The show received a mixed reception from media publications. Some media outlets were more critical of the show. "The Washington Post" television critic Tom Shales quipped that the ceremony was "Overstocked with clips from movies -- from this year's nominees and from Oscar winners going back to 1929 -- that it was like a TV show with the hiccups." Columnist James Poniewozik of "Time" commented that Stewart was "an Oscar host–sometimes a funny one, but a pretty conventional one, whose routine was loaded up with kiss-up softballs about how hot Colin Farrell is, what range Cate Blanchett has and what a tomcat Jack Nicholson is." Of the show itself, he wrote, "What we got instead was a show that half the time seemed like the show the Academy would have put on if there had been a strike, chockful of montages. The other half of the time, it was an typical-to-dull Oscars." Columnist Robert Bianco of "USA Today" said, "Has it ever felt like more of a padded bore than it did Sunday night? If so, blame the writers' strike, which left the producers with only a few weeks to prepare for the ABC broadcast and persuaded them to lean less on the host and more on old clips." He also observed that numerous film montages seemed to diminish Stewart's job as host.