrant characters who blend with situations and honk more misery and fun that results bone tickling office humor and numerous laugh sequences. Like many shows, it has its own slipups however it is worth recommend for everyone who is curious in mingling with a gifted bit of humor.

Although it is completely crafted in a fictional and scripted manner, the presence of the camera is openly acknowledged by every character of the series that put every extra effort to make the series able to tickle your funny bone.

MEDIA METROPOLIS 

Tags: NBC, Review, The Office

As I watch several different episodes from multiple channels, trying to provide fun information, I can’t seem to get over the amount of commercials.  Obviously, the time of day brings larger and smaller audiences, respectively.  From a marketing perspective, I think of the people watching each show - or the demographic.  As an example, NBC’s “30 Rock“, targets the 18-49 year old group as does “The Office“, “CSI”, etc. 

Knowing each demographic and when they are watching is important to advertisers.  It is also very expensive.  A specific ad placed randomly throughout the day will be less expensive than primetime tv at a specific time, such as 7:00pm for CBS’s, “60 Minutes”.  According to Wikipedia, there can be as much as 15 minutes per one-hour episode of commercials.  If each commercial is 30-seconds to 1-minute, then we are witnessing 15-30 commercials an hour!  When the SuperBowl comes around, and we hear those amazing statistics about cost per ad, such as $2 Million for each commercial in the 1st quarter, I will let you know how many are for the sporting event. 

What is your opinion of having so many ads per episode?  Do you find most of them useful?  How do you view the new interactive ads asking viewers to watch an episode, find a clue, then go to their Web site and enter the answer resulting in a reward? 

In my opinion, I think that is good marketing.  Reward the viewer for enjoying not only the tv show and episode, but sitting around for the ads as well.  Everyone wins in that picture!

MEDIA METROPOLIS

Tags: 30 Rock, 60 Minutes, ABC, CBS, NBC, The Office

NBC, in its recent announcement unveiled its stirring fall lineup for the 2008-09 television seasons with some of its highly cherished and popular series and a number of new attractions altogether. In its stunning Monday schedule Chuck [8:00PM] has made its place that scripts about a retail hacker who sells computers, become a hunted man with a computer in his brain; with My Own Worst Enemy [10:00PM] where Christian Slater plays a man with two identities. In addition returning of The Biggest Loser [Tuesday 8: 00 PM] where overweight contestants are competing to win $250,000 by losing the highest percentage of their starting body weight, is also adding a gem in the schedule.

Law & Order: Special Victims Unit [Tuesday 10: PM] needs a big mention here that secures a large audience group with its unique presentation style where Law & Order franchise records the life and crimes of the elite Special Victims Unit of the New York Police Department. NBC also filled Wednesday with complete thrills and actions with Knight Rider [8:00 PM] and Deal or No Deal [10:00 PM]. The entire schedule adorns the Thursday with The Office [9:00 PM] that manipulates the daily interactions of a group of idiosyncratic office employees at paper company; and My Name is Earl [8:00 PM] narrates the tale of a young Earl gets his heart broken by the babysitter and swears revenge on her and her boyfriend.

Worth bring up the name of Friday Night Lights [Friday 9:00 PM] and Life [Friday 10:00 PM] that sticks the audiences with their bedroom carpets. Saturday itself shows its importance with some fabulous stuffs worth watching like Dateline NBC [8:00 PM] that depicts the highest-quality reporting, investigative features, breaking news coverage and newsmaker profiles. Last but not least, on Sundays you can enjoy a sea of football broadcasts with Football Night in America [7:00 PM] if simply watching a great game of football isn’t enough for you!

Officials at NBC very much assured that the schedule may create passion among the audience with all new interesting and amazing programs at your own television.

I am looking forward to this new season!

MEDIA METROPOLIS

Tags: Chuck, Law & Order, My Name is Earl, NBC, New Season, The Office