BEST AND WORST OF 2011

BEST AND WORST TV OF 2011

TV for the most part has been a downhill slide these past few years. Every combination of doctor/lawyer/doctor show has been tried and ninety nine percent of them sucked. Let's take a look back and see who fared best and who failed miserably. I will note that only one new show on this list was on broadcast television.

BEST NEW SHOWS OF 2011

5)HOMELAND-The vets of 24 come up with another stellar show about a is he/isn't he terrorist war hero who after eight years as a POW comes home to a wife who thought he was dead, kids who hardly remember him and a near psychotic CIA agent hounding him (and sleeping with him) well played by Claire Daines. A thrill ride that takes lots of twists and turns. Best drama of the year.

4)Wilfred- A underated show about a guy and his next door neighbor's talking dog. Uproariously funny and had the single best ending to any show this year. A must see for any who like oddball comedy.

3)2 Broke Girls- Whitney Cummings has had a great year with this and the better than everyone says Whitney. The boobtastic Kat Dennings and newcomer Beth Behrs are fantastic together and show how a lot of us actually live, paycheck to paycheck, with multiple jobs to make ends meet. And making it funny and relatable while doing so. One of the bets new comedies of the year and the only new show on broadcast TV to make this list. Shocker.

2)Beavis and Butthead- Not only can I not believe that a show off the air for decades could be this funny but that it's Beavis and Butthead being this funny. I hated the film which cut out the best parts of them ragging on godawful videos which is back in full force, including a nightly dig at Jersey Shore, one of the worst shows ever made. I love this show.

1)BBC's Sherlock Holmes- One of the best Sherlock Holmes adaptations ever. Benedict Cumberbatch was brilliant as Holmes while Martin Freeman held his own as Dr. Watson. A must see for any fan of Holmes as well as anyone interested in how to craft a great mystery. The success of this has led to the states trying their hand at it as well for next year. My guess is they screw it up royally but I'm still hoping it won't.


WORST OF 2011-

5)Law and Order SVU- Alright while technically not a new show they did get new cast members to save what can only be described as a sinking ship. And they put lead weights on to help. Without Stabler, the dynamic of this show is out of whack and the two new leads are deadly dull. I stopped watching along with most of their viewers. The fact that it's being pulled for sweeps says this long running franchise may finally be dead.

4)Heart of Dixie- A slapdash soap on the increasingly irritating CW network who seem determined to become the Lifetime network. Even Nikita has lost it's luster and Supernatural the only show I look forward to on the network. This show was awful in every way a show can suck. I feel bad for any guy whose girlfriend forces them to watch this drek.

3)Charlie's Angels- A sad remake that replaced jiggle TV with a serious drama about three ninety pound weaklings who beat the crap out of guys twice the size with nary a bruise. Right. Helpful hint when casting a show like this: make sure the women you hire are hot. Acting skills are not a prerequisite for stuff like this. Another failure in a long line of remake failures. Next year's awful award will almost certainly go to the serious remake of The Munsters. Christ.

2)Ringer- Just missing the top spot this was the worst produced show I have ever seen on a major network. The twin sequences were the worst directed scenes ever in the last fifty years. I watched the old 1970'd Bionic Woman episodes lately which had two Jamie Summers in it and let me tell you, with a budget a fraction of what Ringer's was, they did a much better job. The Ringer scene which gets worst moment in TV last year was on a boat, next to an obvious green screen where Gellar spouted nonsense dialogue to the back of her head played by an obviously different actress. Horrid.

1)Playboy Club- How do you make TV even less titillating than Charlie's Angels? Make a show set in the 60's about a male oriented organization and turn it in a languid soap than men will hate. The result is cancellation in two weeks. A tone deaf show set in a time period that worked well in cable but in primetime. This and the soon departed Pan Am will end this sorry trend.


On a side note, one of the worst movies from last year and should be added to my list is Bucky Larson. A terrible unfunny comedy. Adam Sandler should be ashamed for writing it. As a fan of his previous work, he starting to lose his touch because almost everything he did last year was awful. Try to do something else Adam because I know you are capable of better. This stuff lately is just lazy.