America’s Next Great Restaurant: NBC Reality TV Show

America's Next Great Restaurant is a current NBC reality television show that features contestants pitching restaurant ideas to a panel of judges, where the winner will receive financial backing for their restaurant concept to open three locations nationwide — Los Angeles, Minneapolis, and New York — in May 2011. The judges include chefs Curtis Stone, Bobby Flay, Lorena Garcia, and Chipotle Mexican Grill founder Steve Ells, who will also be investors in the winning concept. The production company behind the show is Magical Elves, the same company who produces Top Chef. The premiere was on March 6, 2011 at 8pm. The show has been described as a cross between The Apprentice and Top Chef.
ANGR Holdings will be the company that will be running the winning concept's restaurants. It also hold register trademarks on several of the restaurant concepts' names.

Ax Men: American Documentary Reality TV Series

Ax Men is an American documentary reality television series that premiered on March 9, 2008 on History. The program follows the work of several logging crews in the second-growth forests of Northwestern Oregon, Washington and Montana. The show highlights the dangers encountered by the loggers. Following in the footsteps of other shows from Original Productions, like Deadliest Catch and Ice Road Truckers, the series is considered part of a recent "real-men-in-danger" television programming trend.

Bleach: Japanese Manga Series

Bleach is a Japanese shōnen manga series written and illustrated by Noriaki "Tite" Kubo. Bleach follows the adventures of Ichigo Kurosaki after he obtains the powers of a Soul Reaper — a death personification similar to the Grim Reaper—from another Soul Reaper, Rukia Kuchiki. His newfound powers force him to take on the duties of defending humans from evil spirits and guiding departed souls to the afterlife.
Bleach has been serialized in the Japanese manga anthology Weekly Shōnen Jump since August 2001, and has been collected into 48 tankōbon volumes as of December 2010. Since its publication, Bleach has spawned a media franchise that includes an ongoing animated television series that is produced by Studio Pierrot in Japan, two original video animations, four animated feature films, seven rock musicals, and numerous video games, as well as many types of Bleach-related merchandise.
Viz Media obtained foreign television and home video distribution rights to the Bleach anime on March 15, 2006. Cartoon Network began airing Bleach in the United States as part of its Adult Swim block on September 9, 2006. Viz Media has licensed the manga for English-language publication in the United States and Canada, and has released 34 bound volumes as of March 2011 as well as published chapters of Bleach in its Shonen Jump magazine since November 2007. Viz Media released the first Bleach film, Bleach: Memories of Nobody, on DVD in North America on October 14, 2008. The second film, Bleach: The DiamondDust Rebellion, was released on September 15, 2009.
Volumes of the manga have sold more than 50 million copies in Japan, and have reached the top of manga sales in the United States. The anime adaptation has been similarly received; it was rated as the fourth most popular anime television series in Japan in 2006 and held a position amongst the top ten anime in the United States from 2006 to 2008. The series received the Shogakukan Manga Award for the shōnen demographic in 2005, and is among the best-selling manga properties in both Japan and the United States.

Breakout Kings: American Drama TV Series

Breakout Kings is an American drama television series created by Nick Santora and Matt Olmstead, which airs on the A&E network. The one-hour pilot episode premiered on March 6, 2011 at 10 p.m.
In order to catch escaped convicts, a squad of U.S. Marshals makes a special deal with several current prisoners . If they agree to help, their sentences will be reduced by one month for each fugitive they bring in and they will be transferred to a minimum-security facility. However, if any of them should try to escape, they will all be returned to their original prisons and their sentences will be doubled.

Brothers and Sisters: American TV Drama Series

Brothers & Sisters is an American television drama series that centers on the Walker family and their lives in Pasadena, California.
The series premiered on ABC on September 24, 2006 and it continues to air in a regular Sunday night timeslot after Desperate Housewives. The cast has included a collection of award-winning actors, including Sally Field, Rachel Griffiths, Calista Flockhart, Rob Lowe, and Patricia Wettig. Sally Field has received both a Primetime Emmy Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award for her performance throughout the series. Rachel Griffiths has also been nominated for two Primetime Emmy Awards and two Golden Globe Awards for her work on the show.
The show is currently in its fifth season on ABC.

Desperate Housewives: American TV Comedy-Drama Series

Desperate Housewives is an American television comedy-drama series created by Marc Cherry and produced by ABC Studios and Cherry Productions. Executive producer Cherry serves as Showrunner. Other executive producers since the fourth season include Marc Cherry, Bob Daily, George W. Perkins, John Pardee and Joey Murphy, David Grossman, Larry Shaw and Sabrina Wind.
The setting of the show is the street of Wisteria Lane in the fictional American town of Fairview in the Eagle State. It follows the lives of a group of women, seen through the eyes of their dead neighbor. They work through domestic struggles and family life, while facing the secrets, crimes and mysteries hidden behind the doors of their—at the surface—beautiful and seemingly perfect suburban neighborhood.
The show features an ensemble cast, headed by Teri Hatcher as Susan Mayer, Felicity Huffman as Lynette Scavo, Marcia Cross as Bree Van de Kamp and Eva Longoria as Gabrielle Solis. Brenda Strong narrates the show as the deceased Mary Alice Young, appearing sporadically in flashbacks or dreams.
Since its premiere on ABC on October 3, 2004, the show has been well received by viewers and critics alike. The show is a multiple Emmy, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild award winner. The series premiere drew 21.6 million viewers and the show's first season finale attracted over 30 million viewers. In 2007 it was reported to be the most popular show in its demographic worldwide, with an audience of approximately 120 million and was also reported that the series is the third most watched TV show in a study of ratings in 20 countries. In 2010, it was the most-watched comedy series internationally, with an average viewership of 51.6 million viewers across 68 territories. It has held this position since 2006. Moreover, it was the third-highest revenue earning show for 2010, with US$2.74 million per half hour.

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition: Reality TV Series

Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (EM:HE), often incorrectly referred to as Extreme Home Makeover, is a reality television series providing home renovations for less fortunate families. The show is hosted by former model, carpenter and veteran television personality Ty Pennington.
Each episode features a family that has faced some sort of recent or ongoing hardship – such as a natural disaster or a family member with a life-threatening illness. The show's producers coordinate with a local construction contractor, which then coordinates with various companies in the building trades for a makeover of the family's home. This includes interior, exterior and landscaping, which is performed in seven days while the family is on vacation (paid for by the show's producers), which is documented in the episode. If the house is beyond repair, they replace it entirely. The show's producers and crew film set and perform the makeover but do not pay for it. The materials and labor are donated. Many skilled and unskilled volunteers assist in the rapid construction of the house.
EM:HE is considered a spinoff of Extreme Makeover, an earlier series providing personal makeovers (often including plastic surgery) to selected individuals, which the Home Edition has now outlasted. This show displays extreme changes to help recreate someone's space. However, the format differs considerably; in the original Extreme Makeover, for instance, participants were not necessarily chosen based on any recent hardship, whereas the family's backstory is an important component of Home Edition. EM:HE also has similarities to other home renovation series such as Trading Spaces, on which Pennington was previously a key personality.
The series is produced by Endemol USA (the people behind Big Brother, Fear Factor, Deal or No Deal, and other reality shows) in association with Disney-ABC Television Group's Greengrass Television. The current Executive Producers are Brady Connell and George Verschoor.

Food Network Challenge: Competitive Cooking TV Series

Food Network Challenge is a competitive cooking television series that currently airs on the Food Network. Each episode, professional chefs compete in a timed competition in their professional specialty. The winner receives a check for $10,000 and a gold medal.
The competitions are judged by various chefs that specialize in the task being focused on. Contestants have eight hours of time to complete a task, usually with qualifiers. For example, cake competitions often have minimum height requirement, must match a certain theme, and require the competitor and assistant be able to move the cake to a judging table without it falling over. When the time runs out the host says the show's catchphrase: "Competitors, Stop Your Work".
Episodes are shot in front of a live audience, usually at tourist attractions such as the Mall of America or Disney World. Depending on the discipline and scope of the competition, the number of competitors range from three to hundreds. Occasionally, regional competitions are held to determine the competitors each week. Some of the events are also held as world championships or as invitationals.
The winner usually receives a check for $10,000 and a gold medal. In competitions featuring five or more competitors, silver and bronze medals are also sometimes awarded, though they have no cash prize. In 2009, the show debuted its first elimination-style competition called "Last Cake Standing". In this format, 6 cake designers are competing for a prize of $50,000. Each week, one competitor is eliminated.
In April 2010, original host Keegan Gerhard was promoted to judge alongside Kerry Vincent, and was replaced as host by Claire Robinson. The way in which the results are read was also changed for most but not all shows. Where previously only the winner was called out, now the third- and fourth-place finishers are announced and asked to leave the stage before the winner is announced.

Game of Thrones: American Medieval Fantasy TV Show

Game of Thrones is an American medieval fantasy television series created for HBO by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss. The series is based on author George R. R. Martin's best-selling A Song of Ice and Fire series of seven fantasy novels; HBO's overall series' title is derived from the first novel. The series debuted in the U. S. on Sunday evening, April 17, 2011 and was picked up for a second season forty-eight hours after its premiere.
The premium cable television series closely follows the multiple story lines of the A Song of Ice and Fire series, and author Martin has stated that the show's pilot script was very faithful to his work. Set in the Seven Kingdoms of Westeros, where "summers span decades and winters can last a lifetime," Game of Thrones chronicles the violent dynastic struggles among the kingdom's seven noble families for control of the Iron Throne; as the series opens, additional threats from the snow and ice covered region north of Westeros and from the eastern continent across a narrow sea are simultaneously beginning to rise.

Ruby: Reality Television Show on Style Network

Ruby is a documentary style reality television series on the Style Network that debuted in 2008 in the United States. It follows the life of Ruby Gettinger who lives in Savannah, Georgia as she attempts to lose weight. Ruby starts the show weighing more than 477 lbs (she originally weighed over 700 lbs.) Ruby works with nutritionists, doctors, and trainers to lose weight, all the while commenting honestly and often humorously about the experience. The show also deals with the everyday life issues a morbidly obese person can face, such as the difficulty in using airplane bathrooms.
The first season featured one one-hour episode and eight half-hour episodes. The second season featured the same amount of episodes as the first season, with mostly half-hour episodes, and a few one hour episodes. The third season was the first season to feature all one-hour episodes. As of May 2, 2010, the third season featured all hour long episodes, minus the season finale, which was two hours, plus one special, Ruby: My Australian Adventure. Currently, Ruby weighs 347.6 lbs, having gained 44.6 pounds.

The Apprentice USA: American Reality TV Show

The Apprentice is an American reality television show hosted by real estate magnate, businessman and television personality Donald Trump, created by Mark Burnett and broadcast on NBC. Billed as "The Ultimate Job Interview", the show stars sixteen to eighteen business people competing in an elimination-style competition for a one-year, $250,000 starting contract of running one of business magnate Trump's companies. The show typically ends with Trump eliminating one of the contestants with the words, "You're Fired".
The show first aired in January 2004 and has run for eleven seasons, with the seventh, eighth, ninth, and eleventh seasons featuring celebrities competing for charity.

The Real Housewives of Orange County: Reality TV Show

The Real Housewives of Orange County is a reality television program on the Bravo network. It is the first installation in the The Real Housewives of... series. Created by Orange County producer and Coto de Caza ("Coto") resident Scott Dunlop, with music by Chuck Hammer, the show was initially set primarily in the gated community of Coto and followed the lavish livestyles of five "housewives" and their families who resided within Coto McMansions, with the exception of one housewife (Lauri Waring), who lives in an executive estate in Corona, California townhouse. This housewife exception-to-the-rule was used in Season 1 as a foil to the (then) extravagant lifestyle of the other four housewives, who lived "behind the Coto gates". The show is a voyeuristic look into the wealthy lives of these housewives, as they shop, get plastic surgery, gossip, fight and live lavishly. The construction-real estate crash, the beginning of which coincided almost exactly with the first season's broadcast, has since trimmed the housewives' lifestyles with job losses, evictions, mortgage defaults, foreclosures, and marital stress—all recorded in progressive seasons of the show. Some have seen the show as a parable of the economic bubble and crisis as it portrayed a lavish consumerism, with American families living beyond their means, only to find themselves in serious debt when the economy soured.

The Borgias: Canadian-Hungarian-Irish historical-fiction TV Miniseries

The Borgias is a 2011 Canadian-Hungarian-Irish historical-fiction television miniseries created by Neil Jordan.
The series is based on the Borgia family (Borja in Valencian), an Italian dynasty of Spanish origin, and stars Jeremy Irons as Pope Alexander VI and David Oakes, François Arnaud, Holliday Grainger and Aidan Alexander as Juan, Cesare, Lucrezia and Gioffre Borgia, respectively. Derek Jacobi also stars as Cardinal Orsini.
It premiered on April 3, 2011, at 9 p.m. Eastern (UTC−04:00) on Showtime in the United States and at 10 p.m. on Bravo! in Canada.

Treme: American TV Drama Series

Treme is an American television drama series created by David Simon and Eric Overmyer. It takes its name from Tremé, a neighborhood in the city of New Orleans. The series begins three months after Hurricane Katrina where the residents of New Orleans, including musicians, chefs, Mardi Gras Indians, and ordinary New Orleanians try to rebuild their lives, their homes and their unique culture in the aftermath of the 2005 hurricane.
The series premiered on HBO April 11, 2010, with an 80-minute pilot episode, the first of a 10 episode season. On April 13, 2010, it was announced that HBO had renewed the show for a second season.
Simon and Overmyer first worked together as writers on the television series Homicide: Life on the Street and became friends. They collaborated again on Simon's series The Wire when Overmyer joined the crew as a consulting producer and writer in 2006. Treme was put into development by HBO in 2008 shortly after the conclusion of The Wire. The show was envisioned to focus on the working class Tremé neighborhood in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina and will be smaller in scope than The Wire, which examined an entire city.
Overmyer lived part-time in New Orleans and Simon believed his experience would be valuable in navigating the "ornate oral tradition" of the city's stories. Simon has stated that the series would explore New Orleans culture including and beyond the music scene to encompass political corruption, the public housing controversy, the criminal-justice system, clashes between police and Mardi Gras Indians, and the struggle to regain the tourism industry after the storm. Simon also consulted with New Orleans musicians Donald Harrison Jr., Kermit Ruffins, and Davis Rogan, and local chef Susan Spicer while developing the series.
In 2008 HBO commissioned a pilot episode for the series but did not "green-light" a complete series at that time. The pilot was announced at the 2008 Television Critics Association summer press tour. Simon initially hoped to film the pilot episode of the series in 2008 and to continue filming in 2009 if the series was commissioned. The series was planned to film on location and was predicted to be a boost to the New Orleans economy.
The pilot did not actually begin filming in New Orleans until March 9, 2009. Award-winning Polish director Agnieszka Holland was hired to direct the pilot. Holland had worked with the creators previously on The Wire, directing three episodes of that series. After the pilot was written HBO commissioned another ten scripts.

Unique Eats: TV Show on Cooking Channel

Unique Eats a television series looking at America's most exciting and revolutionary restaurants. Unique Eats seeks out the most amazing, innovative and extreme examples of modern dining across America. Unique Eats spotlights America's most exciting and revolutionary restaurants. It's the first look and the last word in everything extreme in food today. The locations range from high-end dining rooms.