Alec Baldwin
"Congratulations guys, unbelievable" host Neil Patrick Harris said of seven-time Emmy champ Amazing Race at Sunday's 61st Primetime Emmy Awards. "Upsets at every turn."
Harris was joking about his loss in the supporting comedy actor category to Two and a Half Men's Jon Cryer, but also ironically summing up the mood on a night when repeat winners ruled with just a few new faces sprinkled in.
30 Rock and Mad Men repeated...
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Alec Baldwin, 30 Rock and Glenn Close, Damages
Here's who we think should and will win at Sunday's Emmy Awards (Sept. 20, 8/7c, CBS) — plus, a few dark horses to keep things interesting.
Poll: Vote for your picks to win in our Emmys section
Best Comedy Series
WHO SHOULD WIN: 30 Rock With the most talented comedic ensemble (not to mention those guest stars), better writing ...
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Breaking Bad
Looks like viewers will get to see more of Walter White's transition from meek chemistry teacher to meth kingpin: Breaking Bad has been renewed for a third season.<
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Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad
Breaking Bad kicks off its second season Sunday (9 pm, AMC) with Bryan Cranston returning to his Emmy-award winning role as Walter White — and taking the character to even darker places.
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Who says a show about a terminally ill chemistry teacher who decides to take up cooking and selling meth to make money for his family can't also be a laugh riot?
If you missed Breaking Bad on AMC last season, have no fear: We've got the pilot episode right here to whet your appetite before Season 2 begins on March 8 (10 pm/ET). The series stars Emmy winner Bryan Cranston as Walter White, who is desperate to find a way to make enough money to provide for his handicapped teenage son (RJ Mitte) and pregnant wife (Anna Gunn) before he succumbs to lung cancer. Watch the pilot after the jump, and let us know what you think.
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Bryan Cranston, Breaking Bad
Question: I imagine Bryan Cranston's win for Breaking Bad was a shocker for most people watching the Emmys. I know I did a double take. I thought my husband and I were two of the five or six people in the country who watched it. In fact, I've never met anyone who's even heard of the show, and when I tell them the plot, they cringe. This is a hard sell even by fans like myself. I can't seem to convince anyone that the story and acting around the plot, while being the darkest of dark comedies imaginable, is still hysterically funny. I'm not yet a fan of the other actors except for his teenaged sidekick, but he is fabulous. Like most critics, I'm not sure how long the show can continue to grow given its bleak storyline, but most shows really are not meant to go on forever. I'm curious to know what you think about the win. Is it just that Cranston is popular in Hollywood? Would that be enough to propel him to a win for a show nobody ever heard of or watched? Or is AMC being rewarded for ...
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Question: I'm just so happy that Bryan Cranston won the Emmy for best actor in a drama series. The category was loaded with deserving actors (Jon Hamm and Michael C. Hall are other personal favorites of mine), but it was such a nice surprise to see Cranston win. Breaking Bad seems fairly under the radar, so I was glad to see it get such recognition, and makes me very excited for the next season. Similarly, it was great to see Zeljko Ivanek win among actors with a decidedly higher profile. He created such a great character that it's unfortunate he likely won't be such a large part of the show next season. I must admit I'm pretty happy with the overall winners, though I would love to see Neil Patrick Harris or Mary-Louise Parker earn an Emmy one of these years. How about you? Any picks you found particularly irksome?
Answer: My extended reaction to the awards, and the show itself, were dealt with in a morning-after Dispatch, but I agree that giving Jeremy Piven a third Emmy when Neil
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Bryan Cranston by Mathew Imaging/WireImage.com
The 60th annual Emmy Awards set out to honor TV history and ended up making a little of its own. As expected, AMC's stylishly adult 60s-era drama Mad Men took home the best drama prize, the first ever for a basic cable series. The upstart channel delivered a much more shocking triumph in Bryan Cranston's surprise (but well-earned) win for Breaking Bad. "She's bald, too," marveled the actor, who shaved his head to play Walter White, a cancer-ravaged teacher-turned-meth dealer. Best known for outrageous comedy roles like the dad in Malcolm in the Middle, Cranston is a well-liked star who was considered an underdog in a strong field that included fellow AMC leading man Jon Hamm of Mad Men, House's Hugh Laurie (amazingly, still empty-handed), Dexter's brilliant Michael C. Hall, In Treatment's brooding Gabriel Byrne and Boston Legal's showboating James Spader.
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Dominic West by Nicole Rivelli/HBO
Its final season may have been built around a number of Big Lies, but here's the honest truth: HBO's The Wire is TV for the ages. Though it spent much of its acclaimed existence under the pop-culture radar, despite annual appearances on critics' best-of-year lists, this heartbreaking and searing masterpiece of urban decay and corruption will live on as all great literature does. Any self-respecting DVD library would want to include the five seasons of The Wire. It's that good, and that rich.Sunday’s expanded finale wraps up much of the complex story, but as usual, not in a tidy fashion. Ambiguities, moral compromises, deals struck with a variety of devils, all par for the course in David Simon’s bleak version of Baltimore. No cheap sentiment here, although there is a memorable scene involving a surprise wake at the Irish cop bar.The ironies are deep and dark as McNulty (Dominic West) sweats out the consequences of his scheme being exposed, of having created a fictional ser...
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Question: The cast and crew of Breaking Bad have done a great job — at making me depressed! I couldn't get more than halfway through the pilot, and I wanted to cry through the 30 minutes I did see! I think that for a TV show to affect me this strongly means that the writers and actors are nothing short of amazing and deserve some kudos. I never saw Bryan Cranston in Malcolm in the Middle, so I am not familiar with his comedic work, but watching him in this show made me wonder if he's capable of even smiling. So many moments in the pilot were literally heartbreaking: Being ignored by his students while trying to teach, being ignored at his own birthday party, and the one that got me the most, when his wife asked him if he used the credit card at Staples — his simple, "We needed printer paper" response just killed me. I couldn't watch any further, so please tell me that it gets better, as in lighter. Beneath all the doom and gloom, there was something about the show that I really wanted ...
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