New year, new TV. It’s time for the latest installment of what to watch this month! There are a total of 10 new and returning shows to look out for in January so let’s get right to it, after the break. Continue reading TV reminder: 10 premieres to look out for in January
Here we go. Some great news for longtime fans of Saturday Night Live who might have lost faith in the late night variety show’s funny bone. SNL writer and featured guest Leslie Jones has officially joined the cast as a featured player four episodes into season 40. Audiences were first introduced to Jones’ off-kilter comedy last season when she invaded Weekend Update as an “Image Expert” and talked about black beauty; the controversial discussion projected her unique and brash delivery. SNL head honcho Lorne Michaels must have noticed the effect she had on viewers; she as brought back to the desk again this month to talk about relationships, once again proving her comedy chops. And now, she’s getting upgraded from writer/guest to full on featured player. Welcome to the cast, Leslie Jones!
She will make her official debut this coming Saturday, Oct. 25 with host Jim Carrey and musical guest Iggy Azalea. Let’s hope she’s the spark SNL has been craving ever since Wiig/Hader/Armisen/Samberg era ended.
We’ve made it to the most exciting time of year! Well, it is for me at least. New TV series premiere and favorite ones return in late September, so it’s time to take a look at each of the network’s fall schedules and decide which shows you’ll be tuning into this season. This season I’ve decided to consolidate it all in one post, so without further adieu, jump after the break to view the fall schedules for the Big Four networks (namely, FOX, ABC, NBC, CBS) plus The CW. Continue reading PSA: Fall TV schedules inside
Cast additions and statuses typically don’t make waves here at [e-i-a]. But this is one that cannot fly under the radar. Gillian Anderson, who plays Hannibal Lector’s shrink Bedelia du Maurier, has been upgraded from guest star to SERIES REGULAR for the upcoming third season of NBC’s serial killer thriller Hannibal. This is the most delectable kind of news for Fannibals because Anderson brings a remarkable sense of elegance and subtle jest to an already stellar cast led by Hugh Dancy and Mads Mikkelsen.
At the very, very end of season 2, a bonus post-credits scene revealed Anderson’s Bedelia flying away with the murderous Dr. Lector. Is she in cahoots with the mad man, or is something even sinister happening here? Whatever the case may be, viewers can rest assured that Hannibal creator Bryan Fuller has free reign to tell her story and explore her intentions at length now that Gillian is properly on board for the season.
It’s been spilled that Hannibal and Bedelia are off to Europe and that the season 3 premiere episode will essentially act like “a pilot for a new series starring Mads Mikkelsen and Gillian Anderson.” Does that amazing, or does that sound amazing.
TVLine broke the news and Fuller shared the following statement: “The cast and crew of Hannibal are positively giddy to be welcoming Gillian to Season 3 as a series regular. A striking presence on stage and screen, she brings wit, grace and intelligence to every role she embodies. Screenwriting is so much easier when you’re inspired by a great actor and Gillian has filled the Hannibal writers room with wonderful inspiration. I can’t wait for audiences to see her make a bigger meal out of the Cannibal than ever before.”
The X-Files actress has been enjoying quite the career resurgence as of late. Disregarding her failed NBC series Crisis, Anderson has been wowing audiences during her guest stint on Hannibal and she also currently stars in the fantastic BBC Two/Netflix crime drama The Fall. If you haven’t had the pleasure of getting sucked into that Irish/British series I highly recommend you watch binge it today.
Hannibal returns in midseason to NBC.
The Weekend Update desk at Saturday Night Live is undergoing changes, again. For SNL‘s upcoming 40th season, Colin Jost will serve as co-anchor with former SNL writer and Daily Show correspondent Michael Che. This marks the first time two men will co-anchor the desk, and Che is the first African American to do so. Outgoing co-anchor Cecily Strong, who worked on the desk with Seth Meyers and then Jost, will remain as a full-time cast member.
“Michael is a strong writer, and he’s really funny,” SNL head honcho Lorne Michaels tells The New York Times. “It struggled to find an identity last season,” he admits. “Because what had come before had been pretty brilliant.”
Keeping Jost and replacing Strong with Che is a move Michaels was confident in making. “This is about a new era, what feels appropriate for now,” he says. “That’s why we did a lot of combinations and tests, and this is kind of where we came out.”
Strong started off a bit shaky but over time she acclimated to the desk. However, she ultimately expressed her desire to pop up in more sketches and this aligned perfectly with Michaels’ vision to add Che as new Weekend Update co-anchor.
And the changes don’t stop here. According to the NYT, Michaels will “probably be making one or two more additions to the cast this season.” So stayed tuned. Previously Michaels booted Brooks Wheelan, John Milhiser, and Nöel Wells; Nasim Pedrad departed the show to star in NBC sitcom Mulaney. Michael Patrick O’Brien has returned to the writer’s room.
SNL premieres September 27 with host Chris Pratt and musical guest Ariana Grande.
Update (9/15): Deadline reports SNL is adding one and only one new featured player to its cast roster for season 40. It’s 20-year-old New York comedian Pete Davidson who was handpicked by Lorne. Davidson performed standup this past April on Jimmy Kimmel Live; get aquainted with his style of humor in this clip.
[Via NYT]
The upcoming seventh season of NBC’s Parks And Recreation will be the series’ last, so you need to get all your laughs in now before the curtain closes. Enter the season 6 gag reel brimming with so much funny you might need to take an intermission or two. My favorite part? That’s when Jim O’Heir (aka Jerry/Larry/Terry Gergich) actually pulls a Jerry in real life and totally messes up a take. What’s yours?
Parks & Rec returns in 2015.
As summer approaches many of your favorite shows will be airing their season finales this month. But don’t freak–May is home to a handful of exciting premieres headlined by the return of 24 and Louie. Jump after the break for details. Continue reading TV reminder: 4 premieres to look out for in May
Here’s a quickie: On March 19, NBC renewed Chicago Fire, its spinoff Chicago PD, and supernatural genre series Grimm. Joining these three series next season are the previously renewed The Blacklist, Parks and Recreation, The Voice, and Celebrity Apprentice.
In a recent episode of Parks And Recreation titled “Anniversaries,” Leslie Knope (Amy Poehler) gifted her geeky husband Ben Wyatt (Adam Scott) with a full-scale replica of the Iron Throne as made famous by George R.R. Martin in his A Song of Ice and Fire books and HBO’s adaptation Game of Thrones. Ben’s reaction to receiving said gift, to say the least, was extraordinarily hilarious.
Well, Parks & Rec fans, I present this gift to you: NBC has posted the extended take of the aforementioned scene and you can watch it in full above. If you didn’t think that tag could be any more perfect, guess again.
January, February… March! Let’s take a look at six premieres airing this month. Jump after the break.
Continue reading TV reminder: 6 premieres to look out for in March
Save the cheerleader, save the world. But it didn’t stop there…
Like FOX is doing with 24, NBC is bringing back one its most popular and lucrative series back to the air with Heroes: Reborn. And just like 24: Live Another Day, Heroes: Reborn is being labeled as an “event series” that will produce 13 episodes for a shorter-than-normal broadcast season. Mostly everything is being kept under wraps for now; all we know is that the new season of Heroes will be shepherded by series creator and executive producer Tim Kring and it will tell a brand-new standalone story-arc with new characters. NBC Entertainment President Jennifer Salke shares that existing characters introduced during the show’s original four season run may show up in the revival; her statement in full:
“The enormous impact Heroes had on the television landscape when it first launched in 2006 was eye-opening. Shows with that kind of resonance don’t come around often and we thought it was time for another installment. We’re thrilled that visionary creator Tim Kring was as excited about jumping back into this show as we were and we look forward to all the new textures and layers Tim plans to add to his original concept. Until we get closer to air in 2015, the show will be appropriately shrouded in secrecy, but we won’t rule out the possibility of some of the show’s original cast members popping back in.”
Heroes, an imaginative series about ordinary people who discover they have superhuman abilities, premiered to much fan-fare in 2006. Viewership was high and so was critical acclaim. Watching ordinary people like Peter Petrelli, Mohinder Suresh, Hiro Nakamura, Niki Sanders, and Claire Bennet discover their respective abilities and eventually all coming together to work towards a common goal of destroying the compelling villain Sylar was more than entertaining to watch. While many shows suffer from growing pains in their first seasons on air, Heroes managed to shine creatively from the get-go; in my opinion Heroes season 1 is one of the best premiere seasons of any show out there. Unfortunately, things went quickly downhill from there; though season 2 is manageable the plot and the characters get seriously bogged down in season 3 and if I’m being honest I’ve never even felt compelled to watch the fourth and (then) final season. Without getting into the nitty gritty details of it all the show simply lost itself creatively and the Heroes introduced in season 1 started to feel tired and without the same purpose they shared across the brilliant first 23 episodes. The original idea behind Heroes was to intro a new crop of characters to follow each season, but following Sylar’s quick getaway at the end of season 1 it was decided that our Heroes were here to stay. Though fans of the series may be divided on the return of the show, perhaps we can all have some faith that a new series reborn featuring all-new Heroes might finally inject some excitement and fresh storylines into a show that once carried incredible potential.
NBC aired a brief 21-second promo announcing Heroes Reborn during the Olympics on Saturday and you can watch it after the break. It teases a 2015 launch, and fans can also look forward to a digital web series that plans to introduce the new characters before the show premieres in earnest. Continue reading NBC revives ‘Heroes’ with new arc & characters in ‘Heroes: Reborn’
Levitation, telekinesis, the ability to control nature, see the future… since she was born, Bo (Johnny Sequoyah) has had gifts she could neither fully understand nor control. But now that she is 10 years old, her powers have become stronger and the threat from malevolent forces that would use her abilities to control the world has grown more dangerous. With her life and future in jeopardy, Bo’s protector, Milton Winter (Delroy Lindo, The Chicago Code), turns to an unlikely source to keep her safe – Tate (Jake McLaughlin, Crash), a wrongfully imprisoned death row inmate who’s lost his will.
Tate and Bo begin an extraordinary journey, one in which trust must be earned. On the run and traveling from city to city, every place they stop and everyone they meet will be changed forever. But they’ll have to keep going to stay one step ahead of the sinister forces after Bo’s power… because it will take a miracle to keep them safe forever.
That’s how NBC sets up Believe, the latest series from J.J. Abrams–the creative mind behind Lost, Fringe, and Person of Interest. Joining Abrams behind the scenes is Gravity director Alfonso Cuarón who serves as executive producer and director of the pilot episode.
Get acquainted with the cast and auspicious behind Believe in the clip embedded above. The exciting opening sequence brilliantly executed by Cuarón is on display and you’ll hear from him, Abrams, and some of the stars. “It, to me, was one of those great opening scenes that, when Alfonso described it, I had that sense of, ‘Wait a minute, I’m not changing the channel until I know exactly what’s going on,” gushes Abrams.
Believe premieres March 10. Watch a sneak-peek trailer after the break. Continue reading J.J. Abrams & Alfonso Cuarón introduce NBC supernatural drama ‘Believe’