Can TV's new Terminator series succeed where last fall's botched Bionic Woman failed? Fair question.
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles is even more relentlessly grim, and way more bone-crunchingly violent, than NBC's Bionic dud. But dull it's not. Set in the aftermath of Terminator 2: Judgment Day, this show lives up to its franchise's reputation for suspenseful action.
TV's riveting incarnation of Sarah Connor, unlike the sullen cipher of the new Jaime Sommers, embodies primal urges anyone can relate to: a mother's ferocious need to survive and to safeguard her offspring.
Lena Headey (300), projecting urgent desperation amid the mayhem, is awesomely capable of filling Linda Hamilton's running shoes. On the lam from the law and from the killer machines sent back from an apocalyptic future, she is both a fox and a lioness. Acting tough may keep her alive. Enforcing tough-love discipline may keep her teenaged son alive.
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Question: Please tell me Cashmere Mafia gets better! Please! It was worst written pilot I've ever seen.
Answer: If by "better" you mean "worse," than, yes, it gets better. A lot better.
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A few ratings highlights from this Sunday evening:• The last new Desperate Housewives episode in existence delivered 19.77 million total viewers, a drop of 810,000 from Dec. 2. But I'll be damned if Mrs. McCluskey didn't have me sniffling!• NBC's American Gladiators averaged 12.04 million over its two-hour premiere, trailing Housewives at 9 in viewers and key demos, then trouncing ABC's Cashmere Mafia at 10 in both measures. • Cashmere Mafia drew 10.72 mil samplers, retaining only 54 percent of the Housewives audience.
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The "special" premiere of ABC's Cashmere Mafia has been pushed back a few days, from Thursday, Jan. 3, to Sunday the 6th (at 10 pm/ET). The Lucy Liu-starrer then settles into its regular time slot on Wednesday the 9th at 10.Similarly, NBC's The Celebrity Apprentice has had its debut delayed a week, and now launches Thursday, Jan. 10, at 9 pm. So reschedule that big viewing party you know you were planning!
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As first teased by the Ausiello Report, Lost has found a new home — Thursdays at 9 pm/ET, with the new season premiering Jan. 31 (at which time fresh Grey's episodes will have expired). That pits the castaways against CSI repeats, Don't Forget the Lyrics, Celebrity Apprentice and Supernatural. Greg Berlanti's Eli Stone (starring Jonny Lee Miller and Victor Garber) debuts that same night, following Lost.Also of note on ABC's just- (and finally!) released "strike" schedule: Oprah's Big Give, a new unscripted (and undoubtedly inspirational) series, will air Sundays at 9, pushing Housewives back an hour.More scheduling announcements:• Cashmere Mafia gets a special premiere on Thursday, Jan. 3, before claiming Wednesdays-at-10 as its regular home.• Dance War: Bruno vs. Carrie Ann steps out with a two-hour special Monday, January 7, at 8 pm, then airs weekly 90-minute episodes after that. Samantha Who? returns with fresh episodes in February. • According to Jim returns...
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Get your scorecards handy, because this is only the beginning of the strike-related fallout you'll wanna keep track of: • Although a location manager for CBS' Cane hired two security guards to help out while the show shot scenes from a long-completed script at a Hollywood cafe, 20 angry writers who were yelling and using a bullhorn brought the production to a halt anyway. • ABC has postponed the debut of its Sex and the City rip-off, Cashmere Mafia to sometime after Jan. 1. The Nov. 27 Dancing with the Stars finale is being expanded to two full hours to fill the void. • Sometime-writer Steve Carell didn't report to The Office yesterday, Rainn Wilson called in sick, and B.J. Novak and Mindy Kaling, who are members of the show's writing staff, were on strike. As a result, only two scenes managed to get shot. • Ellen DeGeneres bailed on her show yesterday "in support of her writers," her publicist said. —Ben Katner
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Lourdes Benedicto by Jeremy Cowart/ABC
Lourdes Benedicto, formerly of The Nine, 24 and NYPD Blue, has been cast as Bonnie Somerville's lesbian love interest on ABC's midseason drama series The Hot Dream Rosie Had Last Night Cashmere Mafia.... Also from the Hollywood Reporter, Melrose Place brat Laura Leighton is Daniel's Daughter in a Hallmark Channel weeper about a high-powered magazine editor who comes to some realizations about life when she takes time off to spread her father's ashes.More TVGuide.com casting news: Exclusive: Eddie Cibrian Gets Dirty, Exclusive: George Michael Gets Stoned for ABC
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Frances O'Connor, Lucy Liu, Bonnie Somerville and Miranda Otto in Cashmere Mafia by Craig Sjodin/ABC
An annual report by GLAAD says that the coming TV season is less gay than the one prior, with a total of seven series (versus last year's nine) on the five networks regularly featuring lesbian, gay, bi or transgender characters. The study notes that the only new show to feature a non-hetero person is ABC's midseason Cashmere Mafia, in which Bonnie Somerville swings from both sides of the plate.ABC retained its strong lead in featuring LGBT characters, thanks to the likes of Brothers & Sisters, Ugly Betty and Housewives (which this season has a gay couple moving into the nabe). NBC, with The Office's Oscar, is the only other major to showcase a L, G, B or T.Among recurring LGBT characters, ABC boasts six of network TV's 13. Fox has four (all fabulously animated!) and NBC three.No, I don't know in which category Betty's nephew got counted.
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David Tennant in Doctor Who courtesy Sci Fi Channel Photo
Production on Season 5 of Doctor Who has been postponed until 2010, to accommodate David Tennant's stint in the Royal Shakespeare Company's Hamlet, says the U.K.'s Sun.... MySpaceTV is now featuring "Free Earl," a sing-along with the colorful characters of My Name Is Earl. Funny stuff, check it out.... ABC's Cashmere Mafia will sneak-preview Nov. 27, then air Tuesdays at 9 pm starting Dec. 4, once DWTS goes buh-bye.... Original Apprentice Bill Rancic, comic Kim Coles and former Tony Danza sidekick Ereka Vetrini have been tapped to cohost NBC's revamped iVillage Live, which will now tape in Chicago under the name In the Loop with iVillage and return Sept. 17.... E! counts down The 12 Sexiest Jobs in Hollywood on Sept. 15. Now keep in mind, I work in New York City.
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Peter Krause by Bob D'Amico/ABC
Get lost, ABC. That was the hostile undercurrent behind much of the questioning for ABC's entertainment president Stephen McPherson Wednesday morning. We critics can be a surly group, especially this late in the TCA press tour. (ABC has the bad luck to be up to bat on the final two days of the three-week hype-a-thon.) But give us something legitimate to gripe about — in this case, the decision by Lost's producers to skip the TCA and instead address the game-changing events behind Lost's cliff-hanger at the Comic-Con fan convention in San Diego on Thursday — and you'd better watch out.One reporter even put it this way: “Are we not important enough for you?” At first, McPherson tried to shrug it off with a joke, saying that he has hired Don Imus — fired earlier this year from his radio and TV gigs for a racial slur — to join the show. (This was the closest he or anyone else came to addressing the Isaiah Washington/Grey’s Anatomy debacle during his of...
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