The strike by television and movie writers has reduced the amount of new episodes of many TV shows being shown, like HEROES, ditto many of the late-night shows (although many reality shows have elected to proceed without scripting). And it sounds like the strike, even if resolved today, will delay many new episodes, even new series. (New-to-US episodes of the BBC’s LIFE ON MARS are still showing up, and HBO’s THE WIRE re-starts in early January 2008.)

When not reading or doing other non-work stuff, we enjoy watching TV shows (we get our news elsewhere), but we’re prepared — thanks to the pile of videotaped stuff that’s piled up over the past five or ten years, which we have nicknamed “The Backlog Channel.” Continue reading →