Portal:Television

The Television Portal

Flat-screen television receivers on display for sale at a consumer electronics store in 2008

Television (TV) is a telecommunication medium for transmitting moving images and sound. Additionally, the term can refer to a physical television set, rather than the medium of transmission. Television is a mass medium for advertising, entertainment, news, and sports. The medium is capable of more than "radio broadcasting", which refers to an audio signal sent to radio receivers.

Television became available in crude experimental forms in the 1920s, but only after several years of further development was the new technology marketed to consumers. After World War II, an improved form of black-and-white television broadcasting became popular in the United Kingdom and the United States, and television sets became commonplace in homes, businesses, and institutions. During the 1950s, television was the primary medium for influencing public opinion. In the mid-1960s, color broadcasting was introduced in the U.S. and most other developed countries.

In 2013, 79% of the world's households owned a television set. The replacement of earlier cathode-ray tube (CRT) screen displays with compact, energy-efficient, flat-panel alternative technologies such as LCDs (both fluorescent-backlit and LED), OLED displays, and plasma displays was a hardware revolution that began with computer monitors in the late 1990s. Most television sets sold in the 2000s were flat-panel, mainly LEDs. Major manufacturers announced the discontinuation of CRT, Digital Light Processing (DLP), plasma, and even fluorescent-backlit LCDs by the mid-2010s. LEDs are being gradually replaced by OLEDs. Also, major manufacturers have started increasingly producing smart TVs in the mid-2010s. Smart TVs with integrated Internet and Web 2.0 functions became the dominant form of television by the late 2010s. (Full article...)

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Firefly is an American science fiction television series created by writer/director Joss Whedon, creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel, under his Mutant Enemy Productions. Its naturalistic future setting, modeled after traditional Western movie motifs, presents an atypical science fiction backdrop for the narrative. Whedon served as executive producer, along with Tim Minear. Firefly premiered in the United States and Canada on the FOX network on September 20, 2002. It was cancelled after only eleven of the fourteen produced episodes were aired. Despite the series' relatively short life span, it received strong sales when it was released on DVD, and has impressive fan support campaigns. It won an Emmy in 2003 for "Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Series". The post-airing success of the show led Whedon and Universal Pictures to produce a film based on the series, titled Serenity after the fictional Firefly-class spaceship featured in the show. The series is set in the year 2517, after humans have arrived at a new star system, and follows the adventures of the renegade crew of Serenity, a Firefly-class spaceship. The ensemble cast portrays the nine characters who live on Serenity.

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Digital television transition map, as of 2009

Digital television (DTV) is a telecommunication system for broadcasting and receiving moving pictures and sound by means of digital signals, in contrast to analog signals used by analog (traditional) TV. DTV uses digital modulation data, which is digitally compressed and requires decoding by a specially designed television set, or a standard receiver with a set-top box, or a PC fitted with a television card.

Did you know (auto-generated) -

• ... that after his movement's victory in the Cuban Revolution, television broadcasts showed Camilo Cienfuegos freeing parrots from birdcages, declaring that the birds had "a right to liberty"?
• ... that a Ramadan television show featured riddles, music, choreographed dance routines and "fantastical narratives"?
• ... that Angelle's debut single was promoted with an entire television channel – and still only reached number 43 on the UK Singles Chart?
• ... that Life with Father was the first network television series originating in Hollywood that was broadcast in color?
• ... that Toshiki Seto was cast in the television adaptation of Senpai, This Can't Be Love! because, according to the creator, he could express emotion through his stare?
• ... that CBS News and Stations president Wendy McMahon helped bring local evening news back to the network's Detroit station after 20 years?

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More did you know

• ...that the book The Psychology of The Simpsons uses this TV series to analyze topics in psychology including clinical psychology, cognition and Pavlovian conditioning?

• ...that the fight scene between Peter Griffin and a giant chicken on Family Guy episode Blind Ambition was originally created for the episode Cleveland Loretta Quagmire?

• ...that an advertising spot immediately following Xinwen Lianbo, a daily news programme shown by most terrestrial television stations in mainland China, can sell for an estimated US$100,000?

• ...that the final episode of the 1986 television series Outlaws recycled footage from The Oregon Trail, because actors Rod Taylor and Charles Napier appeared in both programs?

• ... that The Owl Service, a 1969 TV adaptation of the novel, was the first fully-scripted colour production by Granada Television?

Selected biography -

Rudolph Cartier (born Rudolph Kacser, renamed himself in Germany to Rudolph Katscher; 17 April 1904 – 7 June 1994) was an Austrian television director, filmmaker, screenwriter and producer who worked predominantly in British television, exclusively for the BBC. He is best known for his 1950s collaborations with screenwriter Nigel Kneale, most notably the Quatermass serials and their 1954 adaptation of George Orwell's dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.

After studying architecture and then drama, Cartier began his career as a screenwriter and then film director in Berlin, working for UFA Studios. After a brief spell in the United States he moved to the United Kingdom in 1935. Initially failing to gain a foothold in the British film industry, he began working for BBC Television in the late 1930s (among other productions he was involved in the making of Rehearsal for a Drama, BBC 1939). The outbreak of war, however, meant that his contract was terminated; his television play The Dead Eye was stopped in the production stage. After the war, he occasionally worked for British films before he was again hired by the BBC in 1952. He soon became one of the public service broadcaster's leading directors and went on to produce and direct over 120 productions in the next 24 years, ending his television career with the play Loyalties in 1976. (Full article...)

General images

The following are images from various television-related articles on Wikipedia.

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  The Nipkow disk. This schematic shows the circular paths traced by the holes, which may also be square for greater precision. The area of the disk outlined in black shows the region scanned. (from History of television)
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  Hovannes Adamian c. 1900s (from Color television)
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  Comparison of image quality between ISDB-T (1080i broadcast, top) and NTSC (480i transmission, bottom) (from Digital television)
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  The Philco Predicta, 1958. In the collection of The Children's Museum of Indianapolis (from History of television)
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  RCA 630-TS, the first mass-produced television set, which sold in 1946–1947 (from History of television)
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  Ferdinand Braun (from History of television)
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  A map depicting digital terrestrial television standards (from Digital television)
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  Public television in France uses 819 line b&w high definition, from 1959 until 1983 (TF1). (from History of television)
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  Baird in 1925 with his televisor equipment and dummies "James" and "Stooky Bill" (right) (from History of television)
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  The first mass-produced Czechoslovak TV-set Tesla 4001A (1953–57) (from History of television)
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  LG Electronics smart TV from 2011 (from Smart TV)
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  Philo Farnsworth in 1924 (from History of television)
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  Smart TVs on display (from Smart TV)
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  DBS satellite dishes (from History of television)
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  A color television test at the Mount Kaukau transmitter site, New Zealand in 1970.
  A test pattern with color bars is used to calibrate the signal. (from Color television)
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  Manfred von Ardenne in 1933 (from History of television)
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  First television test broadcast transmitted by the NHK Broadcasting Technology Research Institute in May 1939 (from History of television)
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  RCA CT-100 at the SPARK Museum of Electrical Invention playing Superman. The RCA CT-100 was the first mass-produced color TV set. (from Color television)
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  Family watching TV, 1958 (from History of television)
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  Color bars used in a test pattern, sometimes used when no program material is available (from History of television)
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  Samsung's discontinued Orsay platform (from Smart TV)
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  LG Smart TV using the Web browser (from Smart TV)
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  This live image of actress Paddy Naismith was used to demonstrate Telechrome, John Logie Baird's first all-electronic color television system, which used two projection CRTs. The two-color image would be similar to the basic Telechrome system. (from Color television)
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  An early Smart TV from 2012 running the discontinued Orsay platform (from History of television)
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  Ad for the beginning of experimental television broadcasting in New York City by RCA in 1939 (from History of television)

  Featured lists -

Featured lists have been determined by the Wikipedia community to be the best lists on English Wikipedia.

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  Video blogger Alex Day performing during the ninth episode of Chartjackers.

  
  The British documentary series Chartjackers ran for a single season of eleven weekly episodes during the autumn of 2009. The series documents the lives of four teenage video bloggers—Alex Day, Johnny Haggart, Jimmy Hill, and Charlie McDonnell—from the video-sharing website YouTube as they attempt to write, record and release a pop song by crowdsourcing through social media in ten weeks. When initially aired, the first ten episodes of Chartjackers, each five minutes in length, detailed the events of the previous seven days. The final episode, broadcast on 21 November 2009, compiled highlights from the previous ten weeks into one 30-minute episode, which was narrated by British DJ MistaJam. All eleven episodes were produced by Adam King and Jonathan Davenport of the production company Hat Trick Productions.
  
  Chartjackers was devised in 2009 by Davenport and Andy Mettam of Hat Trick Productions, and was commissioned for development by Geoffrey Goodwin and Jo Twist of BBC Switch. Alongside the programmes Off the Hook and The Cut, it was featured as part of a season of multi-platform content designed to appeal to teenagers. The show was also directly linked to the 2009 annual appeal for the British charity Children in Need – profits from sales of the completed pop song were donated to the charity. Chartjackers aired weekly at approximately 1:10 p.m. on Saturday afternoons on BBC Two, with the first episode premiering on 12 September 2009 during the channel's two-hour long BBC Switch segment. The series garnered a viewing figures peak of almost half a million with its final episode and was critically panned by reviewers. Each episode was streamed online through BBC iPlayer to UK residents for seven days after its initial airing. The series was not broadcast outside the UK and, , is not available to buy on DVD. (Full article...)
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  Hanks receiving the Kennedy Center Honors medallion in December 2014

  
  
  Tom Hanks is an American actor and filmmaker who has had an extensive career in film, television and stage. Hanks made his professional acting debut on stage, playing Grumio in a 1977 Great Lakes Theater production of The Taming of the Shrew. He made his film debut with a minor role in the 1980 horror film, He Knows You're Alone. In the same year, Hanks appeared in the television series Bosom Buddies, a role that led to guest appearances on several shows, including Happy Days with Ron Howard. Howard cast him in his first leading role in the Ron Howard-directed fantasy romantic comedy, Splash. His breakthrough role was in Penny Marshall's age-changing comedy, Big, for which he garnered his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor.
  
  In 1993, Hanks starred with Meg Ryan in the Nora Ephron-directed romantic comedy, Sleepless in Seattle. Later that year, he starred in the drama Philadelphia as a gay lawyer with AIDS fighting discrimination in his law firm. For his performance, Hanks earned his first Academy Award for Best Actor. He followed with the 1994 romantic comedy-drama, Forrest Gump, winning a consecutive second Academy Award for Best Actor (the first actor since Spencer Tracy in 1938 to achieve this feat). In 1995, he played astronaut Jim Lovell in the Howard-directed historical drama Apollo 13, and voiced Sheriff Woody in the animated film Toy Story (a role that he would reprise in three sequels). (Full article...)
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  The Office is an American television sitcom broadcast on NBC. Created as an adaptation by Greg Daniels of the British series of the same name, it is a mockumentary that follows the day-to-day lives of the employees of the Scranton, Pennsylvania branch of Dunder Mifflin, a fictional paper supply company. The series ran on NBC in the United States from March 24, 2005, to May 16, 2013. Additionally, nine spin-off series of webisodes of The Office have been aired on NBC.com.
  
  The Office aired a short first season in 2005 that consisted of six episodes. This was followed by a full-length second season in 2005–06 that consisted of 22 episodes, and a third season in 2006–07, with 25 episodes. Due to the 2007–2008 Writers Guild of America strike, the fourth season that aired in 2007–08 consisted of 19 episodes. The fifth season aired during 2008–09 and consisted of 28 episodes. The sixth season aired during 2009–10 and consisted of 26 episodes. The seventh season aired during 2010–11 and consisted of 26 episodes. The eighth season aired during 2011–12 and consisted of 24 episodes. The ninth season aired during 2012–13 and consisted of 25 episodes. A total of 201 episodes of The Office aired over nine seasons. (Full article...)
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No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date	Prod. code	U.S. viewers (millions)
60	1	"Kamp Krusty"	Mark Kirkland	David M. Stern	September 24, 1992 (1992-09-24)	8F24	21.8
61	2	"A Streetcar Named Marge"	Rich Moore	Jeff Martin	October 1, 1992 (1992-10-01)	8F18	18.3
62	3	"Homer the Heretic"	Jim Reardon	George Meyer	October 8, 1992 (1992-10-08)	9F01	19.3
63	4	"Lisa the Beauty Queen"	Mark Kirkland	Jeff Martin	October 15, 1992 (1992-10-15)	9F02	19.0
64	5	"Treehouse of Horror III"	Carlos Baeza	Al Jean & Mike Reiss	October 29, 1992 (1992-10-29)	9F04	25.1
				Jay Kogen & Wallace Wolodarsky
				Sam Simon & Jon Vitti
65	6	"Itchy & Scratchy: The Movie"	Rich Moore	John Swartzwelder	November 3, 1992 (1992-11-03)	9F03	20.1
66	7	"Marge Gets a Job"	Jeffrey Lynch	Bill Oakley & Josh Weinstein	November 5, 1992 (1992-11-05)	9F05	22.9
67	8	"New Kid on the Block"	Wes Archer	Conan O'Brien	November 12, 1992 (1992-11-12)	9F06	23.1
68	9	"Mr. Plow"	Jim Reardon	Jon Vitti	November 19, 1992 (1992-11-19)	9F07	24.0
69	10	"Lisa's First Word"	Mark Kirkland	Jeff Martin	December 3, 1992 (1992-12-03)	9F08	28.6
70	11	"Homer's Triple Bypass"	David Silverman	Gary Apple & Michael Carrington	December 17, 1992 (1992-12-17)	9F09	23.6
71	12	"Marge vs. the Monorail"	Rich Moore	Conan O'Brien	January 14, 1993 (1993-01-14)	9F10	23.0
72	13	"Selma's Choice"	Carlos Baeza	David M. Stern	January 21, 1993 (1993-01-21)	9F11	24.5
73	14	"Brother from the Same Planet"	Jeffrey Lynch	Jon Vitti	February 4, 1993 (1993-02-04)	9F12	23.8
74	15	"I Love Lisa"	Wes Archer	Frank Mula	February 11, 1993 (1993-02-11)	9F13	25.2
75	16	"Duffless"	Jim Reardon	David M. Stern	February 18, 1993 (1993-02-18)	9F14	25.7
76	17	"Last Exit to Springfield"	Mark Kirkland	Jay Kogen & Wallace Wolodarsky	March 11, 1993 (1993-03-11)	9F15	22.4
77	18	"So It's Come to This: A Simpsons Clip Show"	Carlos Baeza	Jon Vitti	April 1, 1993 (1993-04-01)	9F17	25.5
78	19	"The Front"	Rich Moore	Adam I. Lapidus	April 15, 1993 (1993-04-15)	9F16	20.1
79	20	"Whacking Day"	Jeffrey Lynch	John Swartzwelder	April 29, 1993 (1993-04-29)	9F18	20.0
80	21	"Marge in Chains"	Jim Reardon	Bill Oakley & Josh Weinstein	May 6, 1993 (1993-05-06)	9F20	17.3
81	22	"Krusty Gets Kancelled"	David Silverman	John Swartzwelder	May 13, 1993 (1993-05-13)	9F19	19.4

Season	Episodes		Originally aired		Rank	Viewers (in millions)
			First aired	Last aired
1	7		January 31, 1999	May 16, 1999	33	12.80
2	21		September 23, 1999	August 1, 2000	114	—
3	22		July 11, 2001	November 9, 2003	125	4.50
4	30		May 1, 2005	May 21, 2006	68	7.90
5	18		September 10, 2006	May 20, 2007	71	7.20
6	12		September 23, 2007	May 4, 2008	84	7.94
7	16		September 28, 2008	May 17, 2009	69	7.56
8	21		September 27, 2009	June 20, 2010	53	7.73
9	18		September 26, 2010	May 22, 2011	56	7.66
10	23		September 25, 2011	May 20, 2012	63	7.30
11	22		September 30, 2012	May 19, 2013	62	6.94
12	21		September 29, 2013	May 18, 2014	78	6.11
13	18		September 28, 2014	May 17, 2015	94	5.86
14	20		September 27, 2015	May 22, 2016	111	4.28
15	20		September 25, 2016	May 21, 2017	116	3.93
16	20		October 1, 2017	May 20, 2018	136	3.52
17	20		September 30, 2018	May 12, 2019	131	3.33
18	20		September 29, 2019	May 17, 2020	107	2.65
19	20		September 27, 2020	May 16, 2021	120	2.19
20	20		September 26, 2021	May 22, 2022	111	1.90
21	20		September 25, 2022	May 7, 2023	104	1.64
22	15		October 1, 2023	April 17, 2024 (2024-04-17)	115	1.44

(Full article...)

Treehouse of Horror, also known as The Simpsons Halloween Specials, is a series of Halloween-themed episodes of the animated sitcom The Simpsons, each consisting of three separate, self-contained segments. These segments usually involve the family in some horror, science fiction, or supernatural setting and always take place outside the normal continuity of the show. Therefore, they are considered non-canon.

The original "Treehouse of Horror" episode aired on October 25, 1990, and was inspired by EC Comics Horror tales. From "Treehouse of Horror" (1990) to "X" (1999), every episode has aired in the week preceding or on October 31; "II" and "X" are both the only episodes to air on Halloween. Between "XI" (2000) to "XIX" (2008) and "XXI" (2010), due to Fox's contract with Major League Baseball's World Series, episodes had originally aired in November. "XX" (2009) and each Treehouse of Horror episode since "XXII" (2011) has aired in October, with the exception of season thirty two's "XXXI" (2020), which was originally scheduled for October 18, but was postponed to November 1 due to the 2020 NLCS reaching game 7. This was the first time since "XXI" that a Treehouse of Horror episode aired in November. The same thing happened with season thirty-five's "XXXIV" (2023), which aired on November 5. (Full article...)

Millennium is a crime-thriller television series which was broadcast from 1996 to 1999. Created by Chris Carter, the series aired on Fox for three seasons with a total of sixty-seven episodes. It starred Lance Henriksen, Megan Gallagher, Klea Scott and Brittany Tiplady. Henriksen played Frank Black, an offender profiler for the Millennium Group (a private investigative organisation). Black retires from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and moves his wife Catherine (Gallagher) and daughter Jordan (Tiplady) to Seattle, where he begins consulting on criminal cases for the group. After the group's attempt to cause an apocalyptic viral outbreak kills his wife, Black returns to the FBI to work with new partner Emma Hollis (Scott) to discredit the group.

Black was one of the first elements conceived for the series, the remainder of which were fleshed out by Carter around his character. Black has been described by a producer as Millennium's constant, as the series' tone and direction changed around him with each successive season. Except for Frank Black, the series' characters have been criticized as one-dimensional, "generic" and little more than "symbol[s]". Television critic Robert Shearman said that the series featured "half a dozen actors who could be termed regulars [...] but without exception they remain functional ciphers". (Full article...)

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No. overall	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Original air date	Prod. code	U.S. viewers (millions)
1	1	"Death Has a Shadow"	Peter Shin	Seth MacFarlane	January 31, 1999 (1999-01-31)	1ACX01	22.00
2	2	"I Never Met the Dead Man"	Michael Dante DiMartino	Chris Sheridan	April 11, 1999 (1999-04-11)	1ACX02	14.50
3	3	"Chitty Chitty Death Bang"	Dominic Polcino	Danny Smith	April 18, 1999 (1999-04-18)	1ACX04	13.78
4	4	"Mind Over Murder"	Roy Allen Smith	Neil Goldman & Garrett Donovan	April 25, 1999 (1999-04-25)	1ACX03	11.69
5	5	"A Hero Sits Next Door"	Monte Young	Mike Barker & Matt Weitzman	May 2, 1999 (1999-05-02)	1ACX05	12.61
6	6	"The Son Also Draws"	Neil Affleck	Ricky Blitt	May 9, 1999 (1999-05-09)	1ACX06	11.20
7	7	"Brian: Portrait of a Dog"	Michael Dante DiMartino	Gary Janetti	May 16, 1999 (1999-05-16)	1ACX07	13.10

Series	Episodes		Originally released
			First released	Last released	Network
1	3		4 December 2011 (2011-12-04)	18 December 2011 (2011-12-18)	Channel 4
2	3		11 February 2013 (2013-02-11)	25 February 2013 (2013-02-25)
Special			16 December 2014 (2014-12-16)
3	6		21 October 2016 (2016-10-21)		Netflix
4	6		29 December 2017 (2017-12-29)
Interactive film			28 December 2018 (2018-12-28)
5	3		5 June 2019 (2019-06-05)
6	5		15 June 2023 (2023-06-15)

(Full article...)

Blue Peter is a British children's television programme created by John Hunter Blair. The first programme was broadcast on 16 October 1958. It is the longest-running children's television programme in the world, and also one of the longest-running television programmes in the world.

Blue Peter currently airs weekly on Fridays in the United Kingdom on CBBC, a digital television channel. The show is produced in a magazine format, often transmitting live, and features a combination of studio presentation, interviews and outside broadcasting items. There have been forty-three official presenters of Blue Peter. (Full article...)

Johansson at an event for Captain America: The Winter Soldier in 2014

Scarlett Johansson is an American actress who has appeared in films, television series, video games and stage plays. Johansson made her debut in the 1994 comedy-drama North. Her first lead role was as the 11-year-old sister of a pregnant teenager in Manny & Lo (1996), for which she received a nomination for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Female Lead. Johansson starred in Robert Redford's drama The Horse Whisperer (1998), and appeared with Thora Birch and Steve Buscemi in the black comedy Ghost World (2001). Two years later, Johansson played a woman in her 20s stuck in a listless marriage who befriends an aging American actor (Bill Murray) in Japan in the Sofia Coppola-directed Lost in Translation, and also played a servant in Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer's household in Girl with a Pearl Earring with Colin Firth. She was nominated at the 61st Golden Globe Awards for both films, and received the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for the former.

Two years later, Johansson starred in Woody Allen's psychological thriller Match Point, for which she garnered a nomination for the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture. In 2006, she appeared in Christopher Nolan's psychological thriller The Prestige, and played a journalism student in Allen's Scoop. In the same year, Johansson made her first appearance as host of the television variety show Saturday Night Live, which she has since hosted a further five times as of 2019. Two years later, Johansson starred in Allen's romantic comedy-drama Vicky Cristina Barcelona with Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, and portrayed Queen of England Anne Boleyn's sister Mary in the historical drama The Other Boleyn Girl (2008) with Natalie Portman and Eric Bana. She received the Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play for her Broadway debut performance in the 2010 revival of Arthur Miller's A View from the Bridge. (Full article...)