TV Shows
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Generations have wondered if they could survive being stranded on a desert island. But how would people cope if they had to do it, for real, and with only themselves to rely on? Adventurer Bear Grylls abandons 13 British men on a remote, uninhabited Pacific island for a month. They will be completely alone, filming themselves, and with only the clothes they’re wearing and some basic tools. The island may look like paradise but behind the beaches it can be hell on earth. When stripped of all the luxuries and conveniences of 21st-century living, does modern British man still have the spirit and resources to survive?
Human Target is an American action drama television series that was broadcast by Fox in the United States. Based loosely on the Human Target comic book character created by Len Wein and Carmine Infantino for DC Comics, it is the second series based on this title developed for television, the first TV series having been aired in 1992 on ABC. Developed by Jonathan E. Steinberg, Human Target premiered on CTV in Canada and on Fox in the United States in January 2010. The series was officially canceled on May 10, 2011, after the conclusion of the second season.
Former British soldier Jonathan Pine navigates the shadowy recesses of Whitehall and Washington where an unholy alliance operates between the intelligence community and the secret arms trade. To infiltrate the inner circle of lethal arms dealer Richard Onslow Roper, Pine must himself become a criminal.
V is an American science fiction television series that ran for two seasons on ABC, from November 3, 2009 to March 15, 2011. A remake of the 1983 miniseries created by Kenneth Johnson, the new series chronicles the arrival on Earth of a technologically advanced alien species which ostensibly comes in peace, but actually has sinister motives. V stars Morena Baccarin, Lourdes Benedicto, Morris Chestnut, Joel Gretsch, Logan Huffman, Charles Mesure, Elizabeth Mitchell, Laura Vandervoort and Scott Wolf, and was executive produced by Scott Rosenbaum, Yves Simoneau, Scott Peters, and Jace Hall. The series was produced by The Scott Peters Company, HDFilms and Warner Bros. Television.
Since premiering in 2009, Southland has redefined the police drama with its raw, authentic look at the lives and work of Los Angeles detectives and beat cops. The show centers on four main characters: Officer John Cooper (Cudlitz), a seasoned cop who will have to prove himself again after recovering from surgery; Officer Ben Sherman (McKenzie), who still has much to learn after recently completing his training rotation; Detective Lydia Adams (King), whose unending caseload hits closer to home; and Sammy Bryant (Hatosy), a former detective who decided to go back to being a uniform cop after the traumatic death of his partner.
Dollhouse is an American science fiction television series that revolves around a corporation running numerous underground establishments across the globe which program individuals referred to as “Actives” with temporary personalities and skills. Wealthy clients hire Actives from Dollhouses at great expense for various purposes. The series primarily follows the Active known as Echo, played by Eliza Dushku, on her journey towards self-awareness.
Private Practice is an American medical drama television program which ran on ABC from September 26, 2007 to January 22, 2013. A spin-off of Grey’s Anatomy, the series takes place at Seaside Wellness Center and chronicles the life of Dr. Addison Montgomery, played by Kate Walsh, as she leaves Seattle Grace Hospital in order to join a private practice, in Los Angeles. Private Practice also revolves around Addison’s co-workers at Seaside Wellness, and how they deal with patients, and the practice while still finding time to live their everyday lives.
The series was created by Shonda Rhimes, who also serves as executive producer, alongside Betsy Beers, Mark Gordon, Mark Tinker, Craig Turk, and Steve Blackman, who serve as showrunners due to Rhimes’s duties on Grey’s Anatomy. On May 11, 2012, Private Practice was renewed for a sixth and final season. The sixth season was the first not to feature Tim Daly and was announced on October 19, 2012, to be the final season of the show.
Summer Heights High is an Australian television mockumentary series written by and starring Chris Lilley. It is a parody of high-school life epitomised by its three protagonists: effeminate and megalomaniacal “Director of Performing Arts” Mr G; self-absorbed, privileged teenager Ja’mie King; and disobedient, vulgar Tongan student Jonah Takalua. All played by Lilley, the characters never interact. It lampoons Australian high school life and many aspects of the human condition and is filmed in a documentary style, with non-actors playing supporting characters.
Following a similar format to Lilley’s previous series, We Can Be Heroes: Finding The Australian of the Year, Lilley plays multiple characters in the show. Filmed in Melbourne at Brighton Secondary College, the series premiered on 5 September 2007 at 9:30 pm on ABC TV and continued for eight weekly episodes until 24 October 2007. Each episode was also released as a weekly podcast directly after its screening via both the official website and through any RSS podcast client in either WMV or MPEG-4.
Summer Heights High was a massive ratings success for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, and was met with mostly positive critical reaction. In 2008, the series won a Logie Award for Most Popular Light Entertainment/Comedy Program.
Robin Hood is a British television programme, produced by independent production company Tiger Aspect Productions for BBC One, with co-funding from the BBC America cable television channel in the United States. Based on the traditional stories of legendary English folk hero Robin Hood, the programme started on 7 October 2006. Series two commenced broadcasting on 6 October 2007 with the final two episodes on 29 December 2007. Series three began airing on 28 March 2009 for a thirteen episode run. The series was axed by the BBC after series three following the departure of multiple characters, including lead actor Jonas Armstrong.
Dragons’ Den is a British television series, hosted by Evan Davis. The format of the show is owned by Sony Pictures and is based on the original Japanese series, which has been sold around the world. The programme has been produced by BBC Manchester since its inception and it was first broadcast on BBC Two on 4 January 2005.
The show allows several entrepreneurs an opportunity to present their varying business ideas to a panel of five wealthy investors, the “Dragons” of the show’s title, and pitch for financial investment offering a stake of the company in return.
The Mighty Boosh is a British comedy television show created by Julian Barratt, Noel Fielding and others. The Mighty Boosh is a comic fantasy containing humour and pop-culture references. Episodes often featured elaborate musical numbers in different genres, such as electro, heavy metal, funk, and rap. The show has been known for popularising a style called “crimping”; short a cappella songs which are present throughout all three series. Julian Barratt wrote the music within the show, and performs it with Noel Fielding. Fielding also designed many of the show’s graphics and artwork.
The TV series has many animated sequences, puppets and special effects. Barratt has said that he approached Fielding with the idea of doing a show like The Goodies, as if it were a complete “world” rather than simply a sketch show. Barratt and Fielding play many of the recurring and one-off characters themselves, with other characters being played by other Boosh members Rich Fulcher, Dave Brown, and Michael Fielding.
Peep Show is an award-winning British sitcom starring David Mitchell and Robert Webb. The television programme is written by Jesse Armstrong and Sam Bain, with additional material by Mitchell and Webb amongst others. It has been broadcast on Channel 4 since 2003. The show’s eighth series makes it the longest-returning comedy in Channel 4 history. Stylistically, the show uses point of view shots with the thoughts of main characters Mark and Jeremy audible as voiceovers.
Peep Show follows the lives of two men from their twenties to thirties, Mark Corrigan, who has steady employment for most of the series, and Jeremy “Jez” Usbourne, an unemployed would-be musician. The pair met at the fictional Dartmouth University, and now share a flat in Croydon, South London. Mark is initially a loan manager at the fictional JLB Credit, later becoming a waiter, and then a bathroom supplies salesman. He is financially secure, but awkward and socially inept, with a pessimistic and cynical attitude. Jeremy, having split up with his girlfriend Big Suze prior to the first episode, now lives in Mark’s spare room. He usually has a much more optimistic and energetic outlook on the world than Mark, yet his self-proclaimed talent as a musician has yet to be recognised, and he is not as popular or attractive as he would like to think himself, although he is more successful with the opposite sex than Mark.
QI is a British comedy panel game television quiz show created and co-produced by John Lloyd, hosted by Stephen Fry, and featuring permanent panellist Alan Davies. Most of the questions are extremely obscure, making it unlikely that the correct answer will be given. To compensate, points are also awarded for interesting answers, regardless of whether they are right or even relate to the original question. Points are also deducted from a panellist who gives answers which are wrong, pathetically obvious, or obviously a joke. The show makes use of a loud siren and flashing lights, as a form of humiliation.
Star Wars: Clone Wars is an Emmy Award- and Annie Award-winning American animated microseries set in the Star Wars universe.
Chronologically, the series takes place during the three-year time period between the prequel films Attack of the Clones and Revenge of the Sith. The show depicted the actions of various characters in the Star Wars prequel trilogy, including Anakin Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, Mace Windu, and other Knights of the Jedi Order during the conflict, leading the clone trooper forces of the Galactic Republic against the battle droid armies of the Confederacy of Independent Systems and the Sith.
The series was produced by Cartoon Network Studios in association with Lucasfilm Ltd., and was aired both online and on Cartoon Network in 25 chapters from 2003 to 2005. The first two seasons, comprising Volume One, were produced in a two to three minute “micro” format, while season three was produced as fifteen minute episodes making up Volume Two. Both volumes were later released on home video edited as feature length films. It was ranked 21 on IGN’s Top 100 Animated Series list. Entertainment Weekly ranked the series 20th out of 25 of the best science-fiction films or television of the past 25 years.
In the unreal world of Sacred Heart Hospital, John “J.D” Dorian learns the ways of medicine, friendship and life.
The Golden Palace is an American sitcom that originally aired on CBS from September 18, 1992, to May 14, 1993. The show is a spin-off of the sitcom The Golden Girls, continuing the story from that series. CBS cancelled the spin-off in 1993 after one season.
Hill Street Blues is an American serial police drama that was first aired on NBC in 1981 and ran for 146 episodes on primetime into 1987. Chronicling the lives of the staff of a single police precinct in an unnamed American city, the show received critical acclaim and its production innovations influenced many subsequent dramatic television series produced in North America.
The World at War is a 26-episode British television documentary series chronicling the events of the Second World War. At the time of its completion in 1973 it was the most expensive series ever made, costing £900,000. It was produced by Jeremy Isaacs, narrated by Laurence Olivier and includes a score composed by Carl Davis. A book, The World at War, was written by Mark Arnold-Forster, and released in 1973, to accompany the TV series.
Since production was completed, The World at War has attracted acclaim and is now regarded as a landmark in British television history. Following the time of its completion, and as the Second World War remained fresh in many people’s minds, the producer Jeremy Isaacs was considered ahead of his time in resurrecting studies of military history. The series focused on, among other things, portrayal of the devastating human experiences of the conflict; how life and death throughout the war years affected soldiers, sailors and airmen, civilians, the tragic victims of tyranny and concentration camp inmates.
After resigning, a secret agent is abducted and taken to what looks like an idyllic village, but is really a bizarre prison. His warders demand information. He gives them nothing, but only tries to escape.
Hogan’s Heroes is an American television sitcom that ran for 168 episodes from September 17, 1965, to July 4, 1971, on the CBS network. The show was set in a German prisoner of war camp during World War II. Bob Crane starred as Colonel Robert E. Hogan, coordinating an international crew of Allied prisoners running a Special Operations group from the camp. Werner Klemperer played Colonel Wilhelm Klink, the commandant of the camp, and John Banner was the inept sergeant-of-the-guard, Hans Schultz.
The series was popular during its six-season run. In 2013, creators Bernard Fein through his estate and Albert S. Ruddy acquired the sequel and other separate rights to Hogan’s Heroes from Mark Cuban through arbitration and a movie based on the show has been planned.
Jeremy Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May are back with a show about adventure, excitement and friendship… as long as you accept that the people you call friends are also the ones you find extremely annoying. Sometimes it’s even a show about cars. Follow them on their global adventure.
Chef Ramsay attempts to do the impossible: turn one ordinary and empty restaurant into the most popular, sought-after venue in town. There’s no time for polite small talk as he embarks on his mission to turn around the fortunes of each restaurant in just one week and save them from their living nightmares.
Totally Spies! depicts three girlfriends ‘with an attitude’ who have to cope with their daily lives at high school as well as the unpredictable pressures of international espionage. They confront the most intimidating – and demented – of villains, each with their own special agenda for demonic, global rude behavior.
Jules balances her life of being a college student, while serving up vigilante justice on her school’s campus. Until Ophelia, a computer hacker, discovers her secret and entangles herself in Jules’ quest for vengeance.
Braquo is a French crime drama television series created by Olivier Marchal and produced by Capa Drama with the participation of Canal+ in association with Marathon Group, Be-Films and RTBF. It was first broadcast in France from October 12 to November 2, 2009. The first season established a record of audience for an original production of the channel, and has surpassed that of many U.S. productions broadcast by the network. The second season started in Canal+ on November 21, 2011. A third and final season was announced by main actor Jean-Hugues Anglade in 2011.
The name of the series comes from the French “braquage” that describes armed robberies, particularly those committed on banks.
Featuring first-person accounts of recent US Special Forces missions in the war on terror, this unnarrated series gives viewers an inside and candid look at the realities of war.
David Attenborough presents a documentary series exploring how animals meet the challenges of surviving in the most iconic habitats on earth.
Happy Tree Friends is an American flash cartoon created and developed by Aubrey Ankrum, Rhode Montijo, Kenn Navarro and Warren Graff for Mondo Media. The show is cited as an early example of a popular Internet phenomenon achieving a cult following.
The action and adventure comedy is drawn in simple appearance and combines cute forest animals with extreme graphic violence. Each episode revolves around the characters enduring accidental events of bloodshed, pain, dismemberment and/or death. The episodes last from between 1 to 7 minutes. At one point, the warning “Cartoon Violence: Not recommended for small children, or big babies” was given on the official website. In 2006, a television series featuring longer episodes aired. A spin-off called Ka-Pow! premiered on September 2, 2008.
Carnivàle is an American television series set in the United States during the Great Depression and Dust Bowl. In tracing the lives of two disparate groups of people, its overarching story depicts the battle between good and evil and the struggle between free will and destiny; the storyline mixes Christian theology with gnosticism and Masonic lore, particularly that of the Knights Templar.
30 Rock is an American television comedy series that ran on NBC from October 11, 2006, to January 31, 2013, and was created by Tina Fey. The series, which is loosely based on Fey’s experiences as head writer for Saturday Night Live, takes place behind the scenes of a fictional live sketch comedy series depicted as airing on NBC. The series’ name refers to 30 Rockefeller Plaza in New York City, the address of the GE Building, in which the NBC Studios are located.
Some Girls is a British comedy series written by Bernadette Davis that airs on BBC Three. The show stars Adelayo Adedayo, Mandeep Dhillon, Alice Felgate, Natasha Jonas, Dolly Wells, Colin Salmon, Jassa Ahluwalia and Franz Drameh. It debuted on 6 November 2012 and the first series ran for six episodes.
BBC Three announced at the end of the first series that the show would return for a second series. On 18 September 2013, they confirmed that each episode of the second series will premiere on BBC iPlayer a week ahead of being broadcast on BBC Three. The first episode became available on iPlayer on 23 September and will be broadcast on BBC Three on 30 September with the rest of the series following that trend.
The series chronicles the personal life (and the wild lifestyle) of Rebecca Wright, a tough-as-nails judge serving on the Los Angeles County Circuit Court, whose time off the bench is spent partying and displaying a reckless behavior. Her reputation is about to be tamed—and judged—by Robby Shoemaker, a eight-year-old boy whose parents Rebecca put behind bars. He might be the one that can turn Rebecca’s life around.
In her sixth year of law school, Cristela is finally on the brink of landing her first big (unpaid) internship at a prestigious law firm. The only problem is that her pursuit of success is more ambitious than her traditional Mexican-American family thinks is appropriate.
When a young boy is found dead on an idyllic beach, a major police investigation gets underway in the small California seaside town where the tragedy occurred. Soon deemed a homicide, the case sparks a media frenzy, which throws the boy’s family into further turmoil and upends the lives of all of the town’s residents.
