**** stars. The biggest toy scandal since Brady Bunch dog Tiger stole Cindy’s Kitty Karry-All and Bobby’s kazoo. Max and 99 go undercover in a department store as a shopper and perfume salesperson. KAOS is transmitting secrets overseas via talking Polly Dolly dolls. Can Fang get word to the Chief in time?
*** stars. Lionel from As Times Goes By (Geoffrey Palmer) as a baddie, and our Kylie as the heroine – she’s come a long way from grease monkey at Rob Lewis’ garage in Neighbours. Another year, another Doctor Who Xmas special; a Titanic theme with a homage to 70s disaster flicks thrown in.
**** stars. Cartoon-like characters abound as Gordo transports his restaurant revival evangelism across the Atlantic. In New York, there’s Pete at Babylon brawling with suppliers. Over on the West Coast it’s the wonderfully delusional pizza chef Sebastian, while poor Michel of The Secret Garden cops the unforgettable triple-x ‘French pig’ tirade.
***** stars. Dexter Morgan – Miami PD blood splatter analyst by day, vigilante serial killer by night. Sergeant Doakes was onto Dexter’s nocturnal activities in series one. Now Keith Carradine as FBI Special Agent Lundy is also out to nab the Bay Harbour Butcher (Dexter). Shaping as the best TV slasher action since Nip/Tuck’s The Carver.
**** stars. The Krofft Brothers (H.R. Pufnstuf) did great 70s trippy kids TV. In Tranquility Forest lives The Bugaloos – a pop band dressed as insects. Evil lurks with Benita Bizarre and sidekick Funky Rat out to kill the peace and love vibe. Think Wizard of Oz, with Dorothy sporting a moptop, digging the 60s Merseybeat.
** stars. Wanted: Local American-style drama appealing to all markets; Demographic check list: A lawyer, social worker, psychologist, nurse, computer geek, Setting - inner-city medical AND legal centre. Add a bit of Damages intrigue. Let’s bring back an Aussie star from America (Paul Leyden: LAX, As the World Turns).
*** stars. After revisiting this sitcom I can’t work out what’s weirder: watching LeBeau (Robert Clary) play Doug and Julie’s waiter, Robert LeClair, in Days of Our Lives; seeing Colonel Crittenden (Bernard Fox) as Bewitched’s Dr. Bombay; or being exposed to Bob Crane’s (Colonel Hogan) ‘other’ life in the biopic Auto Focus.
*** stars. Call me slow, but only when it was pointed out to me recently did I make the supposed connection between creator David Shore’s Gregory House M.D. and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes. After firing Chase, and then Cameron and Foreman walking out, House is hiring new doctors 'The Apprentice'-style.
**** stars. Middle child Jan’s neuroses boil over. Paranoid and insecure, the glasses are ditched. Blind sighted, she crashes her bike into Mike’s anniversary family portrait. There’s also the first fit of “Marcia, Marcia, Marcia” rage. No wonder - teen idol Davy Jones (The Monkees) escorts elder sibling Marcia to her prom.
** stars. Hey, adapting Candace Bushnell’s book Sex and the City worked, so why not try another of her tomes. Make it a trio of sassy vixens though …who work as movie, magazine and fashion executives. Call one ‘Victory’. Power grrrls! Just add pop culture chic by referencing author of the moment J.K. Rowling.
** and a 1/2 stars. More than Jane Seymour doing an American Sigrid Thornton, this series reunites country music’s greatest couple. Johnny Cash and June Carter Cash do their best work since Little House on Prairie’s Caleb and Mattie Hodgekiss. Here, faith healer Sister Ruth (June) tames the Man in Black’s gunslinging Kid Cole – just like real life!
** and a 1/2 stars. Bronson Pinchot tinkers every so slightly with his foreign accented camp art gallery worker Serge (Beverly Hills Cop), morphing into Balki Bartokomous from Mypos. Add the classic sitcom device of throwing two previously unknown relatives together in an unfamiliar locale – Chicago; arguably THE greatest setting for TV shows in the world.
*** and a 1/2 stars. Cleveland, Ohio is home to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, legendary horror movie host Ghoulardi (director P.T. Anderson’s father, Ernie), and this, the best buddy sitcom since Seinfeld. Drew does Jerry, Kate does Elaine, Lewis is George, and Oswald Lee Harvey is Kramer – with a better character name.
** stars. Not the greatest spin-off ever, but when is too much 21 Jump Street ever enough? From the wonderful Stephen J. Cannell (The A-Team, The Rockford Files) – muscle t-shirts, big hair, and Mrs Gabe Kotter (Welcome Back, Kotter) as potential love interest. Great cameo from Robert Romanus (Mike Damone, Fast Times at Ridgemont High).
**** stars. Prison Break owes this big time! 70s TV cop Harry O (David Janssen) is wrongly accused murderer on the run Dr. Richard Kimble; pursued by Space: 1999’s Professor Victor Bergman (Barry Morse) as Lieutenant Philip Gerard. Narration is by TV’s Cannon (William Conrad). Better than the 90s movie remake.
**** stars. Co-producer John Milius directed cinema pop classics like Big Wednesday, Conan the Barbarian and Red Dawn. Consider this BBC-HBO production a cerebral TV take on the Roman Empire (especially when compared to Frankie Howerd’s 70s farce Up Pompeii!). Kevin McKidd (Trainspotting’s Tommy) does his usual honourable turn as Lucius Vorenus.
*** stars. Actress Billie Piper blows away her previous innocent on-screen personas (Doctor Who, Sally Lockhart) with the portrayal of high-class escort Belle de Jour. It’s about moody French music, expensive hotels, threesomes, foursomes, and riding a client like a horse. If only the Doctor could see his Rose Tyler now.
*** and a 1/2 stars. A zombie is a distraction the Winchester brothers don’t need as they fight to extricate Dean from his deal with the devil. Billy Drago (The Untouchables) is creep overload as an alchemist harvesting human organs in pursuit of eternal life; perhaps the best TV horror since The Night Stalker.
**** stars. Aaron Spelling stacked this sitcom set aboard the cruise liner the Pacific Princess with guest appearances from famous TV stars. There’s Colonel Hogan, Marcia and Jan Brady, Sergeant Bilko, Marion Cunningham, Thurston Howell III and Maxwell Smart (reunited with Siegfried who plays the ship’s doctor). And a wonderful Las Vegas-style theme tune.
*** stars. Aaron Spelling’s stab at super-soap is so 1980s it was even referenced in Prince’s song ‘Kiss’. The mysterious woman in the white hat, veil and sunglasses from the series one cliffhanger is revealed to be …Joan Collins – arriving to testify at oil magnate (and ex-husband) Blake Carrington’s murder trial.