I thought it would be fun for everyone to share their favorite TV shows, and why. Yesterday, I signed us up for Showtime on cable, since they have more and more shows I want to see. A friend had told me about "The United States of Tara", a show she really likes. I love it! It's about a woman who has multiple personalities and her family--it stars Toni Collette (she was in the movie Muriel's Wedding years ago) and she is wonderful. It's kind of offbeat, and she's great at doing the alternate selves. Other shows I really like on Showtime are the comedy "Weeds"--another offbeat one; Tracey Ullman's show; and the historical miniseries "The Tudors". As you can see, I have ecletic taste!
love the tudors and jonathan reys-meyers is so hot.....haha... hope it comes back. i always watch it on showtime on demand before its on reg tv... divvi
DirecTV gave me Showtime for 3 months and it was the right 3 months for the Tudors. Loved the show. We used to get all of the movie channels, but dropped them when my husband stopped watching movies. Frankly the Tudors were the only thing I watched from Showtime while I had it.
One summer series that will be coming on starting this week that I like is The Closer. Can't remember which cable channel has it, but it is not a network show. I've been watching it for 2 or 3 years at this point and it tends to be a really good police procedural show. And I like the ongoing characters.
I love The Closer too. It took me awhile to figure out why the actor who plays her father seemed familiar, then realized it was Maurice Minnifleld from "Northern Exposure", my all-time favorite tv show. I find that DH does best with sitcoms as they don't involve much understanding of plot. He really loves reruns of M*A*S*H* and never gets tired of watching. Luckily, they're on so much of the time. He gets confused with "House" because the show always starts with the event that brought the patient into the hospital in the first place. He'll say, "This isn't the right program."
I like "The Closer" and "Miami CSI", mysteries are my favorites, I even like "Law & Order". About all my DW could follow are "The Weather Channel", & HGTV. She does like comedies with a lot of visual action and gags, but nothing that requires following a plot.
I really enjoy the colorful scenes in Miami CSI, I've never seen anything quite like the photography on this show.
DH and I both love to watch NCIS, Law & Order and CSI Miami. Don't care for the closer - DH can't understand her sometimes (with her "accent"). DH is upset right now because some of them aren't on for the summer. He wants to cancel our Dishnetwork. Told him we can't since we got the bundle for phone and internet! LOL
I like the Mon. nite lineup of sitcoms. The cop shows are too gory and serious. Boston Legal is great mainly due to I think its James Spader....he is so bright and clever in the courtroom. Too liberal, but I don't care anymore. MASH is my favorite. I feel part of their family.
I don't think I have a "favorite". There are several shows, I will make the effort to watch though. Bones, House, The Closer, Raising the Bar, Saving Grace, NCIS, The Mentalist and Numbers. I also enjoy "What Not to Wear" when I can see it. Lately I have been watching more of Suze Orman and find that interesting. Sometimes I cringe at what people what to spend on something but it is fun to watch her talk it through with them.
TJ, I loved Boston Legal and miss it a lot! I watch House, 24, NCIS, The Mentalist, and CSI Miami. My favorite channel is HGTV, and show is Devine Design. I wish I could have Candice Olsen redo my whole house!! Her work is fantastic!
Therrja, I watch when Suzy Orman is on Oprah....I tape it and watch it on the weekend after. It is amazing what some people have spent their money on! Is her own show the same thing?
I like Suzy O too--she gives good advice and is entertaining doing it. I liked the British gals on their What Not To Wear--I have their books--but don't really love Stacy on the American version.
I adore The Office. When I worked for the gov't, I vowed to write a sitcom about it when I retired. Someone beat me to the punch with The Office. For anyone who watches it, I had a boss who was pretty much as "out there" as the character Michael Scott--basically a nice guy, but really goofy. He ended up getting demoted for his antics and shoved in a corner--pretty radical for the federal gov't.
marilyninMD, how funny. I much prefer the American version. I found the British gals too mean spirited. But I saw the American version first, so I'm pretty sure that has something to do with it.
My stepmother is from New York and two of my closest friends are from New York. Stacy and Clinton have a lot of similar characteristics to them. I don't always appreciate how they say something but do like the point about looking the best you can in the body you currently have. The difference in some of those transformations is astounding.
Our favorite show is The Last of the Summer Wine. It’s a British show about older people (like DH and me). The show is carried on our local PBS station. It’s the longest-running sitcom in the entire world, having started in the early seventies. We never fail to get good laugh out of the shows, even if we’ve seen them several times.
I watch almost nothing on TV except news, my favorites being Washington Week and the Sunday morning show on CBS.. but I have now started watching Kenneth Branagh in the series (set in Finland, for some reason) on PBS Mystery currently. We do get Netflix and watch a lot. The other day my daughter put on Fargo for my husband and he HATED it - I'd gotten it for me and forgot to tell her that. He likes the Sherlock Holmes we get from Netflix, and old movies, and the funny Only Fools and Horses which is a Brit show from the 80s starring David Jason who is also in a very different crime show called A Touch of Frost.
I don't have time to watch TV much anymore, and DH becomes agitated if I watch too much. I never was one for reality shows, but these days the only shows I watch is The Biggest Loser, and Extreme Makeover Home Edition. I used to love The Ghose Whisperer and CSI.
The old movies on TCM and AMC especially westerns and war movies; Bonanza, Gunsmoke, MASH, I Dream of Jeanne, Leave it to Beaver, Andy Griffith, Matlock, Beverly Hillbillies, CSI (not so much now that Grissom has left), CSI Miami, Monk, NCIS, Law and Order SVU, In Plain Sight, Army Wives, Ice Road Truckers, Property Virgins, House Hunters, most of the shows on GSN especially Catch 21 and Chain Reaction, 700 Club, Charles Stanley, The Young and the Restless, Seattle Mariners, Boston Red Sox when we have them, hockey, Amazing Race, Dancing with the Stars - otherwise we watch a lot of TV.
Charlotte--Never thought about it, but might the old shows you mentioned appeal more to our AD LO's than the new ones? My husband is good about watching old movies too--it's funny, that's one of the things I thought I'd have time for when I retired. It may be one of the few things on my list I actually get to do. Briegull--Not surprised your husbandf hated Fargo. Mine used to love that kind of thing, but now he also hates anything with offbeat characters. It's a shame, that's exactly the kind of thing that appeals to me.
Someone posted on here awhile ago that "all my husband does is watch TV" and we said "and your point?..." I'm happy to have him sitting quietly, even if he doesn't understand it all.
For some unknown reason my husband has begun enjoying watching golf. That is great because he is focused on starting watching TV at 3 in the afternoon, and until there was golf every weekend day at 3 he was disappointed that the shows he was putting on the TV weren't available on weekends. Not that he watches The Doctors, Oprah and Dr. Phil, but he likes having them on during those two hours.
I have Direct TV (satellite) ..... that's all I can get around here. No network television. Can't even get my local news. 'Cause of where I live, there's no service for what I wish I had. BUT, I do get some reruns of what's been on network tv on some other stations. I LOVE the series, "Heros". I also LIVE on the SciFi channel and Chiller channel. I like horror, mystery. The Science Channel, History and History International, I couldn't do without. I like fantasy, and sci-fi because it takes me away from reality. I enjoy watching CNN also. I'm so isolated otherwise. I don't get a paper anymore....it's such a small town paper....I get my news on the internet and radio (NPR).
Stuntgirl, have you gone to TV channels websites and looked at the local news there? I get the local news and weather from local stations on the web...You can also get newspapers online...I read the Houston Post... <grin>
You can also watch several of your unknown, maybe soon to be known, favorites online. That is how I watch the ones that I miss when I get home too late.
Google news gives you the headlines everywhere, and local papers' websites give you the local stuff, usually free. I hate to see this but I understand it.
THis morning I didn't see my paper (the NYTimes). Finally saw it was in the driveway. But before that, I was thinking, can I read it online? Yes I can. Do I want to? NO WAY!!
I think I like the old movies for the following reason: little or no profanity; the actors are better - they have less dialog and special effects so they have to do more actual acting; I have always felt I would have been better suited to live in pioneer times. (read in my counseling books that is a sign of depression - you think??)
I don't think we are depressed, Charlotte, we just have good taste. Do you remember how totally gripping "Airport" was? (Not "Airplane", although that was a riot!).
Jan K--The Last of the Summer Wine was one of my Mom's favorites. Like you, she watched the "Britcoms" (British sitcoms) over and over--the one about the department store was another of her favorites. My parents were also big Fawlty Towers fans too.
My LW likes anything with music. We both liked American Idol, Dancing w/ the Stars, So you thought you could Dance, etc. Really like the Country Music awards and Oscar and Emmy. I am now looking for some DVD's for Big band, country, soul, Jazz, etc. Anything but Rock, Rap, etc. Of course old movies like Sound of Music,, etc. are also great.
For those who missed episodes on tv, try logging on to hulu.com. It is free and you can watch the episodes and shows with very very short commercials. They have lots of series, and the best feature is that it is free...all you do is find the show, and watch it....
also, try veoh.com if hulu doesn't have what you're looking for.
And then there's this one, that not as many people know about:
http://www.watchtvsitcoms.com/
HOWEVER, be warned, chances are when you finally find the show you want to see, when you start playing it a pop-up window might appear. Sometimes they are advertising very X-rated stuff.
(I know that now phranque and Texas Joe will be in a big hurry to try it ! LOL)
Shanteuse..sorry to disappoint you, but there is no sense dangling a steak in front of a starving man...I avoid the xrated stuff, unless it's live and in person......thanks anyway
Thanks Shanteuse, I'm looking forward to that steak of phranque's even tho' I don't care to see what fun others may be having to which I have no access! (sigh)
Okay, guys....without starting a NEW topic...can you remember the first TV shows you watched when you first got the television set?
My first memories were watching IKE get nominated for President at the Republican National Convention and Adalai Stevenson (can't spell it) at the Democratic National Convention, and the crowning of Queen Elizabeth!!! I was about 8 or 9 at the time.
We had The Milton Berle Show, The Bob Hope Show, The Jack Benny Show, and the 15 minute shows of Perry Como, Julius LaRosa, Eddie Fisher, etc. We watched Sky King, Hopalong Cassidy, The Lone Ranger, Roy Rogers and Dale Evans, Gene Autry, The Cisco Kid, Annie Oakley and Little Rascals on Saturday mornings.
Please tell me that I'm not alone with these shows! <grin>
Mary, we had all those shows also. The first one I remember watching was The Lone Ranger on my aunts small B&W TV, admist all the snowy screen. Loretta Young Show was a favorite.
I think our first tv was an Emerson, with the right and left parentheses edges (a 12 inch I think), and we used to watch the test pattern a lot. The only things on were wrestling and the flag flying at 10:00 pm when it went off the air.
OK...Amos and Andy, Micky Mouse Mousketeers, Seahunt, Howdy Doody, Buffalo Bill, Perry Mason, Life of Riley, My friend Flicka, Zorro, You Bet Your Life, You asked for it, This is your life, Whirlybirds, My Little Margie, Dennis the menace, Tarzan, Abbott and Costello, three stooges, Circus Boy, Ozzie and Harriet, Superman (George Reeves), Cisco Kid , Shari Lewis, Honeymooners, Lassie, Leave it to Beaver, I married Joan, Sky King , Rin Tin Tin.. Now what was Sky King's plane called? His Niece?? What was the name of the indian princess on Howdy Doody, with Buffalo Bob?? What was the name of lassies owner??? wow...I must be old...I remember the old Dumont Network, and remember when you would get a tone and blank signal when shows were not on.....
Sky King's niece was Penny. Don't remember the planes name. SummerFallWinterSpring was the Indian Princess on Howdy Doody. There was also Mr. Bluster, and ClaraBelle the cow. Which Lassie owner? there were I think 3--Jimmy, Timmy, and a Forest Ranger type man.
Didn't Ken Murray have an early variety show, where one of the regulars was a blonde cowgirl named Laurie Anders whose trademark line was "I like the wide open spaces, out where the cactus grows, where two guns beats four aces -- I like the wide open spaces!"?
And Sid Caesar and Imogene Coca were a howl -- that would have been back around 1951 -- and George Goebel, whose frequent line was "Well I'll be a dirty bird".
All of those would have been viewed on a friend's TV while we were still at Ga Tech -- we didn't have a TV of our own until 1953 -- a used black and white Emerson in a monster of a cabinet, and got only snowy reception from Miami, Tampa, and Jacksonville, and a little better from Orlando.
Arthur Godfrey (Julius LaRosa - the McGuire Sisters, Wrestling Night, Your Hit Parade ( w/singers Snooky Lanson Giselle MacKenzie, Dorothy Collins..., .... Dave Garroway on the early Today show, with his monkey (Mr. Muggs??),
Wow - such good memories with those shows. Shows with no profanity, going all the way meant necking, the good guy always won, and jokes were funny without being dirty.
Mom always watched Lawrence Welk. Laurel and Hardy. Three Stooges.
The shows I remember watching at home were the "Ed Sullivan Show", "I Love Lucy", "Lawrence Welk" and "Father Knows Best". I thought Eleanor Donahue who played the daughter on "Father Knows Best" was the best looking teen age girl in the whole world.
I saw Elvis in one of his first appearances on the "Ed Sullivan" show and remember watching Queen Elizabeth II's Coronation, gosh that was a lot of years ago.
StuntGirl where do you live that DirecTV doesn't offer the nearest big city's local stations? I'm in Allentown, PA, and we don't have network stations, but we get all of the Philadelphia stations, and the two Allentown stations, and at least one Southern NJ station as our group of stations. The Philadelphia stations do a great job of taking care of ALL of their watchers from the Poconos down to the middle of Delaware for things like weather and even some news stories. As an example, when they wanted to talk about Chrysler Dealerships being forced out of business, the one they chose was actually my own dealership and it isn't even in Allentown, but just outside of it. They also have done stories about my area when something newsworthy has come up. Two that come to mind are a chemical spill followed by a school bus accident (same day, different incidents), and a shooting of a local policeman (did breaking news, and two days of follow up on that one).
My point being that you should be able to either get a "local station" package or the national hookup stations if you really are outside a local area. And you might even be surprised that the big city station is actually covering major stories and weather in your immediate area.