The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #122

• May 4th

 May the 4th be with you!

We watched "Mad Men", which has been our habit now for many years. I think my husband, David, is getting tired of it because they don't show the 60's stuff as much any more, and the plot is not as good as it was. It's not fun watching Don have to swallow his pride just to work at his job. I still enjoy the show, though, so I'll keep watching it even if David doesn't. Although I love Jon Hamm, my favorite character is Roger, who's always funny. I have to say that when the dialogue is funny, that's my favorite thing about the show.

Then we watched "The Simpsons", which was a very odd Lego episode. We don't have kids and haven't seen any of the Lego movies, so it was a bit odd to us, but parts of it were funny.

We lastly watched "Family Guy", which had many good jokes. It seems like all three of these shows had creepy or icky father-centered storylines. Did they think it was Father's Day next weekend instead of Mother's Day???

Then I watched "The Mentalist", which I always love. I'm glad they're finally moving toward a Jane-Lisbon union. It was awesome to see Jonathan LaPaglia again, even if he was playing a bad guy. I loved him in the scifi show "Seven Days" (98-01). He still looks great!

Now I'm happy to be watching "Once Upon a Time"- love it! It was really great, and I can't wait until next week's season finale!

I've been watching some older episodes of "The Young & The Restless" on DVD... catching up on the episodes from February now.

• May 5th

Wow, lots of interviews coming up. This is what I have scheduled so far:
May 7 David Boreanaz and Emily Deschanel (Bones on FOX)
May 9 Oliver Platt (Fargo on FX)
May 9 Writers/producers of the new show "Gang Related" (on FOX)
May 12 FOX executives announcing the Fall schedule
May 13 ABC executives announcing the Fall schedule
May 13 Matthew Rhys (The Americans on FX)
May 13 Roseanne Barr (Last Comic Standing on NBC)
May 14 Claire Coffee (Grimm on NBC)
May 19 Heidi Klum and Nick Cannon (America's Got Talent on NBC)
May 21 Allison Tolman (Fargo on FX)

There'll probably be more, too!

I'm putting up our latest interviews...  Check 'em out! While I did that, I watched some of the early April episodes of "The Bold & the Beautiful". Not my favorite show, but I like the actors a lot...

I did a lot of work on the site, including putting up 3 more reviews of new shows by Sundi. 

• May 6

I don't know why the people in charge of making the actors look good think that we want to see guys with short hair or that they should pull the hair way back on either men or women. I know they want us to see their expressions, but most people do not look good with their hair pulled back. With men it makes them look like their hair is receding. With women it looks ugly. Both should wear bangs or at least have the hair forward a little bit. Foreheads are just not attractive. Shaved heads or very close-cropped hair is also not attractive. I watched part of "Magic Mike" and I don't think that Channing Tatum is all that handsome... I don't like his short hair. Look, if you have kind of boring or plain features, having close-cropped hair makes you look way more so. If you have very broad or protruding features, than having short hair just emphasizes those. I was noticing this on the soaps. Why do they always show Jacob Young and Darin Brooks and Tyler Christopher with their hair pulled back? They have looked way better in the past with their hair combed forward. It just makes them look older and less attrative the other way. Why do they have Stich on Y&R and Shawn and TJ on "General Hospital" with such close-cropped hair? They are not attractive this way. I know Stitch is supposed to be a former military guy, but he's very bland looking so he needs more hair.  Same with Shawn, he's not very handsome and needs more hair.  TJ is cute but needs longer hair as well. And then with women, same thing, they need to quite pulling their hair back and showing so much of their foreheads.  What is wrong with these stylists, anyway???

I'm having a hard time getting motivated today, so I've just been reading a few emails and not much else! Before dinner, I did a little bit of work.

After dinner, I watched "NCIS", which is usually great. That spy story was a bit convoluted, but it's always fun to see Tony in action. That little part at the end with Jimmy was awesome, too! Then came "Supernatural", one of my very favorite shows. I love all of the characters!!  Now I'm catching up on some GH so I can delete it and make more room.

I do enjoy watching GH, but most of the time the writing is like a cartoon, not like a good drama. This is why so many fans are disatisfied with the show. Sure, it's a really good, fun cartoon, but it's NOT a good drama. It's a really weak drama, written for children or very stupid adults.  Speaking of GH, why do they continue to think that we want to see good looking, likable people who are evil killers? We put up with this for years when Bob Guza was writing the show, but it doesn't mean that's what we like or want to see. Sure, we loved Sonny and Jason, DESPITE their flaws, not because of them. I really love the actors who play Sonny, Ava, Julian, and Franco, and Shawn is okay, but they're all merciless killers!  At least, Sonny rarely used to kill anyone, and it was usually bad guys. Having him kill A.J. was stupid. I'm very glad to have them reform Franco, but why make Julian and Ava killers from practically the first moment we saw them? How can we pull for Julian to reunite with Alexis, Sam or Lucas when he's, you know, evil?  It just doesn't work even though I really love the actor who plays him.  Same with Ava. The actress makes you feel bad for her, and root for her love with Morgan, but she's a killer. Then, she cheated on Morgan with his own father. How could she possibly be redeemed?  Same with Carlos. He's great with Sabrina, but...he's obviously a killer and a very bad guy, too.

Now, as far as Luke, I think it's great that they've given Tony Geary so much to do, and he's clearly enjoying being a real bad bad evil villain... but trust me when I say, it better not really be Luke. It better be someone wearing a Luke mask. Or someone controlling Luke's brain (is it Stefano from "Days of Our Lives"?).  Either way, it's silly and cartoonish. I love the actors and their characters, but they deserve real writing, not this silly, mindless fluff.  We want realistic, 3-dimensional people, not cartoon villains. I admit I do enjoy seeing Sean Kanan yell at Sonny as Sonny's conscience, masquerading as A.J....

I'm still trying to go through my thousands of emails! Luckily our volunteer Danielle has returned to us to run the Primetime Forum, so I have a little time to catch up now...

Jenn, who has been writing our GH updates for a long time, especially on Mondays, is now going to be writing them five days a week. Christine will be gone for about a month or so, but when she returns, she will do probably 2 days a week. But make sure to check them out!

Looks like we might be getting a new Bold & Beautiful update writer, too, so let's hope that works out... we're always glad to have good writers and reliable volunteers.

Speaking of updates, our volunteer Joseph has done a great job over the years with writing "Days of Our Lives" updates every single weekday, consistantly, reliably and well!  Yay!!

• May 7

"Hot in Cleveland" was great like usual...that adorable dog was the best part of it, though!

I always love "Law & Order: SVU", and it had great guest stars and good story, but this kind of episode just makes me want to take a shower. The main good part was seeing that Nick and Amanda are together!

"CSI" was great - love that "Stand By Me" opening! It's always fabulous to see Treat Williams. I wish they would give him another network show to star in. He's always fantastic.  Older but still gorgeous and such a super actor.

"The 100" was exciting and gripping as usual. I'm really starting to love that show.

Now I'm watching some DVD's from February with episodes of Y&R.  It's great to see Tristan Rogers again!

• May 8

I'm glad to hear that The CW renewed "The 100" and "Beauty and the Beast", and they're going ahead with the Flash ("Arrow" spin-off). Sad about "The Tomorrow People" and "Star-Crossed" getting canceled, though. Not surprised. I think they both could have been done better. I think "Tomorrow People" was a bit too convoluted, and the guy who plays the star looks more like a villain than a hero, among other things. From what I read, a lot of people hated Peyton List's character.  As far as "Star-Crossed", I think the premise was too stupid for people to get past. If they had made the aliens more alien-looking, then it would have made way more sense. Just looking like humans with tattoos would not be enough to make people treat them so badly. Hmm, we'll have 3 new superhero shows to watch (at least) this coming Fall, with Flash, "Gotham" and the new "Heroes". Wow!

We're watching an old episode of "South Park" from 2010 that we somehow missed the first time around...it's about KFC and medicinal marijuana. Hilarious! They're not usually so funny anymore, unfortunately.

I was just reading an article about the actors who play Will and Sonny on "Days of Our Lives", and they mentioned eating candy that fans send to them. I'm really surprised. I would never eat anything fans sent to me if I was a celebrity. How do they know it's not poisoned or laced with drugs? There are some crazy people out there.

I watched some shows to prepare for my phone call interviews tomorrow morning. I tried watching the pilot for this new show "Gang Related" on FOX that starts airing May 22, but I couldn't get through one episode. That's how awful it was. Not only is it completely predictable and unrealistic, but it's very violent and has a lot of torture. UGH.

• May 9

The calls went very well! First I spoke with Oliver Platt, who seemed very nice. He was kind of hard to listen to, though, because he stutters or hems and haws a lot. Maybe he just wasn't awake yet, I don't know! He's a great actor, though, so we'll forgive him. :) I got to ask him 2 questions, so that was awesome. My second call was with Mary Lynn Rasjkub of "24", and she was really nice, very normal and down-to-earth. She took great care at answering the questions and worrying about whether she was being accurate or not. She even shared a great tidbit from "The Larry Sanders Show", so that was neat!  Then the third call was with the "Gang Related" guys. I got in pretty early with my question, and then I hung up because I just had to get breakfast! :)

On B&B, I'm glad that with all of Hope's "pregnancy scare" that Brooke finally chided her about being more careful when using birth control... stupid that no one else even mentioned it. How does a smart, educated young women of today sleep with two guys and not use birth control? Same with Steffy when she got pregnant... UGH.

• So many announcements this week about shows. I'm disappointed that NBC is canceling "Revolution" and that ABC is canceling "The Neighbors". Still waiting to hear about "The Mentalist" and "Nashville"! I'm very grateful that most of my favorite shows have been renewed so far.

Right now I'm watching one of my favorite shows, "Unforgettable". I hope it gets renewed for next year. My only quibble is, why were they having Carrie's high school reunion, but they said she graduated in 93. So why is she going to her 21-year high school reunion? I wonder if they filmed it the previous year but then didn't air it for some reason. I have to admit that, someone getting murdered at their high school reunion has been done many times, so it's almost a cliche at this point. They really should have edited it to make it 94...

• May 10

We heard that "Nashville" was renewed, so yay!!

I was very busy today and didn't get to watch much TV. However, I did go to this fund-raising event and met a TV star, Jim Nabors!  He lives here in Honolulu. It was great meeting him. Here's the photo I took...

At the end of my perfect day, I was very excited to learn that "The Mentalist" was renewed! Woo hoo!! That makes me very happy. It's a shame they canceled "Friends with Better Lives" because I thought it was pretty funny. Oh, well, you can't have everything.

If you loved the show "All My Children" then please do check out Patti's AMC Fan Fiction because she does a great job.

I'm posting this Sunday night - I hope everyone had a nice Mother's Day!

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #121

If you like TV, you should definitely visit our site at http://tvmegasite.net!   You can see all of the new things we put up every day at our What's New Page.

I was very upset this week to learn that "Almost Human" was canceled. Sign the petition!
Join other fans on Twitter Monday (May, 5) #SaveAlmostHumantweetout (8:00-9:00 PM ET/PT): #AlmostHuman #savealmosthuman

As usual, this week I enjoyed "Once Upon a Time", "Mad Men", "The Mentalist", "Family Guy", "Castle", "NCIS", "CSI", "Big Bang Theory", "Two and a Half Men", "Supernatural" and "Unforgettable"! Everything else I'm behind on.

I thought "Two and a Half Men" was pretty cute and very funny. Sad that they killed off Professor Proton on BBT, but it was a great "Star Wars" episode. I loved seeing Stephen Martines on "Supernatural" but I don't really enjoy those back door pilot episodes too much. "Unforgettable" was a great "Die Hard" episode. That show just keeps getting better and better!

I didn't like the backdoor pilot on "CSI", either, but I loved seeing Patricia Arquette! I still really miss "Medium".

Don't forget to watch the premiere of "24: Live Another Day" tomorrow night. Read my review of it and other shows.

April 30 I got to interview Colin Hanks in a conference call, so that was exciting! He seems really great.  I was in the conference for Kiefer Sutherland the day after that, but as often happens, they had too many people and not enough time, so I didn't get to speak with him. I enjoyed speaking to him on the phone, though. He seemed like a genuinely nice person. This is the second time, by the way, that I've gotten to listen to him but not actually ask a question. I hope the third time's the charm!  Friday I was invited to a call with James Spader, but unfortunately, it was canceled. Sometimes the production schedule gets in the way of these calls.

Don't forget that actors are just people like you and me. Sure, some of them are very rich and famous, but they're still just people. You and I may get divorced, or get drunk, or get arrested, or have problems with our boss at work, but nobody cares if we do. If celebrities do these things, everyone knows. Also, people make up stuff about them all of the time, so don't believe everything you read. And lastly, they also have people who follow them around all of the time and try to push them into a fight, or buy them drinks, or give them drugs, etc.  You and I don't have to contend with these awful fans as well as the news media and the liars.  I never believe anything I read about actors unless the actor has admitted to it.  Even then, you just don't know the whole story.  I'm not saying you should feel sorry for them or anything.   They are very lucky people who get paid a lot (although they also work very hard).  Just don't believe all of the gossip. Heck, even though I speak with them a lot on the phone, I don't know them and can only guess what they're really like. They are, however, just people, like you and me. :)

This week's news page!   Don't forget to also visit our Primetime Forum because Danielle and I post lots of news and other stuff on there!

I'm very happy that NBC will now invite me to press calls. Now if only ABC, CBS and the CW would do the same! I got turned down this week by the CBS guy who handles "Young & The Restless". I have no idea why. "Bold & Beautiful", which is owned separately, did not turn me down. Go figure! Thank goodness for FOX, NBC, and all of the cable networks.

You can see all of the interviews, but check back because  I have some more to put up this week...

Sad to hear that James Scott is leaving "Days of Our Lives". I wonder if that means that EJ and Sami will leave town together? I hope so!

I was excited, however, to learn that Michelle Stafford is on "General Hospital" now. I have some suggestions as to who can play Phyllis on Y&R. There are tons of great out of work soap actresses that could handle the role. I'm sure I'm missing some, but here's a short list:  Sarah Brown, Tamara Braun, Alicia Minshew, Kelly Menigham-Hensley, Colleen Dion, Lesli Kay, Julie Pinson, Terri Garber, Terri Conn, Crystal Chappell, Robin Christopher, Brianna Brown, Cynthia Preston, or Gina Tognoni...

This week I caught up on episodes of "The 100", which is a good scifi show. They have a great cast and good suspense. It's a bit like "Lost" but without quite so much pretension.

My husband and I used to love to watch Dave Atell's show "Insomniac" on Comedy Central. We tried his new comedy show and were very disappointed. So sad... it was not funny at all. It was nice to see him in an upcoming episode of "Louie", though.

If you can watch two shows on Monday, make sure to watch "Louie" which premiers on FX, too, besides "24"!

Otherwise I've just been spending this week catching up on bit on "General Hospital" (just a few weeks behind!) and "Young and the Restless" (I'm finally in February episodes!).

We need some new people to write "General Hospital" and "Bold & Beautiful" updates so please email me if you can do even one day per week!

I'm trying to use this site to get more help for some things that need doing on our site...not sure yet if I figured it out right, so I'm waiting to hear back from Amazon.

Have a great week and Happy Cinco de Mayo!

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #120

I hope you all had a great Easter! 

I was very happy to get most of my weekly news work done and on time for a change...  The next week's will be up at http://tvmegasite.net/prime/news/news042714.shtml  All week I gather the news and episode info from the press releases, post it on our forum, and then put it into this week's news page so you know what's on this week in TV!  Thankfully I now have Danielle back to help me with the press releases and our great Primetime Forum.

I need to find some time to post for more help. We really need some more writers for the daytime soaps (recaps etc.) and I really do need a bit more help with our Primetime news. Danielle and I can only do so much! It only takes a few hours per week if you want to help out our great site.

Sunday we always watch "Family Guy" (Re-run this week because of Easter) and "Mad Men", "Once Upon a Time" and "The Mentalist" (and sometimes "The Simpsons"). Also, I record "Revenge", "The Bletchley Circle" and "Orphan Black".  This week "Devious Maids" premieres, too! Can't wait for that one.

They were all good shows. I hope that, whether or not the show is over, that Lisbon doesn't go off to another city with that guy! She barely knows him. She and Patrick need to get together or I'm going to be very pissed. It was great to see one of my favorite actors, James Patrick Stuart, as this week's bad guy. He usually does play the bad guy! He's so cute, but he's good at being bad or being like a weasel.

As always, I loved "Once Upon a Time". I like how they left the door open for Neal to maybe come back. It was great to see Rose McGowan again, and Cora's past. Also great the way that Regina and Robin Hood finally kissed! Hurrah!

I watched a lot of "General Hospital" this week. I'm about a month behind, so Lulu just found out that Ben is her son.

There are a lot of very exciting things going on with my site, but I can't talk too much about it yet.

Monday I only watched "Bones" and "Castle", two shows I do always enjoy. Bones was very good, although I admit that I got a little lost with all of those McNamaras.... Castle was hilarious with all of the 70's stuff. However, they should know that nobody said "Groovy" in the 70's... that was a 60's word.

Now I'm catching up on some episodes of "Days of Our Lives" I have on DVD...the great episodes when Nick shows up alive again. Yes, I'm very behind on Days!!

Thursday I watched "Supernatural", and then last week's "Unforgettable". I've started watching the shows I have on DVD, including some "The Young & The Restless" episodes from January!

I got a lot of work done this week, so that was great!

I'm very excited about the upcoming interviews. Thursday I get to speak with the writers and producers of the new "24: Live Another Day". Great show, I just watched the season premiere. One of them is Manny Coto, who ran "Enterprise" the 4th season (I just watched that Blu ray last week!) and ran "Dexter" and other great shows.  Then next week, I'm interviewing Colin Hanks! So that's wonderful.

"Two and a Half Men" was very funny this week! It was great to see Jamie Luner guest-star on the show.  "Big Bang Theory" is always very funny. I watched the new show "Black Box" and I didn't find it very believable. It's about a world-famous neurological expert who runs this special clinic, but she's bi-polar. I wonder if Maurice Benard is watching it?

Friday we watched "Real Time with Bill Maher" as always. He's just so funny.  We also watched a lot of episodes of "The Colbert Report" On Demand. I would say this is the funniest show on TV. We got out of the habit of watching it the past year, but now we're watching it again.

It'll be great to see the new season of "The Killing" on Netflix! August 1st seems so far away...

Apparently a lot of "Days of Our Lives" fans are really pissed at the show and at Soap Opera Digest. SOD had a cover article all about how Sami finally finds out April 21 that EJ cheated on her with Abigail. They interviewed the two actors and went in detail about it. Then it turns out that the episode was all in EJ's imagination! Now, they do these type of dream or daydream scenes all of the time, so why make a special episode about something that didn't even really happen? And worst of all, why lie to fans about it? It seems like they purposely pissed off the fans for no good reason. These are the type of things that make fans turn off their shows for good, or cancel their magazine subscriptions. People don't like being lied to or tricked. 

I hope you're all having a good Spring and having nice weather finally! Go outside and enjoy it, and get some exercise, but then come back inside and watch TV! :)

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #119

• April 13

Do you love TV and watch DVD's or streaming shows?  I'm trying to get more help for our site. We always need new volunteers! If you're interested in writing an episode guide for any of the shows we cover, let me know! It's not hard. You just watch the show and write a detailed summary. You do need to be at least a competent writer because we don't have too many proofreaders and people have to be understand what you're writing. I will buy you the TV show on DVD, or a subscription to Hulu or Netflix, whatever you need to watch it. If you already have it, then I'm happy to buy you another show or movie. Our volunteers are not paid, but I'm happy to help out with gifts and things when I can. I can buy one per month! So email me if you're interested.

One of our General Hospital Update writers is quitting at the end of April, and another one is having some surgery. We need someone to write GH updates for two or three times a week. It's not hard, but it does help if you're a good writer and fast typist. We also need a backup person for Bold & Beautiful Updates and Young & The Restless Updates. One of our writers has had health and computer problems, and another one goes out of town a lot for doctor visits.

I'm excited that Danielle is coming back to our run our Primetime TV forum! Yay! She always does a great job, and it'll free me up to do other things.  Woo hoo!

I watched a lot of "GH" and "B&B" this week on my DVR... we watched "Family Guy" as always, plus the season premiere of "Mad Men", and then I watched "Once Upon a Time" and "The Mentalist". I put "Turn" on my DVR, but for some reason, it didn't record.

I wonder if Sunday is when most people watch TV? Because it sure seems like they put a ton of the best shows on at once on Sundays. I'm glad I don't watch "Game of Thrones", too. It's just too hard. I record the shows above and usually also "The Simpsons" on my living room DVR, then in the other room I also record "Revenge" and "Drop Dead Diva" and now "Bletchley Circle" on PBS (I think a couple of other shows, too). Since I missed "Turn", I'm recording it off the On Demand channel.

"Family Guy" was pretty funny.  "Mad Men" was kind of slow...it was nice to see what happened to almost everyone (where's Harry and Betty?!?!) but it wasn't very funny or all that interesting.  There was a lot of symbolism, but who cares? 

It's always great to watch the other two shows. I hope we get to see more of Rumplestiltskin soon.

I spent a lot of time working on our usual Primetime News Pages and the star appearances.

• April 14

I got up late but wrote up the soap scoops, anyway... I felt bad that I didn't do them last week!

We have this monthly drawing and some crazy, obnoxious woman won, and she keeps bugging me about when I'll send her the prize, even though I keep telling her I'll send it when I can. I have 2 prize winners every month and I'm really busy, so I don't always get a chance to get to the post office. I tried being nice, but she's just rude...So glad that most people that email me are very nice!!  Don't forget to enter our April drawing before the 25th!

We watched "The Simpsons" tonight from On Demand. It was really good for a change! Almost like they combined it with "Futurama". I sure enjoyed it.

Now I'm catching up on some episodes of "Criminal Minds". I've got most of the season on DVD from the other room's DVR, but I missed a couple of episodes. They re-ran one so I'm watching that, and then I'll watch one on Amazon Prime. They always do a good job with the show, and of course I love Shemar and the other actors!

• April 15

This week I watched the DVD for the 4th season of "Enterprise" so I can write up the review for our site.  It was really fun and reminded me of the original "Star Trek". They did a great job with it. The ending was a bit sad, though.  I need to go back and watch the first 3 seasons, too. I watch some of it but all.  In the past, when I would record stuff on tape, I had it set up so I would record multiple shows, and some of them I never got around to going back to watch because I was just too far behind.

I had to take some time to organize my DVD's this week so I would know which episodes of the shows I'm missing and which I have, all that sort of thing. I hate watching shows out of order.  Whew! So much trouble just for "watching TV". LOL!  This is one problem with TV today -- too serialized, and if you miss an episode or watch out of order, it can get confusing. So people stop watching.

I loved "Supernatural" this week as always. It was a very cool episode. It had Dean in the shower a lot, which is always preferably... For some reason, the cast of the show was tweeting about it with William Shatner. Not sure why he was involved...I guess he's a fan? He seems to tweet about all of The CW shows. What's that about?

I watched the new show "Friends with Better Lives" and despite it's dumb title, it's pretty funny. I will have to keep watching. Most sitcoms are lame, stupid or not funny. To me, at least!

• April 16

Mostly this week I've just been working on the site, and watching the soaps, and the Enterprise DVD.

I've also been reading this book "The TV Showrunner's Roadmap" by Neil Landau. It's all about how to make a TV show. Very interesting reading. It's like a textbook for anyone looking to get into TV as a writer, director or showrunner. Very eye-opening.

Please consider doing one of our Volunteer jobs. Most of them don't require more than a few hours per week of your time. Most don't require great skill or knowledge.  We're very happy to give gifts to our volunteers at the end of the year, and I think this year should be especially good. However, the best reason to help out is that we need you!  We're very grateful for all of our great volunteers. We currently have about 30 wonderful, hard-working volunteers.

• April 17

I always love the scifi shows, so it's great to have shows like Continuum, Warehouse 13 and Orphan Black back.

Still waiting to hear which shows will be canceled. This is a good list of predictions.  Even though it says October, it's current... I think they have a more positive outlook on the shows and their status than Zap2it does, but I have no idea which is more accurate.  TVLINE seems to think that it can go either way as to whether "The Mentalist" will be canceled, whereas Zap2it seemed indicate it was probably canceled, so who knows what to believe!!??!

It was a funny "Hot in Cleveland" this week. Loved seeing Susan Lucci!!

• April 18

I got to interview a very funny and kind lady this morning, Jenn Lyon! She plays the sitcom wife of George Lopez of "Saint George" on FX. She also played last year's Lindsey on "Justified"! It was a very fun call.
This one and the one I did last week with Costa Ronin of "The Americans" were both one-on-one calls. I hope to put up their interviews in a day or so. Sorry it's taken so long! Just so much to do. I'm hoping that this week I can start working on the 2500 emails in my inbox. :(

Next week I'm going to be interviewing Colin Hanks! Can't wait. So cool. He's awesome in this new "Fargo" miniseries on FX. He was great on "Dexter" and "NCIS", too. I always thought he was Tom Hanks' younger brother, but he's his son! Silly me :) I'm over 50, but I tend to think of myself, and anyone who was on TV, as young, even though they're older now. I still think of Tom Hanks as that guy from "Bosom Buddies" in the early 80's, even though I've seen him in a zillion movies and watched him get older just like the rest of the world.

I hope everyone had a nice Easter, Passover and the rest! I hope you're having nice Spring weather, too.

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #118

• April 6

There was no "Mentalist" this week -- too bad!

We watched "Family Guy" (one of the few shows my husband will watch any more, besides sports and news) and it was pretty funny... especially the part where they were making fun of the way people treat soldiers, but there were LOTS of great jokes in the episode. I could have done without the gross herpes stuff, though.

"Once Upon a Time" was as enjoyable as usual. Check out the link to the left because we have a new section of our site devoted to that show! Also Perception and Person of Interest.

"Turn" recorded on my DVR, but I haven't watched it yet. Maybe tomorrow.

I spent a lot of time this evening watching General Hospital and The Bold & The Beautiful, to make more room on my DVR. I enjoy both shows, but B&B is still too repetitive and is slow to get around to things. I know a lot of people complain about them making Aly crazy, but they did use good history to do it, like showing the clips from back when her mom died, how she tore up Taylor's wedding dress.  The actress who plays her does a great job, too.  Right now I'm on the early February episodes, slowly catching up!

I really hated seeing Robin leave, and it was stupid the way they did it because they never said why she couldn't keep in touch with her family. In this day and age, with the technology they have, and especially with the wealth of the Cassadines, they could easily have Robin calling and Skyping all the time, and them flying back and forth. I understand the actress is going to be gone, but why not just say that all of that is taking place off-screen? Or they could easily have filmed a few scenes of her ahead of time, Skyping with Emma. It makes no sense that Robin would run off to help them, even if Jason's life is at stake. It is not at all in her character to do that to her family.  Not even to mention that she should have told Anna and they could have come up with a way for her to infiltrate the Cassadine's lair and rescue Jason from them, so she wouldn't have to leave. I mean, apparently it's not even a "lair" but just the same hospital that Silas' wife was being kept in? In New York City? So Robin is in the same state, which makes it even easier for her to go back and forth. Just ridiculous.  The writers really think that we're idiots. I really love the actors and SOME of the writing, otherwise I'd just give up watching GH in protest of how stupid the show is. Even though I've watched since 1984.

• April 7

I didn't send out my newsletter scoops this morning... so sorry. I have been trying to change my sleep schedule, so it's always veriable, and I didn't get up early enough today to do them like I'd wanted. Definitely will have them next week! Don't forget that you can always read the soap spoilers/scoops by going to our page http://tvmegasite.net/day/news2.shtml  Those are the links I use, anyway...

I'm on Facebook a lot (too much, really!). There's this group I sometimes go on, for the Microsoft program Expression Web.  For our site, we use Microsoft Frontpage, which is an old program that they don't make any more. The last version was in 2003, I believe. A lot of people hate that program (but then again, a lot of people hate Microsoft, too) but I like it because it's very easy to use. It's a lot like Word, but it just has a few more added things to use.  After they stopped making it, they came out with Expression Web.  Unfortunately, in order for me to have volunteers who work directly on our site, they have to use MS Frontpage or Expression Web.  Frontpage uses something called Server Extensions that let it do all these great things I like.  If you tried to use some other program to access our site to edit it, it would really mess up the server extensions. At least that's what my webhost guy tells me! Anyway, Expression Web can be used as well on my site. I tried that program but I don't really like it. I'm not keen on using new software, even if it's somewhat similar to the old one.  I got a new laptop with Windows 8 a few months ago, and let's put it this way, it was tough at first, going from XP to 8.  I'm not one of those people who thinks it's too hard and wants to upgrade to 8.1 so I can have the start button back. Pfft. That's silly. There's a start menu on the Charms Bar so that's fine.  Using programs like MS Paint was hard at first because the menus are very different and it has a lot more features than the old version. But eventually I learn them and like them if I have to. I was worried that by upgrading to Windows 8, my new laptop might not run Frontpage, but it does. Anyway, this is all a rather long-winded way of explaining why I'm on this particular Facebook group.

So anyway, this one guy said something about my site, but I didn't understand what he was saying. He's a bit hard to understand, at least for me. So I asked him what he meant and eventually he answered... and I still didn't really know what he meant. I think now I get that he's making suggestions about how my site could make more money etc.  Thing is, people are always making these suggestions... I don't mind ANY suggestions, and I appreciate them, but a lot of people seem to think that somehow I'm being rude if I don't run with their ideas. I mean, first of all, my site has been around since the 90's, so I've thought of most of the ideas that people come up with, or one of my volunteers has. If I don't use that idea, there's a good reason. Either it's not something I want to do, or it would require more time or money than I have, to do it.  The thing is, although I wouldn't MIND making more money with my site, it's not my main goal. My main goal is to have a site that people come to because they're looking for information about TV. I want it to be a good resource. That's all! It's my legacy. I work on it full-time and many other people have worked on it full- or part-time, for over 20 years. It's a grand collaboration between TV fans, for other TV fans.  It's a smaller-scale version of IMDB or Wikipedia. If I had more money or more volunteers, I would make it as great as those sites. I can't, though, so we just do what we can...  the ad money we do get is pretty good. It pays for the site's hosting and other expenses. That's fine with me! I don't need to draw a salary. Sure, it would be nice if it made more money, if we could all get rich from it. I would love to have the money to travel to all of the fan conventions for the TV shows, like Comic-Con in my hometown of San Diego, or the GH Weekend in L.A. etc. Those are fun, and I could get great photos and videos, and more interviews.  But I'm not going to sacrifice the rest of my site or force my current readers to pay for content (which they probably wouldn't, anyway), in order to do that. I would love to take off the ads all together, but then I'd have to pay for everything myself, which I'd rather not do... So unless some rich guy out there would like to buy the site from me (and it would take quite a lot) or invest in my site...it is what it is.

Of course we're always looking to grow and improve the site! That's why, besides keeping up with most of the things we already do every week - news, spoilers, appearances, transcripts, updates, recaps, Best lines and more - we're also building new pages for newer shows, and putting the newer design on our older pages. These are the things we do, all of the time. And when I saw "we" I mean, myself, Gisele, and all of of our great volunteers! We have a lot of people who work on our site, and we're so grateful for them. If you see a name on the site that's not mine, then it should have one of their names. We always need more people, though, so please email me suzanne@tvmegasite.net if you can help out! Even an hour a week would be a great help. Here's the list of volunteer jobs we have available.

What I would MOST like help with is our primetime news forum and pages because I spend so much time on them and still always have more to do, and I can't say I really enjoy most of that, but it needs to be done... I would rather spend my time putting the newer design on all of our pages, and building pages for new shows etc.

Today I've been working on our monthly giveaway page, so please do make sure to enter every month to win a DVD or other prizes!

Wow, tonight's "Bones" was a fantastic episode about marijuana. I love that they sometimes tackle controversial subjects.

Tonight I was also watching a lot of the "The Bold & The Beautiful" episodes from the past month. It's weird because Ridge is being played by Thorsten Kaye, so he's very different. It helps when he says, "I've changed", that's for sure.

I watched "TURN" and it was really good. I don't have time to watch any more shows regularly! Gack!

• April 8

This morning, I interviewed the executive producer of "Kitchen Nightmares". I think he kind of thought I implied something that I didn't, but hopefully it was ok :) I've never seen the show before, but I saw the episode this week where they go back to this awful place in Sedona that they went to last year. Crazy people! I don't watch reality shows, but it was fun to hear about them on this call. What struck me as very weird is that people actually go there to see the place, even though they know now that the place has terrible service and lousy food, with long wait times. Why would you go there to eat?? LOL!!!

• April 9

I interviewed Billy Bob Thornton this morning about his new show "Fargo". It was great to talk to him, and he couldn't have been more nice or normal on the phone with all of us. He's probably the most famous person I've ever interviewed, but I guess fame does depend on things like your age, how much TV you watch, whether you go to movies, etc. He's the 4th Oscar winner I've interviewed, but unlike the others, he won for writing, not acting, even though he starred in "Sling Blade" as well as wrote it. He's really great in "Fargo".

I watched NCIS, and it was mostly a good episode, but I didn't like when Gibbs tortured a suspect (somewhat - he was in the hospital and he poked the guy, who's just had knee surgery, in the knee).  Even worse, it turned out he wasn't the guy they were looking for. Did we see Gibbs apologize to the guy? NO, of course not. I believe one of Gibb's rules is "never apologize".  Still, I hate when TV shows have police abusing their power like that.

I tried to find a website that measures or quantifies fame, or ranks the most famous people, but I couldn't. I think that's very odd!

"Hot in Cleveland" has been great this season! So funny. It was great to see Craig Ferguson on this week's episode. I used to love him on "The Drew Carey Show" years ago.

"CSI" this week was just gross...all about cannibals.  "Law & Order: SVU" wasn't much better. I hope they're done with abusing Liv. I don't like seeing torture and abuse.

• April 10

This morning I interviewed Martin Freeman, who will also be starring in the new "Fargo" series (which is great, by the way). You may know him from "Sherlock" where he plays Dr. Watson, or from the Hobbit movies, where he plays Bilbo! That was very exciting and he was also very very nice.  He sounded like just your average British bloke.

Later on, I interviewed Costa Ronin, the handsome guy who plays the Russian Oleg in "The Americans", also on FX. He has a Russian accent, so I hope I'm able to transcribe it properly. I had a one-on-one interview with him, so I got to ask him many questions. You can read all of these interviews (except for Ronin's, which I haven't yet transcribed) on our Primetime Articles Page.

Luke is still acting weird on GH, I see. I wonder if he's really Bill Eckert? Luke mentioned "The Outback" as if that was still around on the show, like it was in the early 90's. Bill Eckert, played by the same actor who plays Luke, and supposedly his cousin but looks a lot like him, died, but as we know, most people come back to life on GH. They would have to somehow have messed with his brain, though, because Bill was a nice guy. Also, it makes no sense that he hates Sonny, who was not yet around then... it will be interesting to see who is really masquerading as Luke or if someone has messed with Luke's head.

Wow, pretty surprising that Stephen Colbert is going to be taking over for Letterman. I hope he'll still be funny!

"Big Bang Theory" and "Two and a Half Men" always make me laugh, and this week's episodes were great. It was great seeing Mila Kunis, too! I really don't watch any other live action network comedies. Most of them are not very funny.

• April 11

I'm very glad that "Unforgettable" is back! CBS has not really given the show much of an audience, constantly pulling it off the air... I really enjoy it.

Bill Maher's Real Time on HBO was great as always.

Today I got the last two episodes of "Warehouse 13" in the mail...boo hoo!! I hate to watch it because then the show will be over.

I had a lot of family stuff to do today...it was fun but put me further behind on this week's work!

• April 12

I have a bunch of interview transcripts and reviews to put up this weekend..Check out this week's news and schedule!

I don't know when I'll be able to catch up on "Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." since I just found out that the latest Captain America movie affects that show! I don't know when I'll see the movie, so...

I updated my "What I Watch" Page so you can see what I watch, what I recommend, etc. 

Have a great week, everyone!

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #117

I must apologize because last week I inadvertently published my PERSONAL blog post here... I must have been really tired! :)

• March 30

I usually spend all week copying the press release from the various web sites and pasting them into our Primetime TV Forum
Then I paste them into a notepad page for each network. Then I put them on the next week's news page. This week's page was at http://tvmegasite.net/prime/news/news033014.shtml and next week's will be at http://tvmegasite.net/prime/news/news040614.shtml  They're always numbered by the date.
Usually I do that last part on Saturday, but sometimes I just get busy or forget, and then I have to do it late, on Sunday, like I did this week! Yikes. Then I'm scrambling around, trying to get everything done.  So I did a lot of that today.

As usual on Sundays, we watched "Family Guy". It was okay. We skipped "The Simpsons". It just hasn't been very funny lately so we gave up on it.  Then later I watched "The Mentalist" and "Once Upon a Time". I always enjoyed "The Mentalist". No matter what, it makes me smile and chuckle and get involved in the stories. I don't know why it's ratings are so poor, unless people just got tired of waiting for them to catch Red John? I've really enjoyed it all the way through. I know that some people haven't liked the way they got rid of the CBI and had the characters join the FBI (I admit that was pretty far-fetched). Still, I love the way this show is written, and I love the characters.  I always love "Once Upon a Time", too, but this episode was too sad. I'm glad they brought back Rumplestiltskin, my favorite character, but not happy that they had to kill off his son to do it (he's my second-favorite character!).  Boo, hiss!! I loved it when MichaelRaymond-James showed up last season. He was so great on his two previous shows, "True Blood" and especially "Terriers". I was so upset when they canceled "Terriers", and now this. Boo!!!

Now I'm watching some of the soaps from February that I'm behind on (mostly "Bold & Beautiful" and "General Hospital"), to clear them off my DVR.  I can't say I really love either show...

No conference calls early tomorrow, thank goodness! I was invited to 3 on Wednesday, but hopefully I have other volunteers covering those now... I'm hoping to interview Graham Yost of "Justified" and the others will interview Keith Urban of "American Idol" and Simony Barry and Rachel Nichols of "Continuum"!  Then the following Wednesday, I get to interview Billy Bob Thornton! He'll be starring in "Fargo" on FX. That should be thrilling!

• March 31

I spent my morning working on the soap scoop newsletters and sending those out, and posting them to our forums. I also updated a few pages on the site and posted on Twitter and Facebook. Work work work! :)

I've been watching soaps while I did all that. I'm in February still with most of the soaps, although "Young & The Restless" a bit further behind (still in January I think). I really hate how they're having Robin leave again on GH. It makes no sense that she couldn't fly back and forth or have her family with her, or have them visit. Stupid! And I have to agree with Carolyn Hinsley that all of the soaps were pretty boring and un-romantic on Valentine's Day and around that time. The soaps need to do two things to bring back viewers: have more interesting (unpredictable, but not stupid) and realistic stories (no more soap cliches of coming back from the dead, evil twins, baby switches, ridiculous coincidences, etc.), and bring back lots of romance. Otherwise, why bother? Just cancel them all now. They really underestimate soap fans and think we'll watch any old rehashed crap. It's very sad. Don't they get that we're the same people that also watch the wonderful soapy dramas on primetime? We know what good writing is. Look at Good Wife, Vampire Diaries, and many other great shows.

This evening we watched "Real Time with Bill Maher" on HBO. I record it on my DVR Friday nights. We just love his monologue and the "Real Time" segment, which are usually pretty funny.  Now I'm watching "Bones", which is always enjoyable because of the colorful characters and fun cases. Poor Finn, though!

"Castle" was another re-run. They sure show a lot of those lately...

I was behind a bit on "Justified", so I had fun catching up tonight on "On Demand" with the last few episodes. Such a great show. Every episode is a pure gem. I sure wish all shows were like that one.

I also watched the next episode of "The Americans", which FX sent to me. It's a really good show, too, but this week's episode is really weird, and kinda gross. I don't understand the ending at all, either.

No "Supernatural" this week? UGH, that's disappointing...

I had trouble sleeping, so I got up and started watching "Magic Mike". It was so boring. I only sat through a little bit of it before going back to bed. I didn't realize it was a Soderburgh film. I don't like his... Also, I thought Matt Bomer had a larger part that he did, so I was disappointed. That guy Channing Tatum is a good dancer and all, but he's too bland to me.

• April 1

I watched some of the B&B and GH from February. Later I watched NCIS, which was pretty good. It was the second half of the two part pilot for the new spin-off of New Orleans. I don't know yet if I will watch that one. I do love Scott Bakula.

Then I ran the transcripts... I saw parts of the GH 51st anniversary episode. I really hate that they've killed off AJ again. First of all, I didn't like the way Ava manipulated Sonny into shooting AJ, and I find it hard to believe that Sonny would do that to Michael. But most importantly, shame on the writers for killing off one of the last remaining Quartermaines. I did like how they focused on Monica and brought back Emily, with a nod toward Lila, Edward and Alan. I liked what they did with the three Carly's, too, although it was kind of contrived. I would have liked to have seen more of Luke, Anna and other favorites, but it was great seeing Scotty, Bobbie, Lucy, Kevin, Mac and Felicia!

I was watching the sitcom "About a Boy" On Demand last night. It's not all that funny, but it's amiable and fun to watch.

• April 2

I was supposed to do this interview this morning but went back to sleep instead... actually, I was filling in for a volunteer who was supposed to do it. It was way too early for me. I have one tomorrow that I don't want to miss and it's even earlier. GROAN. That's the only problem with living in Hawaii because calls that are at a normal time on the mainland are super early here. I'm not a morning person, although I'm trying to change that.

I've been watching B&B and GH so far today, to make room on my DVR. I mostly enjoy GH... B&B is just the same stuff over and over, so it's not so interesting.

I think the TV networks need to make more shows that are non-serialized, like they used to. I mean, sure, it's great for them if they have a successful one like Lost where people watch every week, but how many of those shows can you sustain? Not many, I don't think, so people fall behind or lose interest. I like this new show "Crisis" but I don't think it's going to last very long. Like so many others this past season, like Betrayal, Hostages etc. it just requires too much commitment. If you look at CSI and shows like that, you can watch them any time and you don't have to worry about what you missed. Or even if you look at NCIS, the main characters have some stories and history but it's not pivotal, usually, if you miss an episode or view them out of order.

I took a little time tonight to email each of the major networks to let them know which shows I watch and which ones I'm particularly invested in, and asked them not to cancel them! It may sound silly, but I do this every year. They do read viewers' letters and emails. It may not help; I don't know. It does at least make me feel like I tried. I'm most concerned about The Mentalist on ABC, Almost Human on FOX, the scifi and fantasy shows on The CW, and Revolution and Dracula on NBC. There are a few others I like, too, but those are the main ones. You can write ABC an email by going to this page http://abc.go.com/feedback ; CBS by going to http://audienceservices.cbs.com/feedback/feedback.htm ; The CW by going to http://www.cwtv.com/feedback/comments/ ; NBC by going to http://www.cwtv.com/feedback/comments/ ; and you can just email FOX (Wow!) by emailing them at askfox@fox.com   And by the way, you can ask FOX questions at that address, too. They are very good at answering and always have been.

I have 2 DVR's and the one here in the living room drives me crazy. It has a lot less room than the one in the bedroom, and I'm always filling it up. What's irritating is that when it gets about 95% full, it says that it's all filled up, even though it has a couple of hours left on it at that point. It brings up a little blurb that tells me that, and I used to panic when I see the little blurb. Another thing. I was going to watch a half hour show On Demand, and it told me I couldn't do that because it would mean switching the channel away from 2 shows I was recording, even though they weren't recording for 20-something minutes! It has no concept of "watch a little now and a little later", I guess. So in order to watch the On Demand show, I had to cancel one of my recordings. I went back to re-record it and then it told me I couldn't record it because I had no room! Grrrr....

This week I also watched NCIS, which is always entertaining. And then tonight I saw Law & Order: SVU and CSI as well. CSI was a really good episode with a hostage situation, and Billy Miller guest-starred so it was cool to see him.

Law & Order SVU was tough to watch.  There are some legal things there they promoted that I kind of have trouble with, but I'm not going to go on and on about it...

• April 3

This morning I had a great conference call with Graham Yost, who runs and writes "Justified" on FX. He was really funny and interesting. I love that show! I also had one with the stars of "Bitten" on SYFY but for some reason I kept thinking it was tomorrow so I totally forgot to go to it. What a dummy! Oh, well, I'm way behind on watching it, anyway.

I watched quite a lot of GH today to make more room on my DVR. I have over 50 DVD's to watch besides that!

Although I'm behind on watching the soaps, I see parts of them on the TV while I run the transcripts. There were some great scenes this week where Ridge and Rick were fighting. It was Déjà vu because Thorsten Kaye is playing Ridge and Jacob Young is back as Rick. I remember when they used to argue on "All My Children", so I kept expecting Ridge to call him "Junior" the way Zach did. So funny. I wish they would bring on Michael E. Knight (Tad), though. I really miss him.  Especially now that Cady is going to be on Y&R, I have to say that he's the one I miss the most now from AMC. I also miss a few others but he's the most missed.

I enjoyed watching "Big Bang Theory" and "Two and a Half Men" as usual!! They're always funny.

• April 4

This morning I'm speaking with the stars of "Warehouse 13". I love that show!  So sad that it's almost over. The call is rough because we all know it's the last one and they're so nice, and funny. For them the show's already over so it's extra sad.  They sent us the next 4 episodes, and then there's just 2 more after that. They're great episodes, too.

Later on, I watched last week's "Justified" and also next week's (the season finale, which airs on Tuesday). It was quite fabulous. I just love this show so much that I can't even explain it. It's riveting. I can't watch anything else while these characters are on the screen. I love them all, even the awful ones. And the best one is Raylan, of course. He's just so wonderful. SIGH :) Next year I'll be even more sad around this time, about the end of "Justified". I can't even think of it right now.  I ordered all of the show's DVD's so I can review them for the site and re-watch them all.

There's this interesting thing going on in L.A. in May. Instead of the usual science fiction convention, they're doing one-act scifi plays, starring many popular actors who've appeared in scifi shows and movies. http://www.sci-fest.com/

I was just reading this interesting article in Soap Opera Digest. This guy, Jeff Giles, interviewed lots of people who had been connected with "One Life to Live" and wrote a book about it (I need to read that book!). He mentions in the article that he didn't get to interview either of the actors that played Todd, and he implied that Trevor St. John was not polite about it when he turned him down (although Roger Howarth was). Wow! That's a shame. Sounds like he's kind of a jerk. Too bad. I liked both of them...

I'm catching up on the DVD's the PR people have sent me to review. I watched the latest episode of the show "Pioneers of Television" from PBS, which is all about stand-up comedians who went on to sitcoms. Those are always good shows. Now I'm watching "Fargo", which will air on FX. Great new series, like the movie, starring some amazing actors, some of whom I get to interview next week! It's good, but I'm not sure if I really should be watching it before I go to bed because it's so dark...

I apologize for missing some of the transcripts lately, but our local stations have been pre-empting shows, which is really annoying. I'll eventually get the missing episodes when our volunteer Wanda sends me copies. She will hopefully send them someday, along with the ones from last Summer that we're missing.

• April 5

I read that John Barrowman is going to host a singing show this summer, "Sing Your Face Off". That's very odd (and not just because of the strange title). I guess because he sings and is on some similar show in the UK. He's such a fantastic actor, but he's also a great singer. I'll have to make sure to watch that one since he's one of my favorites. Even though I don't normally watch reality or game shows!

I've been watching the DVD's that were sent to me to review. I love this new show "Fargo" on FX, especially the actors, but there was one part I didn't like where they killed a dog. They need to stop using that horrible plot device in TV and movies!

I found out from Twitter that actor Ronn Moss is into guns. That's disappointing. Oh, well, it's not like a big deal. At least he was nice enough to reply to me when I asked him about it.

For once, I got our TV news and schedule pages done on time!

I can't believe that "Being Human" is ending on Monday. So sad! I'm still in denial about it.

I just read an article in "Entertainment Weekly" about the return of "24" on FOX. That should be good! Sounds fascinating.

Tomorrow I need to start watching some more soaps from my DVR and then finish watching these DVD's.

Don't forget to watch our "What's New" page for all the latest changes we made and stuff we added to the site.

Have a great week!

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #116

We had company the week of March 16, so I didn't watch too much TV.  We did watch "Family Guy" with our friend, but it wasn't a very funny episode. Later we also watched "The Mentalist" and some of "Justified". Our visitor is not the type to show much emotion, so I have no idea what he thought of the shows! He's from Germany.  Most of the shows he watches are in German so I don't know them, of course.

The past two weeks, I watched some of soaps from January. I'm still very behind. I run the soap transcripts every day, but our local station didn't show Y&R Thursday and Friday due to basketball. That was really annoying because the rest of the country got the show, but not us. I have to hope a friend can eventually send me the shows on DVD so I can run the transcripts for those episodes.

Also, I haven't been able to send out the site's soap scoops newsletters... just for one reason or the other, I stayed up too late and didn't get it done, and then ended up sleeping in the next day. I will definitely send them out tonight.

I have a lot of interviews the past week or so. I should have more up soon. Check it out!  The only problem with these is that they tend to be around 7 or 8 am my time.  This coming Wednesday, we have three all at the same time, but I think we will get them covered.

I've been enjoying having all the shows back this Spring!  Unfortunately, it also means that we're getting closer to May when we know which shows will be canceled. It's a sad part of the year for TV fans. I watched 4 of the new episodes of "Warehouse 13" that are coming up in April. They are really great episodes, but now there are only 2 more left for me to watch, then the show will be over. Boo hoo!

I've been thinking a lot lately about heroes and villains, especially on TV.  The past few years, TV seems to want to give us characters that are not really "heroes" but just "protagonists" or "main characters". People that are not really good people. They would probably just say they're more realistic. But how much reality do we really want on TV?

Personally, I like TV and movies to be larger than life. If I want reality (not reality shows, which are not real), I will just go out in the world and talk to real people, or watch the news, or go on the internet. TV should be, first and foremost, entertaining. That means I want characters to be heroic and good. They can have bad guys, and the good guys can certainly have some shades of grey... but I don't want certain lines crossed.

I don't know, perhaps I'm in the minority about this. The show "Chicago PD" got renewed, so it must have gotten good ratings. I couldn't stomach it because it was about crooked cops. That's why I stopped watching "CSI: Miami" because the cops got worse and worse.  It really does depend on the show, though.

There was a show years ago that starred Simon Baker and some other fine actors as jewel thieves and other "bad guys". I didn't watch it for more than one episode even though I liked the actors. I didn't want to see charming guys that kill people. I don't mind a show like "Leverage" where they used to be bad guys, but now they're doing good things. None of them were killers (well, maybe Elliot, but he was a soldier).

I don't mind cartoon bad guys or ones who are more like comic book heroes, like "Dexter". Besides, that was a comedy. Dexter did kill people, but he only killed bad guys (at least until near the end of the series - LaGuerda was an exception) and he tried hard to be a good person. Even though Simon Baker's character in "The Mentalist" is not a strict good guy, all of the other people around him are, and Jane is definitely seen as someone who is not normal.  Even when he wanted to kill Red John, it was understandable because the guy had killed his wife and kid.  He didn't start out the show killing someone and then going, "Oh, well". Things have to be done in context, and in character. We have to get to know the character first, and like that person, before they do bad things, and then they better not be a cop or otherwise abusing their power.

I think we all still want heroes because why have shows like "Once Upon a Time" where Prince Charming is always a hero (he definitely makes mistakes sometimes) and the bad guys are sometimes not so bad.  It's good to have grey characters, but they'd better not cross a certain line. We don't mind "evil" characters becoming less evil, but we don't really want our "heroes" to be too tarnished.

At least I don't. You may think differently. I never watched "Breaking Bad" or "The Shield" because to me they were not shows that had people I could root for.  What do you think? Email me about it or post on our Talkin' TV group on Facebook.

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #115

I still haven't watched last week's Oscars! LOL!

This week started out right with the return of some of my favorite shows.

"The Simpsons" was pretty funny (it's always great to see Sideshow Bob!), but "Family Guy" was hysterical. We were in stitches with all the jokes in that one. Finally!  The show hasn't really been very funny for the past year so we're glad to see it's really funny again.

It was great to see "The Mentalist", especially to see Rigsby and Van Pelt back again. What a shocker of an ending, too!

"Once Upon a Time" is back and I'm so happy about that. It was great to see Chris Gorham, even if he did turn into a flying monkey! I hope they bring him back again.  Love the episode and the shocker ending, too. The show always rewards us with so many awesome twists and turns and great guest-stars and wonderful moments. I sure hope they can bring back Rumplestiltskin soon, though. He's my favorite part of the show.

I was just glad to get so much work on the site today... make sure to check out our news pages every week, and also our Primetime Forum.

If you watch "General Hospital" we would really use your help. We need some more volunteers to watch the show and write daily updates. These are our detailed summaries . We have 3 people writing them and none of them really want to do it every week and have trouble meeting the daily deadlines.  Please help!  You must be able to watch the show at least once a day and write a detailed summary (and write well enough to have good grammar, spelling, and punctuation). Email me if you can help out!

This morning I'm gathering the news and spoilers around the net about the four remaining soaps and then posting it to our newsletters and forums. I try to do it every Monday, but some weeks I don't do it for one reason or another, like being sick or having other work to do.

"Teen Wolf" is always fantastic, but this week's was even more so than usual! Wow!

I will miss Beauty & The Beast. They had a good season finale. I hope it's not the series finale.

I had an interview this morning with the creator of "Psych" on USA, Steve Franks, as well as the two stars James Roday and Dulé Hill. I've spoken with them before, and it's always fun. It was a bit sad, though, knowing that the last episode is coming. I got to see it, and it's really good! I'm so sorry to see it end. I reviewed the last episodes.

I enjoyed this past week's "Law & Order: SVU". I kind of figured that Rollins was working for someone and not just totally going off on her own, although of course the big twist was that she kinda did cross the line before having to work undercover. I love Donal Logue - such an amazing actor! He was so great in this role. I hope they bring him back or better yet, spin him off into his own series.

CSI was great as ever, too. Gene Simmons was on it, though, and he's a terrible actor.

I've seen a few little snippets of the soaps while I run the transcripts for our site. What is up with Luke on GH? I wonder what the Cassadines or someone else did to him. Creepy that he hit on Kiki.  I also saw how "Days of Our Lives" tried to make us think that EJ was responsible for trying to give Abby an abortion against her will! That would really earn him another shot in the head...

I didn't watch as much TV as usual this week because we were having a visitor (a friend from Germany). He loves golf, and they don't show golf too much on his country's TV, I guess, so he likes to watch the Golf Channel a lot.  We have to indulge our house guests! :)

I caught up on "Justified" episodes from the past month on our cable's On Demand. I so love that show! It's always so shocking and makes me chuckle as well.

Have a great week and have fun watching TV! Happy St. Patrick's Day, too!

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #114

• March 2

The Oscars are tonight. I always DVR them and then watch when I get a chance. I had to stay off Twitter and Facebook all night to avoid spoilers. Not that I care all that much because I haven't see any of the nominated movies!

• March 3

I got to interview George Lopez this morning with other interviewers. We were told to only talk about his new FX show and his career. He did mention in passing the trouble he got into last week. I was hoping he would address the issue and make a joke about it, but I guess not. He seems to have some issues, that's for sure. I read up about him. He's always fighting with someone and he's divorced. I don't know what's gone on in his life, but it's sad that his mom died when he was young and his dad ran off when he was born. I can sorta relate. We're actually the same age so that's interesting. He seemed ok on the interview...not the nicest guy but not a jerk, either. Just somewhere in-between. You read our interviews on our Primetime Articles Page.

I watched the movie "42". I saw a lot of TV actors in it! Nicole Beharie from "Sleepy Hollow"; Christopher Meloni from "Law & Order: SVU" (he was awesome!); Lucas Black from "American Gothic"; Alan Tudyk from "Dollhouse", "Firefly" and so many other shows; Hamish Linklater from "The Crazy Ones"; T.R. Knight and James Pickens Jr. from "Grey's Anatomy"; John C. McGinley from "Burn Notice" and "Scrubs"; Max Gail from "Barney Miller"; Brad Beyer from "Jericho" and many other shows; Brett Cullen from tons of shows like "Person of Interest" and "Devious Maids", going all the way back to when I first noticed him on "Falcon Crest"; Peter Mackenzie from tons of shows (I know him best from "Herman's Head"). There were just so many!

• March 4

I've just been trying to watch as much as possible on the DVR to make room for more stuff. It gets tough when it's too full.

I'm glad the shows are all back from winter break, though. I really miss some of them!

• March 5

I've been watching a lot of soaps the last few days... they always bug me. Bold & Beautiful is just annoying because it's just the same stories repeated over and over. I'm at the end of January on most of the soaps still. I'm looking forward to seeing Colin's return on Young & The Restless and seeing Thaao Penghlis on General Hospital. I'm not looking forward to the lame storyline they're using to get Robin out of town, though. I'm sure it will be something really ridiculous and stupid.

I watched the 2 latest episodes of NCIS. It was great to see Robert Wagner back! I always love him. I was half hoping that they would show his new fiancee and it would be Stephanie Powers.  Too much to ask for, I guess! Or even his real life wife, Jill St. John, would be awesome. I do have to admit that I noticed that Michael Weatherly is getting a little pudgy, at least in the face. He used to be so handsome. He still is but...I don't know, maybe he was just having an off-week or was sick. It's funny because the other actor, who used to be pudgy (Sean Murray), is now skinny. It's like they switched places!

• March 6

Today I was watching General Hospital from late January when the little kids Emma, Cameron and Spencer hear Carly cry out for help and get all scared, and then Heather covers it up. That seemed silly to me. The kids were scared when they heard Carly crying out for help. They're supposed to be about 8 so that might concern them but not SCARE them. They should have gone for help at their ages.  There's just a whole lot of silliness to soaps. I know I'm always harping on shows being more realistic. They should be. Their first priority should be telling a great story in as realistic a fashion as possible. The story shouldn't be so realistic that it's boring or gross. I don't need to see characters going to the bathroom, but if they occasionally mention someone's hair cut or watch TV like a real life person, that would be great.  The story should be the most important thing, and then secondarily, the characters. The characters and story both need to be consistent and grounded in reality. It shouldn't make me shake my head in bewilderment or curse at the TV or wonder why I watch the show when it's so stupid. Soap operas should have lots of romance and thrills, not stories dumbed down to a third grade level. I read that Kimberly McCullough (Robin) said that she thought General Hospital was the best written it's ever been. Not even close.  In some ways, it's the worst. It was best in the 80's (at least when I was watching it), although back then there were other problems because soaps were slower moving back then and had certain social or censorship constraints on them.  I know that a lot of people hated long-time writer Bob Guza, but he created some really good characters and stories. The current guys are just mediocre with everything. It's like they're writing for not-too-bright teens.

And another thing...One of the things I've long noticed is that people on TV almost never touch, even young people that are in love. That's not realistic. People touch each other all the time, especially when they're young and in love.  Soaps are supposed to be romantic, so the young lovers like Michael and Kiki should be touching and kissing a lot. Even older ones like Sam and Silas should be doing that. Not at work, but everywhere else, especially in private.  And then I noticed this week (on the January shows I've watching) that Ava and Julian were having this conversation where he was half naked. I guess he had just been working out because he was only wearing these little shorts and nothing else. Who doesn't put on a shirt, especially when their sister is around? Okay, fine, fans wants to see him shirtless, I get that. But Ava shouldn't then go and stand very close to him and then lean on his bare shoulder. That's too creepy.  Not only are they siblings, they didn't grow up together. So now they're having siblings touch each other more than the couples in love, which makes it even more gross and creepy. And then lastly, the gay guys were kissing. Which is fine, I have no problem with it, but if you have them kissing, and no one else, then it's kind of like GH is just saying, "See, we have gay people kissing, too, just like other shows!"  so it's very contrived and manipulative.

I'm not saying everyone should be touching all the time or having sex constantly. Anyone who is under 30 and in love, certainly. Couples who haven't been together longer than a few years. Family members who grew up together should hug kiss in a friendly way, not hang out with each other undressed and touching bodies.  Even when couples are fighting, if they still have passion, they still touch each other. But think about what a great dramatic effect it is if the couple is having a fight then suddenly they're NOT touching? Or if they've been married a long time and don't touch much. It shows how their relationship is going. That's normal.  I wonder if soaps are worried that maybe the hair or make-up will get messed up? That's not a good reason. Story and characters should come first.  Physical contact is part of character and story, and aids in development of each.

• March 7

I'm looking forward to seeing my favorite Sunday shows this weekend, The Mentalist and Once Upon a Time! It was great seeing last night's "Big Bang Theory". Always so funny!

Last night I caught up on watching "Supernatural", so that was great fun. I love that show. It was sure nice to see Castiel back, and the episode with the Facers was great. And then the other episode with Kevin was awesome. Too bad he's dead now, but I hope we still see his ghost occasionally.

I still haven't watched the Oscars...I'll have to try to catch that this weekend.

I was supposed to have a conference call interview this morning with the "Bones" guys Hart Hanson and Steven Nathan, but I screwed up the time. Such an idiot! I watched next Monday's episode, which is really good. Freddie Prinze Junior returns!! Good story, too.

• March 8

I mostly watched soaps today... I'm finally on the Y&R episodes where Billy figure out that Adam killed Delia! Woo hoo!

I did a lot of work today to get our news pages ready. This week's schedule and news is here so check it out.

After we had a fun night out, we watched the last three episodes of HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" that we were behind on. Well, we don't watch the whole show, just his monologue and "New Rules" because they're funny.

Have a great week! Lots of good new shows on. Who's watching "Resurrection", "Believe", "Crisis" and "Cosmos"? (Is it me or do most of these shows' titles sound the same?)

The TV MegaSite's Blog Post #113

• Sunday February 23

So glad that the Olympics are over! I'm very tired of re-runs.

Here's a good article about which shows are being renewed and which they're not so fond of. I hope they don't cancel The Mentalist or Almost Human! I will also not be happy if they cancel Beauty and the Beast, Dracula, Nashville, The Neighbors, Once Upon a Time in Wonderland, Revolution, The Tomorrow People, or Two and a Half Men! These are all on their "Looking Not So Good" list.

Every Sunday night or Monday morning I post our soap scoops. Sign up here!

• Monday February 24

This morning I got to interview Jim Jefferies, star, creator and writer of "Legit" on FXX. I watched 4 episodes of his show last week and thought they were so funny. He was even funnier on the phone. Then we also did some chatting on Twitter! Awww!

I watched some "Days of Our Lives" earlier today and now I'm watching "Almost Human" and "Castle". So tired...have to watch "Teen Wolf" tomorrow, I guess!

• Tuesday February 25

I watched "Teen Wolf". That show is so great - riveting.  I did notice a few things that annoyed me about this week's show, but otherwise it's still great. I hate this idea (now overdone in so many TV shows) that an insane asylum always has a secret locked room (usually in the basement) full of torture devices and/or old paperwork etc. No one would do that. Why wouldn't they just clean it out and throw all the stuff away? Makes no sense. At the very least, it would be a stupid thing legally to have that stuff lying around near crazy people. The other thing that struck me as stupid is that, since Stile's therapist Marin Morrell knows that he shouldn't sleep or else the nigutsine (demon) will take him over, you'd think she's make sure that the orderlies were told not to give him a sedative no matter what.

Now I'm catching up on "Vampire Diaries", which I always love. I guess, just with Teen Wolf, you have to just sit back and enjoy the ride and not pay too close attention to the details, the inconsistencies or the contradictions (or occasional stupid things). It's nice to have Damon back as his old evil, wise-cracking self, but I also like the new, good guy Damon, too. We don't want him too sappy, though.

I got to watch next week's "Archer", guest-starring Kenny Loggins, so that was fun. That show is always such a great chuckle.

• Wednesday February 26

I get to interview Kenny Loggins this morning! Should be fun. Honestly I had no idea that he sang and/or wrote some of my favorite songs, like "Whenever I Call You friend" and I'd forgotten that he was part of "We Are the World". It was a great call. Make sure you check out all of the interviews.

• Thursday February 27

I can hardly wait for the new Veronica Mars movie that's premiering March 14. I was a huge fan of that show. I beefed up our Veronica Mars pages a bit more. I really love it when TV shows I liked find new life in other mediums. A lot of the shows I like become comic books. Movies are even better, in a way (at least you get to see the real actors and not just drawings, and hopefully the original writers as well). TV is still my preferred medium, though. I love that you can watch 10-30 episodes per year, every year. I guess none of us ever like change, so that's why it makes it difficult when our favorite shows go away. A show seldom gets so bad that I stop watching it or think that it should get canceled. It has to get really really bad or make huge drastic changes that I don't like, for that to happen. I can only think of a few examples where that happened, and they were shows that were not on the air very long. One was a show called "Get a Life" starring Chris Elliot. Loved the first season, hated the second. Another was the show "War of the Worlds" that I believe lasted 3 seasons. The last season was very different.  Even when they really change the cast or the premise of the show, it has to be something I really hate for that to make me stop watching. I'm a devoted fan, what can I say :)  Obviously I'm not talking about shows that I'm not a big fan of to begin with.

I'm very sad that "Psych" is ending, although it had a pretty good run. I feel that its last two years were the best in quality and humor, though. I read that "The Mentalist" might not be renewed. I hope that's not true! I can't believe it. Even though he found Red John, so what? The show is better than almost any show on regular TV. They should do whatever it takes to keep it going.

• Friday February 28

I watched the premiere of "Sirens" and also "Legit" (as well as many others they sent me DVD's for). Funny because Sirens' first episode had a lot of jokes about porn, and Legit's first episode of the season was partly about porn and quite a lot about masturbation.  I hope this isn't a new trend! Both were very funny, but still....kinda gross, too.

I'm always saying I want shows to be more realistic, and that's so true, but only to the extent that they're entertaining. That is, I don't want to see things that are boring or gross, just because they're realistic. These particular episodes were not boring, and they didn't quite go into gross territory (YMMV).

This morning I interviewed John Gammon, who plays Darrin on "The Middle" on ABC. It was a one-on-one interview. For some reason, my regular phone was acting funny, so I had to use my cell phone. It ended up working out ok.

There are a few actors I'm Facebook friends with and some are nice enough to chat with their fans. One of them is very opinionated, which can be funny. However, he's, how shall I say, unenlightened, and not very educated, so we have really had some verbal battles. Both of us know to keep cool, though. We don't get upset. I had quite a fight with this guy today about rape of all things. It's astounding how some people have some really backward ideas about women and about rape. I hope he got educated a little bit, but who knows. People are stubborn, particularly when they're arguing. I guess all those TV shows like the soaps and SVU really are necessary and more people should watch them to understand just what rape is, how devastating it can be and how often it happens (and what all the myths are about it). I have to admit that it kind of bugs me that on Y&R they're not calling it rape with regards to Nikki's sex years ago with Ian. I'm still on the January episodes, so forgive me if they've addressed this already. I think they have been saying all along that she was enamored of him but didn't necessarily want to have sex with him, but they were vague on the details of whether she said no or not. Clearly he was older and "took advantage" of their relationship, but if it is rape, they should call it that, and not use euphemisms.

I read that George Lopez got drunk and fell asleep on the floor of a casino up in Canada that he was working in, then I guess they arrested him. I wonder how that will affect the interview we're supposed to have with him on Monday? Hmm...

• Saturday March 1

I wasted a lot of time today so I fell really behind on my work on the site! Sometimes I just need a break from all of the email and press releases.

I really hope the new "Flash" pilot is really good like Arrow and gets picked up! I thought the character was great on "Arrow". I loved the original Flash show in the early 90's and was so bummed when they canceled it.  John Wesley Shipp, who starred in it, will have a small role in the new series, so that's awesome.  He's actually one of those actors I was just talking about that is good at chatting with his fans on Facebook.

It was very sad that Soupy Sales died. He had a kids' show when my brothers were little, and they liked it, and my mom did, too (it was over before I was 1 year old). I saw him on TV a lot later in the 70's, in shows like "What's My Line" and "To Tell the Truth" (I used to watch a lot of game shows).  He had a big fight with Howard Stern in the 80's, when they were both on WNBC, near the end of Soupy's career.  We were living in New York at that time and listened to Howard's show, so we heard about it at the time.


We always try to review the new shows as much as we can so please check out our Primetime Reviews page! Quite a few new ones there.

Happy March!

Don't forget to check out all of the shows we cover and the Primetime news...