1) Basketball, 8:30 p.m. ET, ABC, with pre-game at 8. It’s opening day of the pro playoffs. Amazon Prime — which aired the “play-in” portion this week — has games at 1, 3:30 and 6. Then ABC has Kevin Durant’s Rockets (shown here) and LeBron James’ Lakers, which finished 5th and 4th in the 15-team Western Conference. On Sunday, games will be on ABC in the afternoon, NBC at night. Read more…
Some familiar CBS shows will be on the shelf this fall.
When the new season starts, don’t look for “Matlock” … or “Ghosts” (shown here) … or “NCIS: Sydney.” All will be waiting for mid-season spots.
For that matter, don’t expect “DMV” or “Watson”; they’ve been canceled.
Replacing them, for now, will be shows from familiar sources: A comedy from the “Ghosts” producers, a lawyer show from the “Elsbeth” producers, another “NCIS” show and the return of “Harlan Coben’s Final Twist,” which had a brief run this winter. Read more…
Each year, a few TV networks remind us that Earth Day is still important.
There is, after all, still an Earth; there is a day (April 22) to celebrate it. And there are gifted filmmakers, with high-tech equipment.
So nature shows will abound that day on broadcast (PBS), cable (National Geographic, Nat Geo Wild, Animal Planet) and streaming (everyone).
Here are details. We’ll start with one advance marathon (April 18) and end with a few post-Earth Day shows, plus streamers that are available any time. Other than that, however, everything is on Wednesday, April 22: Read more…
1) “Now Hear This,” 9 p.m., PBS. This beautifully crafted show — with violinist Scott Yoo (shown here in a previous episode) as host and sometimes-performer — finds fresh ways to visit music masters. Last week was Brahms and European elegance; now it’s Scott Joplin and mid-America. We hear dazzling bits of ragtime piano and much more — including a 12-piece orchestra in Pennsylvania and a Black-themed opera in Chicago. Read more…
All season, “Doc” has been piling up high-stakes, life-and-death stories.
But in its season-finale (shown here) — 8-10 p.m. Tuesday, April 14, on Fox — it manages to top that. Personal and medical issues interlock neatly.
That’s always at the core of this show. It started with a potent personal story about Dr. Amy Larson (Molly Parker), then thrust her into hospital crises.
Now that peaks. The less you know about the specific plot, the better; instead, here’s some background. Read more…
1) “Ghosts,” 8:30 p.m., CBS. Iain Armitage was 9 when he landed the title role in what became broadcast-TV’s best comedy, “Young Sheldon.” Now, just shy of his 18th birthday, he’s on TV for the first time in two years. Desperate for money, Sam and Jay try to use ghosts to fleece gamblers … including Armitage (shown here, left), playing himself. Read more…
1) “MasterChef,” 8 p.m., Fox. These are home-chefs from the U.S., but the emphasis is global. Four five-person teams will be chosen, representing roots in Europe, Africa, Asia-Pacific and the Americas. The opener is Europe, including family links. One chef’s grandma finished 14th in 2015; another (shown here) saw her husband finish fifth in 2021 Read more…
David Duchovny’s career had been littered with oddities.
He’s met monsters and mutants, ghosts and cryptids and schemes to create alien-human hybrids. Also, poison labs and poison guns and mind control and a plan to have bats carry incendiary devices.
We expected that from his “X-Files” series. But bizarrely, some of that is non-fiction: Everything that was listed above after “also” involves real-life schemes, detailed on “Secrets Declassified” (shown here), which he hosts at 10 p.m. Tuesdays on the History Channel.
“Some of it is laughable,” Duchovny said, in a Television Critics Association session. “But then you step back and you go, ‘Well, this could have really impacted a lot of people in a negative way.'” Read more…
1) “Doc” season-finale, 8 and 9 p.m., Fox. It’s been a terrific season, stuffed with high-stakes medical and personal stories. Now it tries to top that with this two-parter: A deadly virus is loose; with their floor quarantined, doctors scramble to identify the virus, Amy (shown here) faces memory seizures … and when Richard (her nemesis) is stricken, she puts herself in danger. Read more…
1) “The Voice,” 9-11 p.m., NBC. Trimmed to half its usual length (to make room for basketball), this will conclude Tuesday. Tonight, we get the final nine singers; they’re shown here, from left: Liv Ciara, 16; Lucas West, 20; K.J. Willis, 35; Mikenley Brown, 19; Alexia Jayy, 31; J.W. Griffin, 25; Jeremy Keith, 40; Jared Shoemaker, 32; and Syd Millevoi, 23. Read more…
Best-bets for April 18: glory of basketball and nature 
Best-bets for April 17: music masters, movie miser 
Best-bets for April 16: Sheldon-adjacent laughs 
