Drama

The new season of the popular Netflix series focuses on the doomed fairy-tale royal couple and the British prime minister of the day, Margaret Thatcher

‘Homeland’ offers another damaged-person role to the former star of ‘My So-Called Life’

Entertaining, if you don’t take it too seriously

Dramas and reality shows are getting trounced by half-hour comedies

“Bullying” may be the accepted term for kid-on-kid brutality, but it’s seldom used among kids themselves

Like that of Henry V, Prince Jack’s passing leaves a big hole

I wasn’t personally a fan of Rubicon, but a lot of people I respect were fans, and on their behalf I’m sorry that the show has been canceled after one season. I was wondering whether the success of The Walking Dead — success far beyond anything AMC has ever had before — would be good or bad news for Rubicon, whose ratings were low but comparable to the first seasons of AMC’s two flagship shows (Mad Men and Breaking Bad). Some people thought that this new success would make the network more willing to take a chance on a low-rated show that they like. Others argued that The Walking Dead created new expectations for this network: once they prove that they can get a big audience, it’s harder to make excuses for a show with a small audience, because the term “not bad for AMC” no longer applies. It looks like the latter might have been closer to the truth. Not that AMC will never pick up a low-rated show, but they’ve already got a low-rated show in Breaking Bad, and that show is more acclaimed (and better) than Rubicon. In general, though, low-rated shows have a better chance on struggling networks: we’ve seen repeatedly that NBC has a lower threshold for renewing a show than CBS does, because the expectations are lower at NBC. Future AMC shows may be expected to perform… not as well as Walking Dead, but certainly better than Rubicon. The show could be a victim of sudden increased expectations.

Remember when choice and flexibility were good things?

Clint Eastwood’s pensive drama about the afterlife is a startling departure

HBO is hoping its new period drama can beat the one it turned down

A tense, heart-wrenching film about the slave living next door

A backstage ballet melodrama with a frisson of Cronenberg