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Eric Deggans Eric Deggans is NPR's first full-time TV critic.
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Eric Deggans

Emmy Awards 2014: Safe Choices In A Time Of Groundbreaking TV

Julia Louis-Dreyfus won her fifth Emmy on Monday night. Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP hide caption

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Chris Pizzello/Invision/AP

Television

Emmy Awards 2014: Safe Choices In A Time Of Groundbreaking TV

NPR TV critic Eric Deggans says Monday's Emmy Awards promised to recognize TV's emerging future — but ultimately rewarded comfortable favorites over disruptive upstarts.

Emmy Awards 2014: Safe Choices In A Time Of Groundbreaking TV

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Television

Past Winners Do Well At 66th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards

Plenty of statuettes were handed out Monday night at the Emmy Awards in Los Angeles. ABC's Modern Family won for best comedy series and AMC's Breaking Bad won best drama series.

Past Winners Do Well At 66th Annual Primetime Emmy Awards

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Television

Emmy Awards To Be Handed In Los Angeles

Matthew McConaughey or Brian Cranston? Orange Is the New Black or Modern Family? The questions about which actors and shows will emerge at the top of the TV industry get answered Monday night.

Emmy Awards To Be Handed In Los Angeles

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TV's New Doctor Who Has An Old Connection To The Series

Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman star as The Doctor and Clara Oswald on the BBC science fiction drama Doctor Who. Ray Burmiston/Ali/BBC America hide caption

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Ray Burmiston/Ali/BBC America

Pop Culture Happy Hour

TV's New Doctor Who Has An Old Connection To The Series

The BBC will soon air its first Doctor Who episode with Peter Capaldi as the show's hero, The Doctor. Capaldi says the 50-year-old series inspired him to become an actor.

TV's New Doctor Who Has An Old Connection To The Series

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Don Draper? Tywin Lannister? These Aren't Your Father's TV Dads

Breaking Bad's Walter White always insisted his bad deeds were for a good cause: helping his family. AMC hide caption

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AMC

Men In America

Don Draper? Tywin Lannister? These Aren't Your Father's TV Dads

As part of All Things Considered's series on Men in America, NPR's Eric Deggans considers the way television fatherhood has changed over the past five decades, from Ward Cleaver to Walter White.

Don Draper? Tywin Lannister? These Aren't Your Father's TV Dads

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Television

Modern Anthology Series Could Revolutionize Television

TV is reinventing the anthology with shows like Fargo, True Detective, and American Horror Story. Our TV critic examines what the form allows producers, writers and executives to do.

Modern Anthology Series Could Revolutionize Television

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Television

'Sharknado' Part Deux: The Laughably Bad Epic Strikes Back

Syfy channel has cornered the market on a new kind of film: a movie that's played completely straight, but constructed to look cheesy and easy to ridicule. The best example? Sharknado 2, the sequel to a film so bad it became huge success. Can the network strike gold twice by being stupid on purpose?

'Sharknado' Part Deux: The Laughably Bad Epic Strikes Back

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'Purple Rain' Taught Me How To Be In A Band

"I never wanted to be your weekend lover": Prince and his Purple Rain costar Appolonia Kotero. Warner Bros./Getty Images hide caption

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Music News

'Purple Rain' Taught Me How To Be In A Band

For Eric Deggans, Prince's movie wasn't just a spectacle. Sitting in a theater packed with kids his age, he saw Purple Rain as "a validation of the musical world I was already seeking out."

'Purple Rain' Taught Me How To Be In A Band

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5 Things I Learned About TV's Future From The Critics Press Tour

Noah Hawley (left) and Warren Littlefield, executive producers of the FX series Fargo, speak at the Television Critics Association's summer press tour. Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images hide caption

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Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images

Pop Culture Happy Hour

5 Things I Learned About TV's Future From The Critics Press Tour

From being mistaken for Randy Jackson to confronting network executives about diversity issues, TV critic Eric Deggans runs down highlights of the two-week blizzard of parties and press conferences.