STATE OF AFFAIRS:  Monday 10PM on NBC (starting November 17) THE FACTS:  Katherine Heigl is the CIA agent in charge of putting together the President’s (Alfre Woodard) daily list of the nation’s Top 10 threats.  She’s also the quasi-widow of the President’s son, who was killed in an apparent terrorist attack overseas.  Except, guess […]

  ALMOST HUMAN:  Monday 8PM on FOX (after a Sunday Nov 17 preview) – Worth A Look The ALMOST HUMAN pilot has a whole lot of concept.  The show was created by J. H. Wyman, a senior writer/producer on Fringe (the pilot is directed by Brad Anderson, who also directed many Fringe episodes), and the […]

  NBC has perfected the art of releasing bits of information each day throughout pre-Upfront week, and today’s nuggets introduced a trio of additional new sitcoms.  It appears that at least 2 of these will be given small midseason runs of 6 episodes to see if they catch anyone’s fancy before potentially expanding. MISSION CONTROL:  […]

  UPDATED with reactions to FOX trailers, which are available here:   The FOX fall schedule is a puzzlement. FOX seems to have done little to help itself with its fall 2016 line-up, leaving two of its weakest nights unimproved, and burying one of its highest-profile projects on low-rated Friday.  The network will be more […]

  Welcome to Upfronts week, when the broadcast networks (or what’s left of them) announce their Fall schedules and attempt to generate billions of dollars worth of excitement from advertisers.  It’s harder than ever to authoritatively analyze the thought process that goes into a broadcaster’s cancellation, renewal and pick-up decisions, because network ad revenues directly […]

  CONSTANTINE:  Friday 10PM on NBC THE FACTS:  John Constantine (Matt Ryan) has the ability to see demons and spirits hidden from the outside world and the ability to defeat them; unfortunately, he’s also been damned to hell for actions in his past.  Trying to redeem himself, he sets out to protect Liv (Lucy Griffiths), […]

  THE MCCARTHYS:  Thursday 9:30PM on CBS THE FACTS:  Ronnie McCarthy (Jake Lacy) is part of a lovingly smothering Boston Irish-Catholic family, who are just fine with him being gay but embarrass him at every turn anyway.  The series was created by Brian Gallivan, a relative newbie, so the showrunner will be Mike Sikowitz, of […]

  The rest of the week:  Monday,  Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. The Saturday primetime network schedule, such as it is, isn’t worth much attention, being a patchwork of reruns and sports (although we will include estimates for that night in our full-week network projections).  That brings us to Sunday, once the showcase night for […]