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    Salt Lake City Weekly: Cable Ready?

    From the Salt Lake City Weekly:

    http://www.slweekly.com/editorial/20...2004-07-15.cfm

    True TV - July 15, 2004

    Cable, Ready?

    More good, bad and fugly summer TV offerings from coaxial land.
    by Bill Frost

    That "revolutionary" 2004 summer season certain broadcast networks
    were convinced would change the landscape of television forever?
    Turns out it's actually Xeriscape: Dry, barren and really only
    succeeding in annoying the neighbors.

    Now, there are few bigger advocates for annoying the neighbors than I
    (shut up your damned kids and dogs, I'll take down the Vote
    Nader/Satan 2004 sign, fair enough?), but this summer tube season is
    seriously weak. At least The Only TV Column That Matters™ can fall
    back on the superior new offerings on cable, right? Not so fast ...

    Stargate Atlantis (Sci-Fi; debuts Friday, July 16): They're all
    freaks, but there are two distinct categories of Stargate SG-1 fans:
    The ones who've followed the galaxy-surfing saga for seven seasons
    since the Showtime beginning through the transition to the Sci-Fi
    Channel, and those who are a couple of years behind because they've
    only recently gotten hooked through syndicated reruns. The latter
    group always gets screwed when the local channel bumps those weekend
    SG-1s for exclusive college volleyball coverage; the former is
    absolutely wet over the arrival of Stargate Atlantis, the series'
    first spin-off. All they need to know (this is not a newbie-friendly
    franchise) is that Atlantis is faster-paced, higher-tech and a tad
    more environmentally preachy than SG-1. Later Gateheads can clip and
    save this for when Atlantis reruns head to syndication and/or Al
    Gore's sprouting network.

    Entourage (HBO; debuts Sunday, July 18): Mark Wahlberg, the underwear
    artist formerly known as Marky Mark, can be a funny guy—watch Rock
    Star as a comedy instead of a serious indictment of the drug and
    leather-pants trades sometime, you'll see it. Too bad his first
    production project Entourage, a not-autobiographical-wink-wink series
    about hot young Hollywood actor Vincent Chase (Adrian Grenier) and
    his posse of hangers-on and handlers, is longer on stilted "cool"
    than laughs. Even more puzzling, as a supposed rising star, Vincent
    exhibits all the on-screen charisma of a fern, made even more
    glaringly obvious when real celebs (Wahlberg himself, Jessica Alba)
    make Larry Sanders-style cameos. Best pilot-ep moment: Vincent's
    agent (Jeremy Piven, Entourage's saving grace) informing his fern
    that Colin Farrell has taken the $4 million role he declined in the
    sure-to-be-blockbuster Matterhorn ("It's Die Hard at Disneyland—
    what's not to love?").

    The Grid (TNT; debuts Monday, July 19): If we learn only one thing
    from TNT's new counter-terrorism drama, it's this: Don't smoke while
    assembling sarin-gas bombs! That, and Julianna Margulies probably
    should have taken the gazillion-dollar paycheck they offered her to
    stay on ER. She and The Practice's Dylan McDermott star as American
    Feds leading an international/interracial/interdenominational task
    force charged with stopping a global terrorist cell (if you're still
    awake, you and your six online friends probably loved Threat Matrix).
    Everyone's job title is at least a paragraph long, requiring a freeze-
    frame to display every time a new character shows up—without the
    freezes, The Grid's two-hour pilot would clock in at about 28 minutes
    and still seem to drag. Apparently commitment-phobic, TNT is pimping
    The Grid as a "limited series," freeing Margulies up for Ghost Ship
    2. ... She'd be starting her 10th season on ER this fall, just sayin.'

    Things I Hate About You (Bravo; debuts Tuesday, July 20): Give
    couples personal video cameras and have them record every little
    annoying tic they can't stand about each other and see who wins, uh,
    something. This is such a recipe for double homicide, it ought to be
    on Court TV, not Bravo.

    Rescue Me (FX; debuts Wednesday, July 21): Denis Leary stars as a
    hard-drinking/internally conflicted/basically effdup (new word,
    kiddies) New York City firefighter in an intensely graphic and raw
    series that promises to tweak the basic-cable content limits already
    stretched beyond recognition by FX's The Shield and Nip/Tuck, if not
    those Ex-treme Dating reruns. Firefighters, cops, plastic surgeons—
    when is FX going to produce a gritty drama about booze-abusing,
    whoring, effdup, nonsensical-word-inventing newspaper television
    hacks? It's the best idea since Matterhorn, and the title True TV is
    available for a quite reasonable price, just sayin.'

    |*|(*)|*|(*)|*|

    Thursday, July 15: Kingdom Hospital (ABC, 7 p.m.) Two-Hour Series
    Finale: A séance sends Peter and Dr. Hook to the Old Kingdom, where
    they finally free Mary's spirit and get on the cover of Rolling
    Stone, a reference only Stephen King gets.

    Friday, July 16: Stargate Atlantis (Sci-Fi, 7 p.m.) Two-Hour Series
    Debut: A new Stargate team discovers a lost city beneath Antarctica,
    populated by aliens who want to kill them. Hey, brilliant plan!

    Saturday, July 17: Movie: Dogtown (1997, IFC, 6 p.m.) A Hollywood
    washout (Trevor St. John) returns home to Missouri and romances a
    suicidal alcoholic (Mary Stuart Masterson) involved with a racist
    goon (Jon Favreau). Hey, brilliant plan!

    Sunday, July 19: The Days (ABC, 9 p.m.) Series Debut: A dysfunctional
    Philadelphia family gets more dysfunctional; wackiness presumably
    ensues.

    Entourage (HBO, 11 p.m.) Series Debut: A Hollywood playa (Adrian
    Grenier) parties in the fast lane with his dim buds; little wackiness
    ensues.

    Da Ali G Show (HBO, 11:30 p.m.) Season Premiere: Hip-hop journalist
    Ali G returns and gets wicked wiv geezer Sam Donaldson and chills wiv
    aminal trainers, references only CW Editor Ben Fulton gets.

    Monday, July 20: The Grid (TNT, 7 p.m.) Two-Hour Series Debut: It's
    like Threat Matrix, only with Julianna Margulies, Dylan McDermott
    and, fingers crossed, more than a dozen viewers.

    Tuesday, July 21: Things I Hate About You (Bravo, 10 p.m.) Series
    Debut: Through the magic of reality TV, couples try to figure out
    which of them is more irritating. Helpful Hint No. 1: Ask who
    decided, "Let's be on reality TV!" There, done.

    Wednesday, July 22: Rescue Me (FX, 11 p.m.) Series Debut: It's like
    The Shield, only with Denis Leary as a New York City firefighter,
    more comedy and fewer man-rape scenes. Hey, brilliant plan!

    Listen to Bill Mondays at 8 a.m. on X96's Radio From Hell, popular
    with suicidal alcoholics and aliens.

    |*|(*)|*|(*)|*|

    Morjana

    SG1-Spoilergate
    http://tv.groups.yahoo.com/group/SG1-Spoilergate/

    Richard Dean Anderson Fans
    http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rdandersonfans/

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