[Televisionary]

Imagine a world where the very simplest of actions, the most basic of decisions, could produce a flood of absurd consequences. You'd likely be too terrified to even step outside of your box-sized Manhattan apartment but for Tim, the hero and titular character of HBO's animated comedy The Life and Times of Tim seems to have not heeded the lesson that if you stick your hand in the flames, you're likely to get burned. Season Two of HBO's cheeky The Life and Times of Tim begins tonight and finds Tim (voiced by series creator Steve Dildarian) attempting to get out of a slew of bizarre circumstances that he has found himself in by dint of being, well, Tim. Whether it's his possible replacement at the nebulous company Omnicorp by a homeless man named Vince (guest star Tony Hale), thanks to his efforts to grow a beard, or suffering through a terrible revival of a 1940s play ("it's like an Arthur Miller play... only slower") so that his friend Stu (Nick Kroll...

Most people don't realize that I am a sucker for a good cartoon, especially if it's based on a well-known superhero comic property. I still put on my DVDs of Batman: The Animated Series when I need a little pick-me-up and I thought X-Men: Evolution was canceled way before its time. So imagine my surprise when I learned that not one but two fantastic new superhero-based animated series are currently running on Friday nights and they couldn't be more different from one another. Nicktoons recently launched a third animated iteration of the X-Men franchise, this time entitled Wolverine and the X-Men , focusing on Marvel's band of misunderstood mutants with Wolverine front and center. (It makes sense, given the forthcoming release of feature film X-Men Origins: Wolverine starring Hugh Jackman as the adamantium-clawed mutant.) And Cartoon Network late last year launched Batman: The Brave and the Bold , which features the Dark Knight teaming up with various other superhero...