Atlanta’s animation world isn’t just the folks at Adult Swim with “Squidbillies” and “Aqua Unit Patrol Squad 1.”

Now Atlanta-based Floyd County Productions is animating both “Archer,” and “Unsupervised,” both on FX starting tonight at 10 p.m.

“Archer” enters its third season with rising ratings and even a new spoof spy how-to book out (“How to Archer’”), which came out Tuesday.

I spoke with Adam Reed, one of the two creators of the show, to promote the new season.

Q: So who are some of the guest stars this season?

A: We had Patrick Warburton ["Rules of Engagement"] and David Cross ["Arrested Development"] during our three-episode mini season last fall. Burt Reynolds will be in the premiere episode. [Co-creator] Matt Thompson and I flew to Florida to record it in person because we were dying to meet him. We don’t  normally record people in person. But this was special.

Q: So what was Burt like?

A: He’s insanely cool. He came in dressed in black and shades. Holy crap! That’s …

Continue reading ‘Archer’ back for third season, Thursday, January 19, with Burt Reynolds »

Colton Dixon and Schyler Dixon on AMERICAN IDOL airing Wednesday, Jan. 18 (8:00-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX. CR: Michael Becker / FOX.

[UPDATED to reflect final Nielsen numbers.]

Now we know what the early impact of “The X Factor” and “The Voice” has had on “American Idol,” which debuted last night for its 11th season: a major negative and more so among younger viewers.

Compared to a year ago, ‘Idol” saw its ratings tumble from 26.25 million for the season 10 opener to 21.93 million last night. That’s an 16.45 percent drop off, presumably a lot of folks who preferred “The X Factor” and didn’t feel the need to commit to “Idol” season 11. That is also a 28 percent fall from two years ago, when the show debuted at 29.9 million viewers.

Among younger viewers, the impact was even bigger, falling from a 9.8 to 7.4 rating. That’s a whopping 24 percent fall off. And compared to 2010? The 18-49 rating was 11.8. That’s a 37 percent drop over two years. Scary!

Sadly, it usually only goes down …

Continue reading ‘Idol’ ratings plummet 16%, 24% among 18-49 year olds »

AP

Herman Cain has signed back with his former employer AM750 and 95.5 FM News/Talk WSB.

Starting this morning, he will provide pre-taped two-minute commentaries each weekday at 8:45 a.m. during Neal Boortz’s morning show and repeated at 6:45 p.m. during Erick Erickson’s evening program. (UPDATE: Cain’s first topic this morning: the Keystone pipeline.)

The Atlanta businessman will also speak to Boortz live at 10:35 a.m. every Monday and Friday. And he will do occasional fill-in work for Boortz and Erickson when they are on vacation. This arrangement is set for at least through Election Day this year.

Pete Spriggs, WSB radio program director, said Cain’s busy schedule precluded him from returning to his talk show full time.

This exclusive radio deal does not impact Cain’s TV commitments, Spriggs added.

The former Godfather’s Pizza CEO was a night-time host on WSB from 2008 until early 2011 when he left to pursue a run for the presidency. With his debate performances and “999″ …

Continue reading Herman Cain rejoins WSB Radio with daily commentaries »

AMERICAN IDOL: Thousands line up at the North Charleston Coliseum in South Carolina for the chance to become the next AMERICAN IDOL on Friday, July 22. CR: Rick McKee / FOX

Season 11 is upon us!

Typically, “Idol” tries to put its best foot forward with the strongest city up front, since this episode some years is the highest rated of the year, short of the finale. And Savannah is very very strong. Forty-two singers make it through.We hear 16 of them.

Best of the lot is kept for the end of the two hours: Phillip Phillips from Leesburg. The country boy seems destined not only for Hollywood but for the final 12.

To the strains of “Forever Young,” the opening celebrates the history of “Idol” and how the 15 and 16 year olds grew up with the show since they were in kindergarten. “After ten years, the phenomenon continues with another incredible journey,” Ryan Seacrest said. Yes, that “journey” word again. Then those words “where dreams come true.”

And he even utters the phrase, …

Continue reading ‘American Idol’ recap: season 11, audition city #1: Savannah/Charleston »

Stephen Colbert, on the heels of showing up in a poll with 5 percent in his home state of South Carolina, has started a facetious run for the presidency himself – at least in South Carolina.

The problem: he’s not on state Republican ballot. But Atlanta’s Herman Cain, who suspended his campaign last month, still is.

So in a particularly absurdist move, Colbert’s Super PAC (which he handed off to his buddy Jon Stewart last week to “separate” the PAC from himself) has released an advertisement in which he simply calls himself Cain.

“A vote for Cain is a vote for America,” the narrator intones while shots of Colbert cavorting about are shown. “He’s such a Washington outsider, he’s not even running for president!”

For the final 20 seconds of the 60-second ad, they show Colbert, first not smiling, then smiling ever so gradually, in homage to that classic Cain ad of yore where he starts grinning maniacally at the very end.

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By Rodney Ho, …

Continue reading Stephen Colbert masquerades as… Herman Cain? »

Nationally syndicated morning host Tom Joyner is reviving his “Sky Show” at the Rialto Center for the Arts for a special single outing this Friday to celebrate the release of “Red Tails,” a film about the Tuskegee Airmen and their service during World War II.

The free show will feature Joyner’s regular morning program live on stage with actors from the George Lucas action drama, veterans who took part in the actual Tuskegee program and R&B singers Ashanti and Estelle, among others.

Joyner, who is heard locally on Kiss 104.1, has a deep personal interest in “Red Tails.” His late father, Hercules, was accepted into the flight training program though he didn’t get his wings. Hercules met his future wife Frances, who was a secretary at the time. on the base as well.

“So if it weren’t for the Tuskegee program, I wouldn’t be around,” said Joyner, who visited his hometown of Tuskegee, Ala. on Martin Luther King Jr.’s holiday this past Monday.

The Lucas film, which …

Continue reading Tom Joyner reviving Sky Show at Rialto Center Friday for Tuskegee Airmen »

Rickey Smiley is part of a new TV show "Dish Nation" debuting nationwide this fall. CREDIT: Rodney Ho/rho@ajc.com

Last summer, Twentieth Television tested a show for six weeks called “Dish Nation,” which takes the humor of four morning radio shows to create a pop culture melange not unlike “TMZ.”

One of the four is Atlanta-based “Rickey Smiley Morning Show,” which is syndicated in 60 markets, including Hot 107.9 locally.

Good news for Smiley is the show was picked up for a full season in 2012-13. Already, the production company has gotten the show on stations that reach more than half the country. Locally, it will be shown on Fox 5 (WAGA-TV), one of a handful of stations that tested the show last summer.  What time slot it will air this fall has not been finalized.

Each morning show was given several pop culture topics to riff on. Then the producers after the fact would edit them together, throwing in pictures, animation or whatever it took to make it fast paced and …

Continue reading ‘Dish Nation’ (with Atlanta’s Rickey Smiley) gets full-season pick up, will be on Fox 5 »

If Beavis & Butthead were fed copious amounts of Prozac, they might end up as Gary and Joel, the new teen duo on the upcoming FX animated series “Unsupervised,” which was animated by Atlanta-based Floyd County Productions.

Gary, voiced by actor Justin Long, and Joel, voiced by executive producer and actor David Hornsby, are both poor, unsupervised kids but relentlessly earnest and positive despite their rather bleak circumstances.

“It’s adolescence with a big dose of comic absurdity,” said Rob Rosell, one of three executive producers. The trio also work on FX’s “It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia.”

“Maybe under different circumstances, they’d be real ***head kids, but they somehow remain upbeat,” Hornsby said.

“They found each other and that probably saved them from going down a different road,” Rosell said.

The show debuts at 10:30 p.m. this Thursday (January 19) after the third season launch of “Archer.” Ten episodes will air, then three more later in the year.

Gary’s stepmom …

Continue reading Atlanta’s Floyd County animates new FX show ‘Unsupervised,’ debuting Jan. 19 »

Continue reading Video: talking ‘American Idol,’ Ty Pennington, ‘Archer’ »

The gritty, documentary-style cop show “Southland” returns to TNT for its fourth season tonight at 10 p.m. for ten episodes.

It’s the lowest rated TNT show that survived last year’s reshuffling, which included the cancellations of “Men of a Certain Age,” HawthoRNe” and “Memphis Beat.”

“I call us the cardiac cops,” said actress Regina King in an interview last month. “We just keep going and going!”

This season’s newest cast member is Lucy Liu, who has certainly done her share of action films with “Kill Bill” and “Charlie’s Angels” but nothing quite this raw. She’ll be playing Jessica Tang, an officer newly paired with John Cooper (Michael Cudlitz), who just returned to the force after back surgery and a secret rehab for addiction to painkillers.

“I’m loving it,” Liu said in an interview last month. “You get to really see parts of Los Angeles you don’t normally see. We get to wander.”

Her character has a rather open secret that reveals itself tonight.

The formerly dark Cooper …

Continue reading TNT’s ‘Southland’ returns Jan. 17 for a fourth season, a talk with Lucy Liu, Michael Cudlitz, Regina King »