Arkin’s take on the situation is heartening for fans of the show. Instead of lamenting the move, he’s focused on the hopefully positive impact of several increasingly popular alternative methods to watching TV shows on the actual tube, such as TiVo recording and online streaming.

In his opinion, “because of the preponderance now of people using their TiVos, and the amount of people watching shows online or recording and streaming video, the scheduled night is not as important as it once was.”

Still, I would love to see how relocation to that night would affect megahits like American Idol and CSI. I wonder if their numbers would remain as strong or suffer from the weekend curse.

Another point Arkin makes is that on Fridays, the series, which struggled in the ratings during its freshman run, won’t encounter “as much vehement competition.” Of course, one could argue that if CBS keeps the hit FBI procedural Numb3rs in its present time slot, Life actually will have a pretty popular force to deal with at 10pm.

Even so, perhaps fans should be less apprehensive about the scheduling change since Arkin’s perspective does have merit. I feel a bit better already.

Read the entire exclusive interview with Adam Arkin at Comedy Centric.

Tags: Adam Arkin, Life, NBC, television, tv

If you don’t recall — and I’m fairly certain lots of people don’t — Life is the funny and engaging show starring English actor Damian Lewis as Zen-loving, wrongfully incarcerated cop Charlie Crews. During the first season, Crews returns to his law enforcement job after finally being released from prison, only to encounter suspicious attitudes from colleagues as he skillfully solves crimes while secretly tracking down the person who set him up for a triple homicide over a decade ago.

Despite being one of the most enjoyable new series last fall, Life continually struggled in the ratings and just barely squeaked through to a second season. After NBC’s announcement at its April 2 upfront presentation that the show will air Fridays at 10pm EST when it returns in September, I’m inclined to think that fatal time slot was the strategy all along.

Something has to go on the schedule at that time, so why not a show that a small, vocal group of fans and critics championed? This way, the network looks good for keeping a very good but low-rated series around, and it doesn’t have to worry about what happens on Fridays. Either Life will sink, as is most likely given the history of Friday-night primetime TV programs that aren’t named Ghost Whisperer or Numb3rs, or, with a huge stroke of luck, it might swim.

Equally distressing is the fact that both the fall and winter planned lead-ins for Life could not be much more incompatible. In the fall, an adaptation of the enduring Robinson Crusoe novel will air at 8pm, and the insipid game show Deal or No Deal will follow at 9pm.

Then, come winter, Deal or No Deal will shift to 8pm and Friday Night Lights will take over the 9pm slot. I love FNL just as much as the next devotee, but let’s be serious. The earnest, small-town, family-friendly, football drama is in no way a good companion to a quirky, cerebral, crime-riddled, big-city detective dramedy like Life.

Ugh!!! Prepare yourselves for Life‘s final season right now, fellow fans. I just hope the show makes it all the way to the end and doesn’t get cut short a few episodes in.

If only someone at NBC had dedicated as much effort to putting together the Friday-night lineup as that on Monday nights in the fall, which rocks. Chuck at 8pm, Heroes at 9pm, and the new Jason Smilovic/Christian Slater spy-daddy drama My Own Worst Enemy at 10pm. Now, I’m totally looking forward to that.

NBC’s primetime schedules for Fall 2008–2009, Winter 2009, and Summer 2009 follow. And, yes — you read that correctly. Over an entire year’s worth of programming is coming up, which is what the network released.

Tags: Damian Lewis, Life, NBC, television, tv, upfronts

There’s a pivotal scene near the beginning of the episode where wronged policeman Charlie Crews (Damian Lewis) is riding along on a deserted highway, listening to a Zen tape. He’s just received a call from an inmate whose help he enlisted to track down the convict he thinks is responsible for the murders that sent him to prison for twelve years.

The meditative discourse on the tape unfolds:

The Buddha was asked if he ever felt anger.
“Of course,” said the Buddha.
The Buddha was asked if he ever felt the desire to strike another.
“Of course,” said the Buddha.
“But, if I am connected to all things,” said the Buddha, “hurting another is hurting myself. And how does that better me?”

Crews’ reply: “Because it just does.”

At that point, the police detective with a huge score to settle calmly ejects the tape from the deck and flings it out the window onto the dusty road. He drives away a few yards, and when the car stops for a few lingering seconds, it seems like he’s going to turn the car around and drive back to retrieve the tape. Yet, the moment passes when Crews continues onward to complete his mission.

That telling scene perfectly sums up the momentum of Life‘s first season thus far. Crews wanted his old cop job back after being released from jail thanks to DNA evidence that exonerated him. Still, that goal was tempered by his irrepressible though well-concealed urge to nail the bastards responsible for him having been imprisoned in the first place.

Yeah—Zen is a nice way of life and everything, but when it’s time to get down to business with the bad guys, the discipline of enlightenment must go. If anyone was doubting it before, now you know: fruit-loving, jovial, contemplative Crews can be bad to the bone when the need arises, which means watching him take down whoever set him up twelve years ago during the back half of the season will be as thrilling as it gets. Fans should be so glad NBC wisely renewed this keeper.

The Verdict: A

Tags: Damian Lewis, Life, NBC, television, tv

Although the series (finally) got some respect and significant promotion when NBC scheduled it after Monday night’s Heroes midseason finale, the ratings weren’t all that spectacular. Yes, they were a bit better than those earned by the time slot’s previous inhabitant, fellow rookie Journeyman, another show that is much better than the ratings and lack of buzz indicate. Still, the numbers were nowhere near as improved as ardent fans like me had hoped they would be.

I have to admit, though, that the episode “Fill It Up, Part 1,” the first portion of the two-parter that concludes tonight, was not as appealing as the last several installments. The central crime—a Zen master’s murder—was a little too pedestrian and the usually spot-on comedic timing among the main characters was noticeably off. Or maybe that was just an aftereffect of the plot’s slightly subpar execution.

Still, the episode was enjoyable enough, giving viewers every reason to look forward to tonight’s conclusion “Fill It Up, Part 2,” as well as the rest of the season next year … if the current writers strike ever ends, that is. Check out 2007′s last episode of Life tonight at 10pm EST on NBC and you might even get to see Charlie Crews (Damian Lewis) track down the real killer responsible for the murders that sent him to prison for twelve years. Wouldn’t that be cool?

Tags: Damian Lewis, Life, NBC, Sarah Shahi, television, tv

Yippee! For the first time I can remember, each and every one of my top rookie shows has survived to see a complete freshman season. Who will write those needed episodes if the writers strike continues is another matter all together, but I’m not going to rain on this here parade.

Congratulations to Chuck and Life, as well as Dirty Sexy Money, three series that have thrived despite middling ratings and a noticeable lack of rampant Bionic Woman- or Pushing Daisies-sized hype. Hopefully, the shows will grow as a result of their extended runs and gain the larger audiences they deserve.

Tags: back nine, Chuck, Life, NBC, television, tv

My first impression of the series was nonexistent simply because the network did and has continued to do an atrocious job of promoting the show. Or maybe I should spin that assessment around and instead say the Peacock has done a fantastic job of thoroughly ignoring one of the best shows from its rookie slate.

Based on the poorly composed description available to the public before the fall season officially began (the tagline is the nebulous “Life was his sentence. Life is what he got back.”), one could understandably assume that the series was yet another newcomer with a sci-fi slant, as I and others very well did. That assessment couldn’t be more incorrect.

The “Zen” crime drama is more psychologically contemplative than unearthly and oddball than weird, which is what helps it stand apart from both other freshmen series and other crime procedurals around the tube. Think Law & Order: Criminal Intent and Monk intertwined, with a lighter-hearted, more optimistic, and less obsessed lead.

LAPD Detective Charlie Crews (Britain’s Damian Lewis of Band of Brothers and The Forsyte Saga) is a wronged man. During his early career with the Los Angeles Police department, he was convicted for a triple murder he didn’t commit and subsequently spent twelve years in prison, before DNA evidence exonerated him. Freed, he and his lawyer Constance Griffiths (Brooke Langton) successfully sue Los Angeles and the LAPD for an undisclosed amount of money that’s rumored to total millions, as well as his old job back.

Crews immediately acquires a high-class lifestyle to go with his windfall, yet he’s still intent on reestablishing the career that disappeared along with his wife while he was incarcerated. When he’s not on the job, he’s usually busy spending piles of money on unlikely nature-based investments (an orange grove and a solar farm thus far), hanging out with his many lady friends, or studying his Wall of Conspiracy (a map of photos on a wall with connections drawn between various people) to figure out who framed him and almost destroyed his life.

At work, Crews is partnered with no-nonsense Dani Reese (former Dallas Cowboy Cheerleader Sarah Shahi of The L Word and Alias), a recovering drug addict from her days working undercover as a narcotics agent. On lesser, shallower shows, Reese would be written transparently as a domineering hottie, reliant on the gun she carries and her obvious beauty.

Life, however, paints her as a reluctantly tolerant ying to Crews’ joyfully carefree yang and a deeply troubled human being who’s dedication to her job is probably the one thing keeping her in fairly good kilter. It sounds sort of stereotypically tragic. But, with the cool yet not always composed Shahi in the role, Reese comes across as a character you can put your faith in to not go down the already beaten path of self-destructive, unfulfilled babes with real power who can’t keep a man or their sanity.

Shahi also expertly plays off of Lewis’ somewhat eccentric, fruit-loving Crews, Life‘s fully capable and deserving main attraction. Whoever cast the show did a much better job than the person who wrote the description, that’s for sure. One thing the partners have in common, if little else, is their devotion to fighting crime, and with each episode, their partnership and the series substantially strengthens.

The weakest element of Life initially was the largely routine and predictable cases (the show has started introducing increasingly layered and original cases, though), which brings me back to my original observation and the importance of how much a viewer values characters with well-defined personalities. Life works for me because I’m loving Lewis and Crews more and more as the season progresses. Crews is strange, he’s suave, and he means business, despite the timidity that his laidback attitude might indicate. Don’t be fooled.

The rest of the competent cast is rounded out by Adam Arkin (Chicago Hope, Northern Exposure) as white-collar convict Ted Earley, Crews’ former prison cellmate and current housemate and accountant (Who hires a convicted embezzler to manage their boatloads of money? Crews does.); Robin Weigert (Deadwood, Cold Case) as LAPD Lieutenant Karen Davis, Reese’s mentor and Crews’ boss who was at first highly suspicious of him when he returned to work; and the aforementioned Langton (Friday Night Lights, Melrose Place) as attorney Constance Griffiths, a married woman who truly believes in Crews’ innocence and has developed mutual romantic feelings for him over the course of their lengthy professional engagement.

If Life somehow succeeds (which seems unlikely at the moment given the awful ratings), Crews’ distinctive head of red hair has the potential to do for Lewis what the striking trait did for natural blonde Gillian Anderson on The X-Files—make him an instantly recognizable star wherever he goes. I’m not kidding or committing hyperbole when I say that Life is the best new show on TV that nobody’s watching. Please, do it and yourself a big favor: tune in at least once and just give Life a chance. You’ll laugh a lot and come away entertained.

The Verdict: B+

Tags: Adam Arkin, Brooke Langton, Damian Lewis, Life, NBC, Robin Weigert, Sarah Shahi, television, tv