The Great Hall is filled with people preparing to sit down for a great feast. A cozy fire roars in the hearth, and rich vegetarian dishes and hot spiced cider are served to you. Here you may eat and talk to your heart's content. After dinner, the guests often call for a story.

My Scribe tells me of an entertainment medium known as "television," a box apparently so amazing that people will sit for hours just looking at it.

Here are some of my good Scribe's favorite shows:

Doctor Who Official Site | Doctor Who News Page | Doctor Who Reference Guide "We need to bombard the alien creature with useless information. Does anyone have a television set handy?" The BBC's Doctor Who is a cult favorite. It is the longest-running science fiction show on television, running nearly nonstop from 1963 to 1989 and starting again in 2005. It is currently broadcast on BBC America.

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is the most expensive television series ever made. It is a visually stunning and well-acted voyage into Middle-Earth millennia before the lives of Bilbo and Frodo Baggins. The first season diverged considerably from J.R.R. Tolkien's source material; it is yet to be seen whether this will be a service or a detriment to the story as a whole.

Outlander is generally faithful to the popular (and very long) series of historical novels by Diana Gabaldon that inspired it.

Superman and Lois Clark Kent and Lois Lane must balance saving the world with being the parents of two headstrong teenage sons.

Past Superman television shows include:

• Smallville was Young Superman meets The X-Files and aired in the 2000's. The show chronicled Clark Kent's journey from high school through college and tells how he became a mild-mannered reporter for a major metropolitan newspaper.
• The Adventures of Superboy aired in the 1980's. Superboy showed Clark Kent in college, and was produced by the same father-son team who made the classic films starring the late Christopher Reeve. Sadly, the series clearly had a low budget and suffered from it. Unlike Doctor Who -- which ran for 21 seasons on a similar budget but succeeded due to good scripts and great acting -- Superboy's writing and acting were mediocre at best. To their credit, the quality of the writing, acting and special effects did improve as the show continued. Stacy Haiduk -- who played Lana Lang -- was by far the best actor on the show, and her performance made Superboy fun to watch even when the lines could have been better.
• Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman aired in the 1990's. This endearing show featured Clark Kent figuring out his life as a young reporter and dramatized his friendship -- later courtship and marriage -- with Lois Lane. The chemistry between leads Dean Cain and Teri Hatcher made the show work even when the storylines were contrived.
• Krypton chronicles the adventures of Superman's grandfather on the doomed planet. Sadly, the series ends on a cliffhanger -- though clearly everything turns out all right!
  The four Superman shows were made by different production teams, and they are not -- nor were they intended to be -- set in the same continuity. Krypton, however, can act as a prequel to Superman and Lois, Superboy, or Lois and Clark.

Agents of SHIELD "Come on! A room full of secret agents, scientists, and superheroes! Someone give me something!" - Agent Phil Coulson. This television show set in the popular Marvel Cinematic Universe chronicles a team trying to do the right thing in a world full of traitors, robots, and aliens. Agent Carter served as a prequel.

Alias Episode Guide "My name is Arvin Sloane. Thirty years ago I joined the CIA, but then I discovered the truth: it was more profitable to join the Alliance of Twelve, a rogue organization dedicated to theft, assassination and gunrunning. But when my wife found out my secret, the Alliance ordered me to have her killed.
"I then leaked information to the CIA allowing them to destroy the Alliance and negotiated a pardon for myself... until I was recruited at knifepoint into the Covenant, a criminal organization comprised of some of my former colleagues. So I went to the only people who could help me. Now I'm a double-agent with the CIA, and my handler is a woman named Sidney Bristow. She is the only person who knows the truth - that I work only for myself. My role now requires me to place my life in her hands. Maybe ordering the murder of her fiancé five years ago wasn't such a good idea."

The Lurker's Guide to Babylon 5 "No dictator, no invader, can hold an imprisoned population by the force of arms forever. There is no greater power in the universe than the need for freedom. Against that power governments, and tyrants, and armies can not stand... Though it takes a thousand years, we will be free." - G'Kar.
Over its five-year run, J.M. Straczynski's television novel Babylon 5 became one of the best shows on American television.

Birds of Prey Batman's daughter and Commissioner Gordon's daughter are allies in this near-future superhero drama. Despite its potential, the show was cancelled after one season.

Vidiot Charmed Page "I swear to God I have seen this in a movie somewhere." - Piper Halliwell. This popular show is the tale of four sisters who - to their surprise - inherit magical powers.

Continuum "I'm not here to work for the company. I'm here to tear it down." -Alec Sadler. Continuum is a thought-provoking drama about a cop from the future stuck in the present.

Elementary "Sorry, that's my roommate. He's... a long story." British detective Sherlock Holmes and American doctor Joan Watson investigate crimes in contemporary New York.

The Flash "While Caitlin sleeps, I am awake." "Oh, my God! You're like The Incredible Hulk!" In this series, the iconic superhero is a young man beset by tragedy doing his best to protect innocents. Its spinoff, Legends of Tomorrow, varied between the dramatic and the silly.

JAG "It could be worse. I couldn't have an alibi." "You have an alibi?" "No." This drama about the Navy's Judge Advocate General corps examines current issues as the characters investigate crimes and spar in courtrooms.

Once Upon A Time Some characters from fairy tales were trapped in a town in rural Maine... and then things got interesting.

The Pretender chronicles the adventures of a genius smart enough to assume any profession. He uses his abilities to solve mysteries and find justice, but there's one mystery he doesn't have enough information to unravel: what happened to his family.

The Quantum Leap Information Kiosk "Dr. Sam Beckett never returned home..." Quantum Leap is the most ingenious television program ever made: it involves a time traveller from the near future who "leaps" into other peoples' identities to change history for the better. If you only watch one television program in your life, watch this one.

Queen of Swords was a short-lived series chronicling the adventures of a female Zorro.

Roswell "Knowing you has made me human. Whether I die tomorrow or fifty years from now, my destiny is the same: it's you." - Max Evans. Roswell was a well-acted drama about three teenage aliens.

Sarah Jane Adventures "I've seen amazing things out there in space. But strange things can happen wherever you are. I've learned that life on Earth can be an adventure, too. But, in all the universe, I never expected to find a family." This spinoff of Doctor Who starred the classy Elisabeth Sladen, and at times was superior to the original.

Stargate Command | GateWorld "You are not a god -- you are a parasite." - Master Bra'tac. Stargate SG1 is an epic tale about an advance force that explores planets populated by the descendants of humans kidnapped from Earth thousands of years ago and enslaved by vicious aliens.

Stargirl This comic book-inspired drama stars a group of high school outcasts who become superheroes and triumph over adversity. It features excellent acting from its young cast.

Star Trek "There's nothing wrong with me... something must be wrong with the universe!" - Dr. Crusher. This is Paramount Pictures' official Star Trek site. My Scribe admits to being something called a "trekkie," which is a follower of this television series. He tells me that the programs created by Gene Roddenberry, Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation, were imaginative, dramatic, and sometimes ground breaking. The shows made after Roddenberry's death, Deep Space Nine (which started out well and went downhill), Voyager (which peaked in the middle), and Enterprise (cancelled just when it was getting good) were not on the same level as the originals. By the end, the producers had clearly run out of ideas, the excellent acting could not save the stale writing, and most fans had tired of the inconsistent quality. Of the shows produced in the 21st Century, Star Trek: Discovery, Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, and Star Trek: Prodigy successfully recaptured the spirit of the original. Sadly, despite its talented cast, the trite writing in the first season of Star Trek: Picard did not do the characters justice, though the second and third seasons improved over the first.

Supergirl "Last night, the space-time continuum ripped itself apart in the middle of your apartment, which only makes it slightly less intense than last year's Thanksgiving." Superman's cousin proves she's a heroine in her own right.

Transformer World 2005 "Freedom is the right of all sentient beings." - Optimus Prime. In his youth my Scribe collected Transformers, innovative toy vehicles that changed into robots. There was a corresponding cartoon and an animated movie that, although exciting, killed off so many characters that the franchise shot itself in the foot. My Scribe was slightly embarassed that he still has his Transformers gathering dust on a shelf in his living room - until he performed a web search and found that there are thousands of other Transformers enthusiasts and hundreds of web sites online! Resources on Transformers toys and characters are found at tfu.info, Seibertron, Transformers Catalogs, Transformers Variants, and the Transformers Wiki. After several years of ridiculous toys and media, the live-action movies and the Prime-universe cartoons re-vitalized the brand, appealing to a wider audience than kindergarteners. Director Michael Bay's films feature outstanding special effects, vacuous plots, and silly dialogue. Though the franchise has made over two billion dollars, the plot holes in the second and fourth movies make them difficult to enjoy for all but the most committed fans, and the fifth movie is all but unwatchable. Fortunately, the prequels Bumblebee and Rise of the Beasts were much better than their predecessors.

My young Scribe also spent a lot of time building castles out of Legos. To find more web resources on Lego toys, visit the Lego Users' Group Network.

Other favorites include Mission: Impossible, The Muppet Show, The Muppets Mayhem, Nikita, and Star Blazers.

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