ENTERTAINMENT

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The first seasons of Nurse Jackie, starring Edie Falco, and Superjail are out on DVD next week

If you want an easy, vivid demonstration of how much and how variously the television landscape has changed in the age of cable, check out two new TV on DVD releases Tuesday. Both are first-season collections, and both are adult entertainment; beyond that, they are about as different as two shows on the same medium can be.
New to Video, DVD and Blu-ray
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Roger Daltrey, left, and Pete Townshend of The Who perform during the halftime show for Super Bowl XLIV.

The Who was the band, the What was the halftime show of Super Bowl XLIV, and you already know the Where and When. But the Why is a little trickier to answer.

Quoted: What they're saying about this year's Super Bowl ads
You Tube: Choose this year's best Super Bowl commercial

Comedy Central and HBO

Sarah Silverman, left, and The Life and Times of Tim

Most of the time, the release of a TV show on DVD is an opportunity to indulge an already established enthusiasm.

But a DVD collection also can be a chance to reconsider a show. I did this with two shows to be released Tuesday: HBO's The Life & Times of Tim: The Complete First Season and Comedy Central's The Sarah Silverman Program: Season 2, Volume 2.

Quoted: What they're saying about Sarah Silverman
Blog: More on TV

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Glenn Close

To critics of TV's serialized storytelling trend, FX's Damages is everything that's wrong with this approach.

Episodes are interfused and story arcs stretch out over a season (or more), dropping off here, popping back up there. Time isn't linear. Past, present and future are forever slipping in and out of one another, so that the viewer can never settle into a certain and stable "now." Or rather, it's always "now," it's just always changing.
Quoted: What they're saying about Glenn Close
Blog: More on TV

AP Photo/BBC Worldwide

Top Gear host Jeremy Clarkson navigates his self-designed amphibious pickup truck across the English Channel.

Top Gear is a British TV show that originally began in 1977, but has become a national hit and an international cult phenomenon since it relaunched in 2002. It's estimated to have 350 million fans worldwide. It's an hour-long show in which three guys talk about cars, drive cars, smash them, and generally have fun with them.
Blog: More on TV

ABC

Matt Long, left, and Billy Zane in The Deep End

Think of The Deep End as a cafeteria-style TV show: It offers up a little bit of everything so viewers can have their choice.

The new ABC drama is full of young, attractive people with montages of fast cars, cool clothes and hip clubs.
David Hemingson, creator of ABC's Deep End, draws on his experiences as a young lawyer
Blog: More on TV

AP Photo/NBC

Ricky Gervais

The Golden Globes awards show was hilarious fun, full of not-ready-for-prime time silliness and open-bar-primed celebrities. At least it used to be, back before the Oscars-industrial complex turned it into the official warm-up event of Hollywood's big night.
Quoted: What they're saying about the Golden Globes
Relive the night: The show | The red carpet
Link: GoldenGlobes.org

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Clockwise: John Hamm in Mad Men, Lea Michele in Glee, George Clooney in Up in the Air and Zoe Saldana in Avatar.

Sunday night's Golden Globes awards show for movies and TV is considered the fun one. The booze flows freely, and a looser, table-hopping vibe prevails. Here are the nominees, with predictions and picks for movies from critic Chris Vognar and TV from critic Tom Maurstad:
Shopping Blog: Fashion writers' views of the Sunday red carpet
Movies Blog: Join the Golden Globes discussion at 7 p.m. Sunday
List: Nominees and winners

AP Photo

Clockwise from top left: Michael Jackson, Natasha Richardson, Patrick Swayze, Farrah Fawcett, Walter Cronkite and Brittany Murphy

If death were like any other pop culture trend or event, we would be declaring 2009 a great year, a banner year for the fallen famous. Of course, death isn't just another buzz bin of boldface names generating yet another year-end, top 10 list.
More Year in Review coverage
Vote: Best of the Decade

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The 2000s, or naughty aughties. Clockwise from top left: Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie on the cover of People magazine, an iPhone in 2009 and the original iPod in 2001.

When the decade began, most of us had never heard of Paris Hilton, but as we end it, the legacy of the prototypical reality star is all around us, from the legion of her celebrity offspring – the Lindsays, the Britneys, the Kardashians – to the tabloid-industrial complex she helped create.
Vote for your favorite movies, TV, music and books of the decade
More Year in Review coverage