Last Thursday, I was honored to moderate a panel at the "Made in NY" PaleyFest at New York's Paley Center, celebrating the third season of CBS's terrific cyber-thriller Person of Interest. Before the discussion with many of the show's cast and executive producer Jonathan Nolan, there was a screening of this week's episode (Tuesday, 10/9c) — the best of the season to date, and a fairly pivotal one — that is especially enjoyable in how it showcases the series' fabulous femmes fatales. With the target du jour a chameleon Casanova, the women must act as nightclub and social-media bait: an off-duty and glammed-up Carter (Taraji P. Henson), the ferociously trigger-happy Shaw (Sarah Shahi, hilariously playing against her natural beauty) and Reese's favorite fixer, the alluring Zoe Morgan (recurring co-star Paige Turco). A CBS contact refers to them as "Finch's Angels," and if they want to spin themselves off, that would be fine by me. A scene where the three ladies of the evening compare their weaponry is a riot. So's a later scene in which Shaw reflects on her disdain for relationships. (When I asked Shahi if Shaw has a soft side, she wasted no time in barking a "No.")
read moreQuestion: So we had the first cancellation of the season with Lucky 7 after two showings. There are no tears from me as I never watched it. My question is: On what planet did anyone ever perceive this show's premise to be interesting or sustainable? Out of the hundreds of pilots, it is sometimes hard to believe someone at ABC thought this was one of the best. What do you think is next? — Rob
Matt Roush: Next for ABC, or next in the long annals of "what were they thinking" pilots? (That sound you hear is ABC kicking itself for not keeping Body of Proof around as a back-up, because for the time being, Scandal repeats will be airing in place of the unlucky 7.) To be fair, Lucky was based on a more successful British series, The Syndicate, but something clearly got lost in translation. (Same thing must have happened regarding ABC's equally mediocre Betrayal, based on a Dutch series and adapted by the same exec producer, who's batting 0 for 2 right now.) Your point about the sustainability of a pilot's premise is a good one, and comes up frequently when analyzing the failure of shows as disparate as last season's Last Resort and (though it may be premature) this season's Hostages — more on that one later. But from the moment many of us saw clips of Lucky 7 at last spring's upfront presentation, it felt like nothing we could imagine almost anyone would want to see. And we were right.
read moreSend questions and comments to askmatt@tvguidemagazine.com and follow me on Twitter!
Question: This TV mid-season has brought us three dramas about serial killers: The Following, Hannibal and Bates Motel. Why do competing networks often program similar TV shows? Remember the recent explosion of shows set in the 1960s (The Playboy Club, Pan Am, The Hour)? Last year we had the more successful slate of fantasy universe-meets-modern universe shows (Grimm, Once Upon a Time). What gives? Are the networks just waiting around for word of what their rivals are doing so that they can make a duplicate? Or is it all just coincidence? — Sam
read more