Television

Some very unexpected news from Variety yesterday:

USA Network has staged a “Psych” reunion.

The original cast and creator are returning for a two-hour holiday movie, “Psych: The Movie,” this December, Variety has learned.

The news comes more than three years after “Psych” went off the air in spring 2014, after airing for eight seasons and more than 120 episodes.

Ask any millennial the question, "Who shot J.R.?" and you'll likely get a blank stare. But after last night, they can finally relate to that expansive generation gap, as RIVERDALE serves up the real murderer of Jason Blossom.

Last week, Riverdale law enforcement searched the trailer of F.P. Jones (SKEET ULRICH) and found the gun that killed Jason Blossom. The problem with that? The trailer had just been searched moments before by Archie (KJ APA) and Veronica (CAMILA MENDES), at the behest of Alice Cooper (MADCHEN AMICK), and the gun was not there then. Which means someone planted it. But who? And why does F.P. confess to the crime?

That's the mystery that Archie, Veronica, and Betty (LILI REINHART) have to solve, before a dejected--and now parentless--Jughead (COLE SPROUSE) leaves Riverdale for good.

Everything has been leading up to this point. Armed with knowledge from the future, Marty McFly Team Flash has to convince Doc Brown Tracy Brand (ANNE DUDEK, THE MAGICIANS) not to give up on developing the flux capacitor her practical applications of speed force theory. That's because four years from the present, she develops the technology Flash can use to imprison Savitar in the speed force.

But...isn't that what caused this in the first place? If Flash 2024 managed to trap Savitar in the speed force after he killed Iris, then when does Savitar get the imprisonment that creates him and turns him into what he is? (That question gets even more twisty at the end of this week's episode!)

The AIMS team has been challenged by the Rogue Team to return to the Dark Forest and capture the Woman of the Woods -- a legend who, among her other talents, can mimic anyone else's voice. She's out there with the Raven Mocker (another Bigfoot) and now apparently also with the Black Wolf, who has made its presence known. According to Shawnee folklore, the Black Wolf arrives to escort a departed soul to the afterlife.

It sure seems that way.

In a tweet last night, writer-producer Patrick Schumacker, revealed that POWERLESS would not air this week or next. He also indicated some doom-and-gloom on the horizon and thanked fans for watching.

While this particular writer at Critical Blast really enjoyed POWERLESS, many felt that the humor fell flat and was just written poorly. I contend that the writing was actually quite good and the show was full of heart and fun. Unfortunately, I wasn't in the majority.

Doctor Who Series 10 - Episode 1 – The Pilot

Writer: Steven Moffat

Director: Lawrence Gough

Cast:

I'm used to seeing Archie Andrews with red hair. I'm used to seeing him drive a red car.

But I never thought I'd see him with a red Solo cup.

But that's just how things roll in RIVERDALE, the edgy, angsty version of the classic comics characters where everybody is broken, everyone has a secret, and the best people are the ones who live in the morally lighter gray areas than others.

At issue this week is Jughead's birthday party. The thing is, Jug (COLE SPROUSE) doesn't like celebrating his birthday. He really doesn't like celebrating it. So when Betty (LILI REINHART) decides she's going to throw him a party, Archie (KJ APA) tries his best to talk her out of it. But Betty is headstrong and won't be denied, so Archie volunteers his house -- which is going to be empty this weekend, because his dad (LUKE PERRY) is out of town to finalize divorce papers with his mom! So, yeah, Archie is at the top of his angst game right now.

As a kid growing up, I was very fond of Nickelodeon cartoons. This was during the good days, before it all became preteen Junior High drama shows for kids learning about the cruel fate that awaits them all as they climb on up there. Nickelodeon used to host a wide variety of amazing cartoons which where ahead of their times, like ROCKO'S MODERN LIFE, ANGRY BEAVERS, CATDOG, and my all time favorite REN AND STIMPY. But there was one show that gave REN AND STIMPY a run for it's money, and that show was none other than INVADER ZIM.

DC's LEGENDS OF TOMORROW has been, overall, a fun show to watch. The characters are a disparate bunch, their origins are slightly (okay, more than slightly) different than what we've seen in the comics, but for the most part it's been enjoyable to watch them band together and travel through the history of the DC universe (or the Arrowverse, specifically). We've seen them travel back to work with Jonah Hex and even the Justice Society of America.

Granted, the rules of time travel for our band of adventurers don't seem all that consistent. For instance, they're told by their founder, Rip Hunter (ARTHUR DARVILL) that they can never go to an event in time where they've already been, to avoid interacting with their other selves. This is something that could break time. This is also something The Flash does about every half-dozen episodes or so, but his actions never seem to cause a time-quake detectable by the Waverider.

While we highly doubt that 'Squirrel Girl and the New Warriors' will be the name of the newly announced comedy on Freeform, she appears to be the frontrunner to lead the team.

In their news release they describe Doreen Green (aka Squirrel Girl) as "a totally empowering fan girl—tough, optimistic and a natural leader. Doreen is confident and has the powers of a squirrel… She’s acrobatic, can fight and talk to other squirrels. Her most important trait is that she has faith in people and teaches them to believe in themselves."

With her increased cult following and the good publicity that comes with promoting a female lead, having Squirrel Girl be the face of the franchise makes perfect sense.

The Legion of Doom got the Spear of Destiny. Eobard Thawne  (MATT LETSCHER), the Reverse-Flash, used it to alter reality to his liking, and then destroyed it, stranding the Legends in a world irrevocably changed.

Their only hope lies in time travel, so that the Legends of Tomorrow can team up with... the Legends of Tomorrow?

It's been a quiet nine months for the Appalachian Investigators of Mysterious Sightings (AIMS). Their adventures chronicled on the last season of Destination America's MOUNTAIN MONSTERS found the AIMS team facing brutal competition in the woods from another team that always seemed to be a step ahead of them, ruining their traps and possibly having even killed the Stonish Giant. The season concluded with a rebus and a message from this so-called "Rogue Team" of Bigfoot hunters.

Since that time, Team Leader Trapper ( click here for our exclusive interview with Trapper has elected to wait them out until they make a mistake. But the team's youngest member, Buck, is tired of waiting, and has taken matters into his own hands.

ARCHER Season 7 takes our dysfunctional “family” of spies into a new direction with this 2-disc DVD set from FX and 20^th Century Fox.

After failing as government agents-turned-drug-dealers and being blacklisted by the CIA, the team tries their hand at being private investigators. The only one able to get his Private Investigator’s license is Cyril Figgis (voiced by CHRIS PARNELL), so they all reluctantly (except for Cyril) now work for the “Figgis Detective Agency) and set up shop in Los Angeles.

It's been a few weeks since we've had a new episode of RIVERDALE, so thankfully we get a really quick time capsule of the Pregnancy of Polly Cooper (TIERA SKOVBYE) that comes with a bit of new information as we see her talking with Sheriff Keller (MARTIN CUMMINS): Jason Blossom (TREVOR STINES) truly was delivering drugs before he was murdered, but as a one-time deal to make cash for him and Polly to start their new lives. He took the job from the South Side Serpents.

I think we can all agree that, for the course of the series, LEGENDS OF TOMORROW has leaned more toward the silly than the serious. That's by design, and it works for this show, but it's certainly had something of an impact on the episode gradings here.

Not this week. For this reviewer, "Doomworld" was firing on all cylinders, and I couldn't be happier with the final product.

The Legion of Doom -- Damien Darhk (NEAL MCDONOUGH), Eobard Thawne (MATT LETSCHER) and Malcolm Merlyn (JOHN BARROWMAN), now joined by a past version of Leonard Snart (WENTWORTH MILLER) and former Legend Mick Rory (DOMINIC PURCELL) -- have used the Spear of Destiny to rewrite reality to their own whim. Thawne himself gives the opening monologue to this episode, which is fitting and sets just the right tone.

Today is heating up and it seems like we have more trailers than a park in Kansas! Hit HBO series GAME OF THRONES has released a new trailer for the highly anticipated and long awaited Season 7!

Along with it came an announced release date of 7.16.17. So as the Summer months get heated up, expect the realm of the seven kingdoms to start cooling down. Winter is Coming after all.

Whether you're a fan of the books or just the tv show, the trailer shows what many of us knew was coming. A showdown of leaders from all over the realm. The trailer focuses on Jon Snow, Daenerys Targaryen and Cersei Lannister. It also appears to include our first look at Dragonstone's throne room.

JENNA ELFMAN returns to manic comedy in the new ABC comedy, IMAGINARY MARY.

Elfman portrays Alice, a single career woman whose life was put on its current track through the help of an imaginary friend she created when she was six, Mary (voiced by RACHEL DRATCH), to help her cope with her parents disastrous marriage and divorce. Mary helped Alice be independent, get into some trouble, and then disappeared when Alice "became a woman" (in just the way you're probably thinking I mean).

Finally we get the introduction of a classic FLASH villain who's gonna reach out and grab ya. (Sorry, but I've been watching the whole episode with The Steve Miller Band song running through my head. If you don't know which one, hie thee to the Googles.)

DAVID DASTMALCHIAN (ANT-MAN, MACGYVER) plays the larcenous legerdemainiac from the future, Abra Kadabra, as the DC Universe gets a little broader with references to Stagg Industries and Kord Industries -- known for their prominence with DC superhero characters Metamorpho and Blue Beetle, respectively. But what does a guy from the future, with technology so advanced it is indistinguishable from magic -- and yes, Caitlin (DANIELLE PANABAKER) and Cisco (CARLOS VALDES) both acknowledge Arthur C. Clarke's law in the episode -- need with technology from the 21st century?

My Two-Bits: Doctor Who: The Curse of Fatal Death

We are about a month out from Doctor Who Season 10 (APRIL 15th)!  This season is the last season for star Peter Capaldi and showrunner Steven Moffat. But what some people may not know is that Moffat got his start with Doctor Who way back in 1999.  As part of Comic Relief, BBC had put together a very funny Doctor Who parody written by Moffat and starring Rowan Atkinson as the Doctor, Julia Sawalha as his companion, Jonathan Pryce (as the Master), and Richard E. Grant, Jim Broadbent, Hugh Grant, and Joanna Lumley as later incarnations of the Doctor.

One spear to rule them all, and in the darkness bind them.

The Legends team have managed to outpace the Legion of Doom when it comes to collecting pieces of the Spear of Destiny -- the spear that pierced Christ's side and embued it with the power to rewrite reality. But the Legion has the final piece and have hidden it in the one place where it can't be found in time -- outside of time, at Vanishing Point.

You'd think a whole episode could be devoted just to obtaining that piece, but it's actually thieved away in a matter of minutes, with Firestorm (FRANZ DRAMEH) showing off to Rip Hunter (ARTHUR DARVILL) his new transmutation powers by turning the safe into jellybeans and revealing the last fragment. Eobard Thawne (MATT LETSCHER), the Reverse-Flash, finds out too late that the fragment has been stolen, and goes ballistic.