Tag Archives: NBC

Preview ‘Revolution’ season 2 ahead of next week’s premiere (inside J.J. Abrams teases new supernatural element)

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NBC’s action-packed drama that poses the question “what would happen if the lights went out” returns for its second season next week so there’s no better time to catch a new preview of what’s to come in Revolution. At Comic Con we learned that the nukes set off at the end of season 1 do in fact go off and decimate large sections of North America. We also learned that the lights will turn off again, and this time for good. In the new preview clip embedded above you’ll hear from the cast and they spill s’more season 2 details: time jumps three months into the future, our main band of survivors makes camp at a fictional town in Texas named Willoughby, and you’ll also catch glimpses of Rachel’s encounter with her dad (played by Stephen Collins), Monroe’s fight club, and Neville’s beard. “It’s the same Revolution everybody knows and loves,” says Tracy Spiridakos (Charlie Matheson), “but with a different little kick to it.”

What might that kick be? Executive producer J.J. Abrams teases it in an interview posted after the break. When the power goes out for good early in the season, Abrams describes a “rip” in reality that occurs. In essence, a supernatural element is being introduced into Revolution this season and Abrams says it will provide the launchpad for more compelling storytelling and higher stakes. Get the tantalizing scoop after the break; below that is a season 1 recapper.

Revolution returns Wednesday, September 25 at 8PM on NBC. Continue reading Preview ‘Revolution’ season 2 ahead of next week’s premiere (inside J.J. Abrams teases new supernatural element) →

2013 Fall TV Schedule: NBC

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The majority of NBC’s fall lineup hits the airwaves the week of September 23–the official premiere week. Perhaps the fall’s buzziest new drama The Blacklist starring James Spader premieres Monday, September 23 at 10PM following The Voice. Revolution returns on its new night Wednesday, September 25 at 8PM. The Peacock’s new Thursday night comedy lineup doesn’t air in full until October 3 when Welcome to the Family and Sean Saves The World enter the mix; the week before NBC will air the one-hour premiere of Parks And Recreation followed by two episodes of The Michael J. Fox Show. Drama Ironside with Blair Underwood premieres Wednesday, October 2 and Dracula with Jonathan Rhys Meyers comes later paired with Grimm on Friday, October 25.

Click here to preview the new shows.

Jump after the break to view the full fall schedule. Browse the gallery below for key art.

Continue reading 2013 Fall TV Schedule: NBC →

Preview NBC’s ‘The Michael J. Fox Show’ with the cast

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Michael J. Fox returns to TV in the NBC sitcom The Michael J. Fox Show this fall on NBC. In it he plays Mike Henry, one of New York’s most beloved news anchors who decides to put his career on hold and spend time with his family after he is diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. The series starts with Mike about to sit back in the anchor seat after being out of the game for five years. His family, led by his wife played by Breaking Bad‘s Betsy Brandt, plays a big part in his recovery and endurance. Check out this extended first look at the show and mark the books: The Michael J. Fox Show premieres September 26 on NBC. (Watch the official trailer here.)

Rashida Jones and Rob Lowe to depart ‘Parks And Rec’ this season

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This is literally the worst news for fans of NBC’s sitcom Parks And Rec: Rashida Jones and Rob Lowe are leaving the series this upcoming season. According to the show’s executive producer Mike Schur, their exit stems from no controversy; this is purely a creative decision to let them go. He released this statement to BuzzFeed explaining the situation head-on:

The news about Rob and Rashida is true — they will be leaving the show after the 13th episode of the upcoming season six. We’ve been working on their storyline (on and off) for four seasons now, and heading into this year, with the two of them contemplating parenthood, it felt like a natural time to move them into the next phase. 

We absolutely love both Rashida and Rob, and will be sad to see them go. Rashida was one of the very first people we knew we wanted in the cast, and as important as Ann is to Leslie (and vice-versa), she’ll certainly never be far from Pawnee. Rob we initially thought we could only have for six or eight episodes, and we couldn’t be happier that he will have stuck around for 75. 

They are wonderful, funny, committed actors, they’ve been a huge part of the Parks and Rec family, and we think we have a great Pawnee send-off in the works for them.

Schur shared additional details with EW: “The decision that they make that will see them transition off the show is made very early, so it’s a long fun kind of celebratory send-off. And it happens in the first episode after the premiere — the seeds start being planted. So it’s going to be a long crescendo and Leslie will go through a series of complicated highs and lows about what’s happening. For obvious reasons, it’s the main arc that plays out in the first half of the year…. They’re moving into a new phase of their lives and they have a lot of things to consider and they’re going to consider them, and then make a decision that leads to their [exit].”

So there you have it. The absolutely positive and lovable Chris Traeger and Leslie’s most ardent supporter and best friend Ann Perkins are departing Pawnee at the half-way point in season 5. The show with one of the greatest ensemble casts will carry on without them, of course, but that doesn’t mean they will be greatly missed. Try to imagine the scene where Leslie has to say goodbye to Ann, a character who’s been with the show since the shaky beginning; a tear-jerker is most definitely in the works.

Comic Con: Showrunner Eric Kripke opens up about a “better” ‘Revolution’ in season 2

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Are you a fan of spoilers? Well you found yourself in the right place if you took a seat at this year’s Revolution panel at Comic Con. Unlike most showrunners at the Con, Revolution‘s Eric Kripke did not hold back when it came to promoting season 2 of the NBC post-apocalyptic sci-fi drama. The panel started with this three minute preview of the new season which includes a boatload of new footage including a first-look at Stephen Collins (No Ordinary Family) as Rachel’s dad, Monroe’s fight club, Neville’s bad-ass beard, and–YIKES!–the death of Aaron Pittman?!

Kripke expanded on some of the screened footage. First of all, our heroes failed to stop the detonation of the nukes; Philly and Atlanta have been decimated. “We’re trying to be the first network show in history that loses two American cities in the first 15 seconds [of a season],” Kripke said. “We’re back to a very intense set of basics, [a world] that’s even more dangerous than in season one.” Furthermore, when Revolution returns the lights will be off again (apparently the consequence of flipping the switch only lasts so long) and a new foe will emerge. The “Patriots” that Randall was referring to before he shot himself in the finale and the “President” who is hiding out in Cuba–these are not good guys according to Kripke. “The idea was to create a villain this year that’s so bad and so insidious and whose tentacles go so far, that even our heroes and our villains ultimately have to band together to fight this threat. They’re using the iconography of stars and stripes and patroism, but they’re using it as a mask. If you were to look behind closed doors…you’ll see that they are really, really bad dudes up to some nefarious stuff.”

So Miles and Monroe and Neville and the rest of our main cast of heroes and villains will team up to fight the Patriots. And no longer will the series be about claiming power and the pendants and the tower; driving the story now will be digging into the characters more and unfolding the mystery behind the Patriots and their endgame.

“It’s always been a show about family and hope and love, and now they can all move towards each other and not just make it so obsessed about the power. I think you’ll see much more intimate digging into character,” said Kripke. “Let’s stop talking about the power and lets start talking about the world.” Later he summed up, “As good as [the show] was, it needs to be better…It was a lot of story about a light switch,” he admitted to some laughs. “I think we have, no question, a better Season 2 than Season 1.”

Comic Con: ‘Hannibal’ gag reel is LOL, obviously

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Now here’s something you wouldn’t expect to come out of Bryan Fuller’s NBC serial killer thriller Hannibal: A GAG REEL! And a fine one, at that. Hugh Dancy, Mads Mikkelsen and the rest of the Hannibal cast do not disappoint this absolutely hysterical peek behind-the-scenes of the darkly violent and gruesome show. In my opinion, Mads steals the show at the dinner table when he calls Freddie Lounds…well, you’ll see!

To find out what’s in store for season 2, watch Fuller, Dancy, and exec producers David Slade and Martha de Laurentiis spill the beans in an informative and entertaining video interview conducted by TVLine that’s embedded after the break. Continue reading Comic Con: ‘Hannibal’ gag reel is LOL, obviously →

‘Community’s Dan Harmon poops on season 4, issues lengthy apology

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Since Dan Harmon confirmed he was returning to Community to executive produce the NBC sitcom he created, he didn’t wait long to take a giant proverbial dump on the entirety of season 4, the one in which he had no involvement. Before he could start imagining the fifth season of the show, he forced himself to sift through the previous season to catch up on what happened during his off-season, a result of him being fired by Sony TV. In his unfiltered podcast called Harmontown he spat out the following:

“It’s very much like an impression and an unflattering one. It’s very much like an impression — an unflattering one. It’s 13 episodes of people doing, ‘Derpy, derpy, der, I’m Dan Harmon, der.’ I’m going back to work tomorrow morning and I’m just like, do I talk like that?”

He compared watching the fourth season to “flipping through Instagram watching your girlfriend blow a million [people].”

He went further: “There’s something awesome about having all of those preconceived notions kind of ripped away from you. It’s exciting. There’s something awesome about being held down and watching your family get raped on a beach. It’s liberating. It makes you focus on what’s important.”

Later: “There’s a system in place that’s winning because I would have had too much leverage, too much power, too much salary as would have a lot of writers coming into Season 4. So they just flushed us, and replaced us with two guys who didn’t know what they were getting into… Writers fighting other writers is the American Dream in the eyes of Sony. That is what they want. They want creative people rewriting each other. They want creative people replacing each other. They want us interchangeable. They want to think about writing the way they think about the guy on assembly line 24 that puts the final screw in the fucking Playstation… I shouldn’t even say ‘they’ because it’s an ‘it,’ it’s a fucking machine. There isn’t a single person that works at that corporation that isn’t also thought of like that by the fucking SkyNet… The system just wants us all to not be human.”

A day after the Harmontown rant, Harmon took to his Tumblr to share a formal apology to those involved with the show and its fans. He tweeted, “I feel bad if I made anyone feel bad with my comments in harmontown. It’s a dirty, personal comedy podcast, not charismatic for quoting. I like making stuff that pleases people, I like being honest about my feelings but I hate hurting other people, especially community fans.” You can read his lengthy apology post here.

With the firing, the rehiring, and the Harmontown rant behind him, hopefully the sorrowful showrunner can now return to making Community great again in its fifth and possibly final season.

Showrunner Josh Safran discusses what would have been ‘Smash’ season three

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Smash took a dive in the ratings in its second season following a showrunner change from Broadway vet Theresa Rebeck to former Gossip Girl executive producer Josh Safran. It wasn’t long until NBC moved the creatively fickle musical dramedy to Saturday nights, effectively canceling the show without physically pulling it from the schedule. In an in-depth interview with Entertainment Weekly, Safran shares his vision for what would have been Smash season 3 and comments on how season 2 turned out. I’ve pulled some quotes here (they’re posted after the break), but I recommend you jump over to EW for the full read. Continue reading Showrunner Josh Safran discusses what would have been ‘Smash’ season three →

Dan Harmon says he’s returning to ‘Community’ [Update: it’s official]

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This came out of nowhere. Following the debacle from last year involving Community creator Dan Harmon and star Chevy Chase publicly exiting the show, it looks like Harmon is making a comeback for the NBC sitcom’s fourth season. “RT @dpeanutbutter: @danharmon GIVE US A STRAIGHT ANSWER! ~ Yes yes yes! I’m back I’m back I’m back. You can thank @joelmchale.” Harmon tweeted this out to his nearly 200,000 followers on June 1. Network NBC and producer Sony TV have not confirmed nor denied Harmon’s out-of-the-blue exclamation, but nevertheless fans of the quirky comedy should be shaking in their boots with excitement. The show’s third season never quite felt like Community fans had come to know, love, and cherish; a friend described it to me as ‘the shell of Community missing its soul.’ Harmon’s replacements David Guarascio and Moses Port are apparently not coming back next season, so the showrunner position is open for the taking. Even with Chase out of the picture, it only seems fitting that the show’s inventor take his rightful seat on the throne back, especially if ratings remain low and season four becomes the final run of 13 episodes for the series.

At a certain point the network and/or the studio will have to make some sort of announcement and when they do I’ll amend this post accordingly.

Update (6/10): Sony TV confirms Dan Harmon’s return to his old showrunning post at Community. Woohoo! Joining him is reinstated executive producer Chris McKenna. Fellow Human Beings, season four will feel familiar again.

[Via Deadline]

NBC renews ‘Hannibal’ for a second season

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Unexpected, joyous news: despite dangerously low ratings following a midseason berth, NBC has greenlit a second season of Bryan Fuller’s imaginative serial killer psychological thriller Hannibal. “We’re so proud of Bryan’s vision for a show that is richly textured, psychologically complex, and very compelling,” said NBC Entertainment president Jennifer Salke. “There are many great stories still to be told.” A 13-episode second season is expected to find a spot on the Peacock’s schedule during the latter half of the 2013-14 season. Hannibal, which stills airs new episodes Thursdays at 10, is currently averaging 4.7 million viewers and a 2.0/6 share in the adults 18-49 demo.

Though Mads Mikkelsen plays the title character in Dr. Hannibal Lecter (and with an incredibly delicate balance of madness and concern, I might add), it’s Hugh Dancy as expert criminal profiler Will Graham who steals the spotlight in Hannibal. Over the course of the season he’s been submitting himself to psychological torture by embracing pure empathy and stepping into the shoes of the most insane of killers. It’s Mikkelsen’s Hannibal who is attempting to mold him into a real killer, ever so meticulously. It’s this journey into darkness and the unknown, with its mythology-driven and not so usual procedural tendencies, that has been coming back every week for more. Hannibal, though on a much darker side of the spectrum to Fuller’s previous work Pushing Daisies, serves as a perfect sequel to that. Absolutely ecstatic more is on the way.

Bill Hader to depart ‘SNL’ this week, Fred Armisen & Jason Sudeikis may follow

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A trio of SNL veterans may be departing Studio 8H this weekend when the late-night sketch comedy show closes its 38th season. One is definitely confirmed to make an exit and that’s Bill Hader. The talented comedian-actor joined the cast of SNL as a featured player in 2005 and a year later he became a main member of the cast. After eights years of so many laughs (his wildly outrageous Weekend Update character Stefon will forever remain in our hearts) Hader is ready to leave his game-show host personas and impressive impersonations (James Carville and Clint Eastwood come to mind) behind.

“It was a hard decision, but it has to happen at some point,” Hader told The New York Times. “It got to a point where I said, ‘Maybe it’s just time to go.’ ”

This Saturday’s episode will be Hader’s last. But what about Jason Sudeikis, who has been fiddling with the idea of leaving the show since last year, and Fred Armisen, a 10-year vet? A New York Post article claims they will be joining Hader on the outs, but the report has not been confirmed by the actors or SNL boss Lorne Michaels.

Michaels praised Hader’s tenure with the Times. “He was so completely committed to the art of it, and enough a student of it, that there’s something strikingly original. He didn’t explode onto the air, but gradually he found his voice, and that became a huge thing.” He also commented on the rumors involving Sudeikis and Armisen. “I think they’re making their decisions, and we’ll know soon enough. I’ve said what I wanted to say to both. You never keep anybody there who doesn’t want to be there, and there is a right time to leave, but it’s more about where they are in their lives.”

Bill is one of the best talents to grace 30 Rock’s Studio 8H and he will sorely be missed next season. And if Fred and Jason leave too, next year one will be one of transition for the long-running sketch show. Also departing in early 2014 is Seth Meyers who is leaving the Weekend Update desk to take over NBC’s Late Night when Jimmy Fallon moves to The Tonight Show.

Update: Armisen and Sudeikis are joining Hader in not returning to SNL next season.

2013 Upfronts: NBC orders 17 new series for next season

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Today NBC kicked off the 2013 Upfronts, an annual event where the big four networks present their upcoming slate of new programming to advertisers and the press. The Peacock unveiled 17 new series coming to the network next season: six comedies, eight dramas, and three reality shows. Jump after the break to get more information about all of the new shows including synopses, cast and creator/executive producer listings, clips, and initial reactions.

Significant changes to the schedule include: Revolution moves from Monday nights at 10PM to Wednesday nights at 8PM to make room for James Spader in The Blacklist (the new drama falls into the network’s high profile slot after The Voice)… Parks And Recreation shifts to 8PM on Thursday nights to lead a family themed night that includes three new half-hour sitcoms and Parenthood at 10PM… The network is expanding its genre night on Fridays by pairing Grimm with Dracula in the fall, and midseason will welcome Crossbones… In midseason when the football season is over, scripted programming will be introduced on Sunday nights with J.J. Abrams’ Believe and Rand Ravich’s Crisis occupying the 9PM-11PM timeframe.

Elsewhere: Community is coming back for a 13-episode fourth season but it doesn’t have a slot on the schedule yet… Hannibal‘s fate is still up in the air… Jimmy Fallon will take over The Tonight Show during the Winter Olympics starting Monday, February 4 at 11:30PM; Seth Meyers will fill Fallon’s seat at Late Night at 12:30AM. About a Boy, The Family Guide, and Crossbones are being held for midseason; Chicago PD, The Night Shift, and Undateable have yet to be scheduled.

Programs not returning next season: 1600 Penn, 30 Rock, Animal Practice, Deception, Do No Harm, Go On, Guys With Kids, The New Normal, The Office, Rock Center with Brian Williams, Smash, Up All Night, and Whitney. Continue reading 2013 Upfronts: NBC orders 17 new series for next season →