By Stu Robinson,

FOX has canceled the action drama Human Target after two seasons.

The show featured square-jawed Mark Valley – brilliant in Keen Eddie, an earlier victim of FOX’s chopping block – as an assassin reformed by his own conscience. Using the name Christopher Chance, he partnered with ex-cop Laverne Winston (Chi McBride) and quietly creepy freelancer Guerrero (Jackie Earle Haley) to protect clients by placing himself in the line of fire.

The show’s creators tried to boost ratings in Season 2 with a double dose of estrogen, casting Indira Varma as wealthy, widowed philanthropist Ilsa Pucci – who ends up bankrolling the business – and Janet Montgomery as a nubile young thief and conwoman named Ames.

The Ames character worked, providing additional plot options and a dose of humor. But the Pucci character never really fit: She didn’t mesh with the other characters, the subplot about her husband’s murder became a tedious soap opera and attempts to ignite romance between her and Chance were implausible at best.

I share the view of Entertainment Weekly critic Sandra Gonzalez that the Guerrero character deserved to live on:

“Much of the credit for turning that character into a fan favorite is owed to Jackie Earle Haley, whose unique combination of dry humor and pure badassery made Guerrero eclipse other characters without even trying. In fact, I’d pluck the character out of the Human Target universe and plop him into any show I currently watch just for a chance to enjoy him again every week.”

As for Valley, he deserves a hit show and might have had one had FOX given Keen Eddie more time. In that 2003 show, he played an American cop working with police in England and sharing a tension-filled flat with Sienna Miller. Perhaps there is still hope for Valley. After all, the CBS hit Hawaii Five-0 was Alex O’Loughlin’s third attempt at carrying a show.

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For years, January was the Best.Month.Ever., television wise. After months of being deprived of my favorite shows, the inevitable post-holiday dreariness, and another two months or more of winter to endure, January brought me back to that mysterious island on Lost, and the high-intensity crack of 24. What is a TV obsessed gal to do this year, now that both of those shows have finished their runs? Instead of being sad and grumpy, I have found some joy in the mid-season television schedule.

Parks and Recreation – I am still at a loss as to why NBC put this show on the shelf for the first half of the season and insisted on cramming the unfunny Outsourced down our throats instead (I actually do know why, but it’s still annoying). P&R got all kinds of awesome last year, and the end of the season brought us some great twists with the addition of Rob Lowe and Adam Scott to the ensemble. Amy Poehler is reliably great, and Nick Offerman as Ron Swanson is possibly the best reason to keep tuning in. I hate singling out people on ensemble shows like this, because every one of  them adds another fantastic layer, making it my easy replacement for the now limping The Office.

V – It’s not like I was waiting with bated lizard breath for this show to return. The first effort was a pale shadow of the original V series and mini-series, but I am a sucker for sci-fi, so I went into the first episode of this new season hopeful, but not expecting a thing. They did amp up the reveals (finally, a glimpse at the lizard face!), had some more action and evil-ness from the queen lizard Anna, and put their special effects budget to good use. But, the writing is still terrible (I feel sorry for some of the clunkers the actors have to deliver), and it looks like we will have to endure even more of Erica’s dolt of a son, Tyler. If I had an inkling to bail on this show, it was squashed by the addition of Sam from Reaper (Bret Harrison), who I think is wonderful, and I hope they don’t kill him off too soon.

Southland - I don’t watch this show (so I’m not gonna bother finding a pic), but it is regularly hailed as one of the best cop shows out there, and the people I know who do watch it, love the crap out of it. I only mention it because it was dead as a doornail after it’s first season on NBC, and was resurrected by TNT in what I think is a true TV miracle. This is the beginning of season three, and if you’re a fan, enjoy the sweet taste of victory!

Fringe - I know, I know, not a mid-seasoner, but every second this show is not around, I miss it. Fox had been unusually kind to us with this show, until now. Even with the steady ratings slide, they blessed us with a third season, and then they pulled the rug out from under us and moved it to Friday’s. I fear that this may be the last season, and it’s a shame, as this season has been freakin’ outstanding!!

The Amazing Race & Survivor - I am no longer in the reality show closet. I like what I like, and I am not ashamed. Competitive reality shows are one of my weaknesses (along with sci-fi and post-apocalyptic shows), and these two are tops as far as I’m concerned. They will both be back in February for new seasons, and I couldn’t be more thrilled.

There are a few others that have me vaguely interested like Game of Thrones on HBO, and The Cape on NBC. The return of Big Love should be more exciting, but I’m not interested enough to write about it. You can bet my DVR will be storing these shows up to try out when it’s too snowy and cold to do anything else.

PS! OMG!! Have you seen this?? June is a very, very long time from now.

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By Stu Robinson,

Six episodes in to Season 2 of FOX’s Human Target, it’s time to check in on how the big estrogen experiment is going.

The show centers on bodyguard Christopher Chance (Mark Valley from Keen Eddie and Boston Legal) and his support team comprising ex-cop Laverne Winston (Chi McBride) and quietly creepy freelancer Guerrero (Jackie Earle Haley).

In its first season, Human Target demonstrated potential but looked to be in need of some time and tweaking tofind its stride. The biggest tweak for Season 2 was the addition of two female regulars: wealthy, widowed philanthropist Ilsa Pucci (Indira Varma), who takes over the business side of the operation; and nubile grifter Ames (Janet Montgomery), a trainee operative.

Ames is a hit. Not just easy on the eyes, she adds some comic relief that lightens the show. Her foils are Winston and Guerrero, two men very set in their ways. Ames chips away at their facades and drags them out of their comfort zones, forcing each to reveal a bit more than he’d like.

That said, the writers need to be careful here, particularly in regard to Guerrero. The key to Guerrero is his quiet malevolence – that fact that nobody really knows what he’s capable of, causing everyone to assume the worst. He needs to maintain the almost cartoon quality of being perfectly comfortable with whatever dirty deed must be done. It’s okay to give him some range, but be wary of humanizing him so much that he loses his edge.

Mrs. Pucci’s patronage enables the team to go wherever it must, armed with the latest technology. But she’s not really a team player. She may hold the purse strings, but she is vexed by her inability to control the rest of the cast. Whenever a scenario spreads outside her comfort zone – which is pretty much every week – she takes on a haughty, petulant tone that really grates.

When I first read about the Ilsa Pucci character, I imagined an absentee owner who wouldn’t be so absent – hence the dramatic tension. But I didn’t expect her to take up residence as the world’s classiest office manger. The fish out of water theme goes only so far. After six episodes, Mrs. Pucci is not fitting in.

The six Season 2 episodes that have aired so far have been a varied lot. While four have seen characters confronting aspects of their pasts, they have gone in different directions. Settings have ranged from the grittier parts of San Francisco, where the team is based, to a South American drug-trafficking zone to corporate suburbia.

The plots are engaging, and usually give the viewer an opportunity to determine the threat on his or her own. The guest stars, mostly journeymen actors who look vaguely familiar, have been solid.

As Human Target enters the second half of its second season, I’m still aboard. We’ll just have to see where this crazy train takes us.

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Stu Robinson, a college friend of the TV Tyrant, is a writer, editor, media-relations practitioner and social-media guy based in Phoenix.

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By Stu Robinson

Human Target returned to FOX last week, launching its second season with a double dose of estrogen.

This comes as no great surprise. In Season 1, Human Target demonstrated potential but looked to be in need of some time and tweaking to find its stride.

For the uninitiated, the show features square-jawed Mark Valley – brilliant in FOX’s late, lamented Keen Eddie but horribly miscast in ABC’s Boston Legal – as an assassin reformed by his own conscience. Using the name Christopher Chance, he partners with ex-cop Laverne Winston (Chi McBride) and quietly creepy freelancer Guerrero (Jackie Earle Haley) to protect clients by placing himself in the line of fire. He usually does this with abandon, perhaps freed by the belief that he deserves to die anyway for his past.

Appropriate for a character born in comic books, Chance is drawn in bold strokes – an action hero from central casting who springs into action on behalf of justice and all that is good. Winston is the imposed-upon sidekick who manages the office and provides backup in the field. Guerrero, meanwhile, is the guy they bring in for special tasks – intelligence, technology, torture. The quieter he gets, the scarier he becomes.

The creators of Human Target were so eager to move in a new direction that they resolved last season’s cliffhanger in one scene – a bank shootout – after which Chance disappears. Guerrero tells Winston that Chance had become too attached and blamed himself for Winston being taken captive in Season 1′s final episode.

Cut to an ashram in the Himalayas, where Chance is in deep meditation until billionaire philanthropist Ilsa Pucci (Indira Varma) arrives by helicopter and convinces him to return to work – and to his colleagues in San Francisco.

This isn’t the first time the writers have tried pumping some estrogen into the cast. They added a woman to the team midway through the first season, but sexy computer geek Layla, played by Autumn Reeser, disappeared after a couple of episodes. Perhaps Reeser was too busy playing agent Lizzie Grant on Entourage.

The result of the Season 2 premiere : After being saved by the Human Target team, Ilsa decides to bankroll Chance and Winston’s protection business. Of course, she tells them she’ll be a hands-off, mostly absentee owner. Yeah, right. We’ll see about that.

In the process of saving Ilsa, the guys capture and eventually employ a nubile young thief and conwoman named Ames, played by Janet Montgomery coming off her own eight-episode run on Entourage. (Hey, if you want to cast actresses, there are worse places to look than the Entourage set.) Winston had arrested Ames numerous times as a juvenile and basically thinks she’s incorrigible. But Chance and Guerrero see potential in her and let her tag along.

The next episode set up some of the interpersonal dynamics going forward. Ilsa will challenge Chance on the moral implications of their work while bedeviling Winston in matters around the office. Meanwhile, Guerrero and Ames will provide comic relief as he tries to mentor his precocious protege. (Think Yoda and Luke Skywalker, but with Yoda cranky and malevolent and Luke replaced by a hot chick.)

Expect that Chance’s past will continue to intrude upon his present. In Wednesday’s episode, he finds himself protecting the widow of a man he killed seven years earlier.

So buckle your seatbelts. Human Target may be a low-key action series, if there is such a thing, but the show seems to be embarking upon Season 2 with a fresh burst of energy.

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Stu Robinson, a college friend of the TV Tyrant, is a writer, editor, media-relations practitioner and social-media guy based in Phoenix.

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Listen, I hear all of you, I do, retread, recycled, done to death, here we go again… but you know what, I still like it. I just can’t help myself. Jack goes off all cocksure and angry, it just gets me every.single.time.

So, along with the expected move of Jack stealing the helicopter (from his biggest fan, no less!), we got one of my favorite pairings in the history of 24. Cherry Jones and Gregory Itzin ruled every moment of their scenes together, and mad props to Bob Gunton for holding his own as the’ Good’ shoulder angel. It was interesting to see a character as idealistic as President Taylor be vulnerable to the brilliant smarmy-ness of President Logan. It was delicious to watch.

I know this may make me a bad person, but watching Jack smack Dana around was satisfying, as I wanted to do that to her for most of the season. Also, not only was she a bad spy, but she sucks at holding immunity too. Everyone gets immunity on this show! Poor, dumb, Dana.

While I was excited that Chloe was given temporary rein of CTU, I did wonder if her and her personality disorder could handle it. I thought she jumped right in and did great. I just hope it doesn’t end in another one of Jack’s BFFs having to break up with him.

All in all, even with a rickety Russian conspiracy plot bolstering the story, I am excited for the last few episodes… ever!

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Oh, glee, how I love you. Why did you stay away for so long?

I take no shame in my unabashed love for this show. From the very first moment of the pilot, I was enthralled, and my love grew and grew, right up to the big sectionals episode. Then, in their infinite wisdom, Fox took glee away from the adoring throngs, and made us wait. A not uncommon move by a network these days, but annoying nonetheless.

Anyhoo, as much as I love, I was fully prepared to not be thrilled with the returning episode. I knew it would be a huge set-up episode for the rest of the season and the road to regionals, and those kind of episodes have a way of being disappointing somehow.

But no! I was mostly wrong. Jane Lynch’s Sue Sylvester was awesomely horrible, Mr. Shue was adorable and didn’t sing any stupid rap mash-ups (thank god), Rachel was her usual self centered self, Finn was a perfect representation of the clueless teen boy (and still perfectly cute), and we got to see into the shallow and hilariously empty minds of Brit and Santana (“Did you know dolphins are just gay sharks?”). With the exception of having to hear “Hello, Again” at all, I enjoyed all of it.

Also, we got the wonderful addition of Broadway lovlies Idina Menzel and Jonathan Groff as potential villian members of Vocal Adrenaline, the main competition to our New Direction glee-ers. Fun!

If you haven’t seen the glorious Sue Sylvester version of Madonna’s “Vogue”, get on that right now, because next week? Madonna week!!

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To admit liking these shows, well, it kinda blows my cover. I take pride in being a big fan of action adventure  and sci fi shows. The cool shows, like Battlestar and Lost and boy shows like 24 and Human Target. A procedural bores me to tears (CSI or Law & Order? Ugh). I find shows about suburban families inconsequential (Desperate Housewives or Parenthood? Stab me in the eye with a fork, please). But somehow, these two shows have won my heart, and I have my last roommate to thank for it (thanks Joanne!).

Medium: A family who lives in suburban Phoenix, the mother is a psychic who works for the DA’s office, the father is an engineer, and they have three girls, all with some psychic ability. But this is the sneaky part: the family is sweet and functional. Jake is one of the awesomest TV husbands ever created on television. Smart and caring, and supportive of all the cuckoo stuff that goes on around his psychic wife. Every week I wonder, “Where can I find a man like that?” The kids are endearing, but not sickeningly so, and Allison is mild mannered but determined in helping find all manner of murders lurking about Arizona. Plus, there’s lots and lots of gross and disgusting crime scenes to enjoy. I find the murder of the week fun to try and figure out, and the writers do a good job of using twisty turns and red herrings to keep you on your toes. But really, in the end, I just love the family dynamic and the sly smartness and wit that is conveyed to us each week.

NBC cancelled the show last year, but since CBS owned it, they took it on and have paired it with a show I’ve never seen, The Ghost Whisperer. Seems like a good pair to me, but I hear the ratings are so-so for CBS, and the show is on the bubble. Of course it is, now that I find myself a full-blown fan.

Bones: I’m gonna be honest here, I only gave this show a chance because I am a big Buffy fan, and if Angel (David Boreanaz) was on the show, maybe it was worth checking out, because he is exceedingly gorgeous. Add in a badge and a gun? I really don’t need much more than that. Hee. But like Medium, the characters won me over. Smart and funny, the lab is full of quirky characters, and the main characters, Booth and Bones, have that crazy chemistry that we all want in our TV couples, and a fun will-they-or-won’t-they vibe that so far hasn’t been drudgery. Also, lots and lots of disgusting and gory crime scenes. Totally revolting corpses and pieces. I just love that stuff. Also like Medium, the writers never really take things too seriously, which can be a very difficult task when you write about death and gore and murder all the time.

I don’t really need to pimp this show. They just aired their 100th episode on Fox, and I hear the ratings are better than ever, so YAY for me!

Some of my favorite shows on the air right now were shows I scoffed at when they started. Medium, Bones, Supernatural, Gilmore Girls,  Buffy, BSG, etc. So now I do my best to try out everything that has even a sliver of interest to me. Most of the time, I am disappointed, but I always try to remember, sometimes what may seem like yet another tedious version of something you’ve seen over and over, may just turn out to be one of your favorites.

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Tonight’s start to the two-night, four-hour season premiere is a bit different from the usual: It’s two hours, but it doesn’t start until 9 p.m.

As my buddy Adam over at The Jack Sack commented, there are some little old ladies who are in for a nasty surprise tonight when they turn on Channel 5 (New York) and discover that, instead of that nice Ernie Anastos (or whoever they have on Sundays), Jack’s throttling some terrorist.

Wonder how many calls they’ll get.

Meanwhile, we’re going to be liveblogging over at Blogs4Bauer, so join us there!

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I was quite happy to hear Fringe would be back this week and intrigued, to say the least, that the second episode, airing on Monday, Jan. 11, is an unaired one from Season 1. Thursday’s episode is called “Unearthed.”

(Note: Some blogs, including some linked to below, have said Fringe isn’t back until Jan. 11, Monday, but the Fox site itself says it’s this Thursday. I’m going with Fox.)

And to make things even more confusing, Charlie (who was killed twice kind of – once for real and once as his doppelganger) plays a major role in the episode.

Fringebloggers had the full text of the press release about Monday’s episode, and it seems that the powers that be don’t really want us to know at this point if this is an alternate universe Charlie or a flashback of some sort:

After a teenage girl is pronounced brain dead, her mother takes her off life support, but when doctors operate quickly to remove her organs, the deceased girl shockingly awakens screaming an alphanumeric code. Equally as perplexing as her resurrection is that she is now somehow able to speak Russian and possesses classified information only a high-ranking soldier would know. While the girl’s mind-bending condition intensifies, Walter dusts off some old lab videos and hypothesizes the unthinkable, sending Olivia and Peter to investigate the bewildering case in an original “Unearthed” episode of FRINGE and here’s another mystery: is it an unaired episode from Season One or is it from an alternate universe? airing Monday, Jan. 11 (9:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. (FRINGE-121) (TV-14 L, V)

We think we know it is an unaired Season One episode, as that’s what Cinemablend and others seemed to have been told.

Of course, that doesn’t mean they were told correct information. That, or after letting the cat out of the bag, the powers that be decided to make it part of the alternate universe storyline. Either way … color me intrigued.

I am kind of ticked, however, that Fox is only putting Fringe back on the air for a few weeks, before yanking it off for midseason replacement Past Life, according to The Futon Critic. It doesn’t come back until April. This is especially wrong, because after moving Fringe to a pretty big night for genre TV (and thus more competition), it’s depriving the show of getting the boost a slot after American Idol could bring it. It doesn’t come back on the air until April 1.

WTF, Fox?

Now, Past Life might be OK, and maybe they’re banking on it being in Fringe’s slot to give it a boost. It’s about a bunch of detectives who investigate whether what’s happening to you now could be related to who you were in a past life.

Here’s a trailer:

Might it be OK? Sure. And Fox reduced the order for the show from 13 to just 7 episodes, so that probably means it’s pretty good.

Oh, fun reading: io9 has a great post about JJ Abram’s obsession with Alice in Wonderland, and contains a link to Hidden Elements, an I Spy-like puzzle you can do (as many times as you want) to “unlock” some very cool wallpapers. I did it enough times that I was able to find all the items and download all eight wallpapers.

Here, they are, click on the thumbnails to download a 1024 × 768 size – if you want larger, you’ll have to go to the site and solve it yourself:

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As it is with every year, a whole bunch of science fiction-y shows were canceled at the end of the season, but I have to give it to the networks for trying a bunch of new ones next year.

It was so hard to keep track of the comings and goings during the upfronts, but SciFi Wire thankfully charted it all in a very understandable fashion.

The clear winner, IMHO, is Fox.

Sure, Fox canceled Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, better known as TSCC because it’s a lot freakin’ shorter. But it did keep Dollhouse around for at least another 13 episodes. (Side note: This comic is probably a bit too close to reality for comfort when it comes to how the decision was made.) I’m thinking that Fox didn’t feel like incurring the wrath of the Whedonverse again, whereas TSCC ended at a spot that could full well be the series’ end. (Not that I wouldn’t have loved to see where it would have picked up in the fall.)

Fox also kept Fringe, which is one of my favorite shows. So the net gets brownie points for that. It’s also picked up Human Target and Past Life, each for 13 episodes and for midseason.

Human Target is based on a D.C. comic book and focuses on a guy who goes undercover, basically, as his clients whose lives have been threatened. It was written by Jonathan Steinberg, who was the co-creator of the late Jericho.

I’m not sure I completely understand the premise of Past Life, and the description on Zap2It didn’t help much, but from what I can tell, it’s about a bunch of investigators who solve crimes by dredging up their clients’ long-lost memories. Whether that means memories of dead clients or memories of past lives for solving cold cases or just stuff people have forgotten, I’m not quite clear on. I’m guessing it’s one of the first two, otherwise the whole “science fiction” aspect of it is lost on me.

NBC is second in the science fiction Olympics, though it canceled more sci-fi-ish shows from this season than it has old and new ones put together. Off the schedule: Knight Rider, My Own Worst Enemy, Kings (I still haven’t forgiven them for that decision) and Medium (which CBS decided to pick up).

But it decided to renew Chuck (midseason) and Heroes (really? Talk about a show past its prime, despite it having been around for only 3 seasons) and has three new shows, though two of them are summer series: Day One, The Listener and Merlin.

Day One sounds the most promising to me, what with its post-apocalyptic Melrose Place-ian-ish-ness. Of course, that means it stands an excellent chance of not succeeding.

The Listener is about a paramedic who can read minds, it seems. And Merlin – well, if you can’t guess what it’s about, you need to go back and read King Arthur.

ABC lost more than it’s gained, but it has one of the best sci-fi shows ever: Lost. This is the show’s last season, though, so hopefully one of the new shows will pick up the mantle. Canceled were Cupid, Eli Stone, Pushing Daisies and Life on Mars (which is the only one of the four I cared about; I tried to like Pushing Daisies, but it was just too precious for me).

But it has V, a remake of one of my favorite miniseries ever. I’m sorry the guy originally responsible for it isn’t involved, and I’d sure like to see Michael Ironside in it, but what is he now, 65, 70? I have great hopes for it, especially if they redo the hybrid alien baby and don’t use a really lame puppet.

ABC also is trying out Eastwick and Flash Forward.

Now, Eastwick is based on the John Updike novel The Witches of Eastwick, which was quite memorably adapted into a movie starring Cher, Michelle Pfeiffer, Susan Sarandon and Jack Nicholson. I tried reading the book at one point but it was a bit too dated and I just couldn’t hack my way through it. I’m willing to give the show a shot, though.

Flash Forward has a lot of promise, though, with a premise in which the entire world blacks out and glimpses 2 minutes and 17 seconds of an undetermined time in each person’s own future. It’s based on a book, whose author is even writing one of the episodes. It’s being written as if it will be five seasons of 22 episodes apiece and could become a worthy successor to Lost, if it catches on.

CBS gave up on two shows: Eleventh Hour and The Ex-List, but kept Ghost Whisperer and snagged NBC’s cast-off Medium. That’s all.

The CW kept Smallville and Supernatural. Though this season is likely to be the final season of SPN, that’s great news they decided to keep it on. But it killed Valentine and Reaper, the latter of which I mourn deeply. I still have three or four episodes on my DVR, so I still have more Reaper to see.

It’s airing the new show Vampire Diaries, though, which I’d imagine might be a good pair with SPN. It’s based on a pre-Twilight series of books, The CW would like you to know, thankyouverymuch. It’s about a girl who can’t decide between two vampire brothers – one good, one evil, of course. They’re battling for her and the souls of all the people in her small town.

So that’s it. Of course, there will be some shows on SyFy, USA, FX, AMC and a whole other slew of acronyms, but these are the big five, so to speak.

Which shows are you looking forward to, and which ones will you miss the most?

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