Two long-running TV shows are preparing their final seasons.
Netflix’s “Queer Eye” has just started production on its 10th and final year. PBS’ “Grantchester” (shown here) has announced that the 11th, next year, will be its last.
Details include: Read more…
Don’t you hate it when kids want to play with toys while adults are still using them?
Now they’re even taking over the Legos. “Lego Masters Jr.” will have a four-Monday, end-of-summer run.
“Lego Masters” (shown here in its episode tonight, July 7) is at 8 p.m. Mondays on Fox and also has Christmastime tournaments. When its current season ends, the new show will take over the spot for four weeks. Read more…
At a sleepy time for the big networks, two mini-nets offer some variety.
For UPtv, there will be cop shows this month: Reruns of “The Rookie” (shown here)now and a new season of “Hudson & Rex,” starting July 17,
And for the CW, it will be this fall. There will be a series (the Canadian version of “Law & Order: Criminal Intent”) and six movies, based on Harlequin romance novels. Read more…
“SharkFest” starts Saturday (July 5) on National Geographic, 15 days ahead of Discovery’s “Shark Week.”
We’ll see lots of scary-looking creatures, plus experts telling us not to be so scared. Here’s an overview; most shows will also be on Disney+ and Hulu:
RERUNS
— They start at 9 a.m. daily and continue overnight until 6 a.m.
SERIES:
— “Investigation Shark Attack,” 9 p.m. daily (except July 10), rerunning at midnight. In a central control room, four people see tapes of an attack and talk by Zoom to other experts. That starts July 5 with four great white shark encounters in California. Next is Hawaii on July 6, the Bahamas on the 7th, the Gulf on the 8th, Florida on the 9th and Maui on the 11th. Read more…
If you prefer your Fourth of July to be indoors and uncrowded, don’t fret. TV has plenty of alternatives.
Here are several of them. All are Friday and include music; most (except for AXS) also have fireworks:
PBS
— When: 8 p.m.; rerunning at 9:30.
— Where: Washington, D.C.
— Music: Beach Boys, Temptations, Yolanda Adams (shown here), Josh Turner (see separate story), LoCash,
Lauren Daigle, Abi Carter, National Symphony, Army band and trumpets.
— Also: Tributes, including the 250th anniversary of the Army, Navy and Marines. Read more…
A TV tradition — guest hosts of late-night shows — returns this summer.
Jimmy Kimmel has announced a full line-up of people to take his spot, at 11:35 p.m. weekdays on ABC.That starts the week of June 23 with Diego Luna (shown here), then includes such varied souls as Fortune Feimster and Jelly Roll.
Johnny Carson used to have a busy roster of guest hosts, including Jay Leno, Joan Rivers, David Brenner and more. That idea fell out of favor until 2020, when Kimmel — after working year-round for 18 years — decided to spend summers with his family. Read more…
For one long, busy evening, TV will break out of its summer slumber.
That’s when ABC has its annual “CMA Fest” concert. Over three hours (8-11 p.m. June 26), it will have 30 songs from country stars, from Adkins and Aldean to Zach Top and Zimmerman.
There will be serious moments (Scotty McCreery singing “Five More Minutes,” for instance), but there will also be Trace Adkins (shown here) singing “Honky Tonk Badonkadonk.” Country music is like that. Read more…
If you have a calendar handy, you might want to put a circle around June 20.
That will be a strong night to see … well, something. There’s “Jaws” and Janis Ian, Grammy greats and (shown here) Minecraft men.
That’s during a generally sleepy summer of TV. Suddenly, different networks all shoveled key specials into the same night: Read more…
It’s really not that hard to steal food from a lion during its meal. Simply:
1) Ask a friend to bite the lion’s tail; and
2) While the lion is distracted, take the food.
One other thought: Suggest to the friend that he run very, very fast.
“As far as I know, the lions never get wise to it,” said Dan Rees, one of the producers of “The Underdogs” (shown here), which debuts June 15 on the National Geographic Channel and ABC. “It’s a fairly well-documented behavior.” Read more…
Les Moonves, a very wise (and sometimes foolish) man, once told me, “There’s no such thing as trying too hard.”
He was wrong, of course. (Wise people sometimes are.) And the latest proof is “Mission: Impossible — The Final Reckoning” (shown here).
Granted, there are many good things about the film. Its action scenes are sensational; a marathon biplane chase through canyon country is about as good visually as a movie can be. Tom Cruise is intense (as usual) and perfect; his cast is full of top people in small roles. (We only see Oscar-winner Angela Bassett briefly. She does, however, save the world.)
The script, by director Christopher McQuarry and Erik Jendresen is smart … to an excess. There’s a lot of excess here. Read more…
