ABC has started putting up its Upfront trailers for the network’s new series, so we’re going to chime in with some instant impressions.  As always, remember that a trailer isn’t necessarily a real sign of what a TV series will be (sometimes it’s not even a sign of what the pilot is).  It’s the […]

  STALKER:  Wednesday 10PM on CBS THE FACTS:  From the grisly mind of The Following‘s Kevin Williamson, a procedural about an LAPD squad that specializes in tracking down dangerous stalkers.  Maggie Q runs the unit, and Dylan McDermott is the cocky new arrival from New York who immediately gets on her wrong side; both of […]

  FOX has unveiled a set of schedules that will shift throughout the season–and even into Summer 2014.  Let’s take a look. FALL MONDAY 8PM:         Bones/Almost Human 9PM:         Sleepy Hollow FOX didn’t want to launch back-to-back new dramas in the fall, so Bones will set up Sleepy Hollow‘s debut until an unspecified (post-baseball) date in […]

  MULANEY:  Sunday 9:30PM on FOX THE FACTS:  John Mulaney, in real life a stand-up comic and TV comedy writer (most notably on SNL, where his biggest claim to fame may be co-creating Bill Hader’s Stefon character), plays one in the sitcom he created for himself, too.  His TV show boss is Martin Short, and […]

  AMERICAN CRIME:  Sunday 9PM Midseason on ABC THE FACTS:  John Ridley, this year’s Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar winner for 12 Years A Slave, has written a serialized crime drama very specifically about race, in which a Latino teen is arrested for the murder of the son of Timothy Hutton and Felicity Huffman. WHAT IT’S […]

  Our journey through the fall primetime schedule–and by “our,” I mean former head of NBC Scheduling Mitch Metcalf, former head of NBC Current Programming Ted Frank and myself–takes us to what may be the most competitive night of the new season:  Wednesdays.  (You can find our predictions here for Monday and Tuesday.)   Our […]

  GALAVANT:  Winter-ish Sunday 8PM on ABC THE FACTS:  A fairy tale musical comedy from Dan Fogelman, the creator of the late, lamented (by some of us) The Neighbors, with an original score by multiple Oscar-winner Alan Menken and Glenn Slater.  It tells the tale of Prince Galavant, whose true love left him for the […]

  Only those involved will likely ever know the details, but ABC and 20th Century Fox Television worked out whatever they needed to, and the result was a pick-up of LAST MAN STANDING and orders for 2 additional 20th sitcoms: CRISTELA has a  nice backstory:  ABC had originally made a script deal with comic Cristela […]