Stories

Stories

Mid-season brings flurry of new shows, season-openers

Slogging through the post-Christmas lull, TV viewers can find quick comfort. Or maybe semi-quick.
Current shows will have new episodes in early January on most networks … or late February on CBS. And they’ll be joined by:
— Nine new scripted series, led by Fox’s amiable “Doc Martin” reboot, starring Josh Charles (shown here on one of the doctor’s many bad days).
— The season-openers of 11 scripted shows, including ABC’s “Will Trent” and “The Rookie.”
— Three new unscripted shows, starting with a Harlan Coban true-crime series, Jan. 8. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / December 21, 2025
Stories

Reiner: amid gloom, triumph and joy in TV and movies

Norman Lear once summarized his friend beautifully:
“To be alone with Rob Reiner is to be in a crowd,” he wrote. “His brain and his mouth, like a chain of Chinese firecrackers, are firing constantly.”
And that brain kept triumphing — as a comedy writer, as one of the stars of Lear’s “All In the Family” and then as the director of classic movies, from “This Is Spinal Tap” to “A Few Good Men” and “When Harry Met Sally.”
Reiner (shown here in “This Is Spinal Tap,” 78, and his wife Michelle, 68, were reportedly found dead Sunday (Dec. 14), apparently stabbed to death. He left an awesome track record. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / December 15, 2025
Stories

It’s happy 100th (or 36th) birthday, Van Swift

This is one of those double birthdays that can keep your head swiveling.
On Saturday (Dec. 13), Dick Van Dyke turns 100 … and Taylor Swift turns 36.
It’s kind of like “Barbieheimer,” when the “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” movies opened the same day, right? Now you don’t know what to put on the birthday cake. “Van Swift?” “Swift Dick?” Maybe not.
To complicate things further, both will be featured Friday through Sunday on TV, cable and streaming. (See box at the end.) Read more…

By Mike Hughes / December 9, 2025
Stories

At last: Percy’s back in the gods’ domain

It’s not easy to fight gods and monsters, you know. It takes time and trouble.
And it takes time to be a fan of the demigods: “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” (shown here) finally starts its second season Wednesday (Dec. 10) on Disney+ … a full two years after the first season arrived.
Consider one of the show’s young heroes. “Annabeth was very patient with trying to go on a quest,” said Leah Sava Jeffries (left), who plays her. She’d been training for five years, before getting her chance.
That same patience has been required of the fans and the people involved. Walker Scobell (center) had just turned 13 when he was cast as Percy; his 17th birthday (Jan. 5) will arrive while this second season is airing. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / December 6, 2025
Stories

Tabernacle concert: hope, joy and mega-music

The word “hope” gets tossed around easily during the holidays.
It’s in the title (“Hope of The Season”) of this year’s Tabernacle Choir concert, which airs at 8 p.m. Dec. 15 and 24 on PBS and often on cable. When the concert reaches its peak — 360 voices doing Handel’s “Hallelujah Chorus” — it resonates with hope and joy.
But there are deeper levels here. By coincidence, this year’s soloist (Broadway star Ruthie Ann Miles) has a daughter named Hope. “Our daughter was named after a terrible family tragedy,” she said. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / December 5, 2025
Stories

It’s a busy Christmas season inside our TV sets

When life was logical, the Christmas season started on Thanksgiving morning. We watched the parade, then looked for movies and music.
Then the logic faded. Some networks talked Christmas in October.
Still, we’ll stick to the basics for this list: TV’s Christmas season begins with Santa and friends rolling through New York on Thanksgiving morning. It ends with Mickey and friends rolling through Disney parks on Christmas morning … followed by a few final shows (including the Grinch) that night.
So here’s a round-up. (Shown here is Aloe Blacc at the ABC special that airs Dec. 1.) There’s more if you have streaming channels, but this (subject to late changes) is what’s new on the networks and basic-cable: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / November 21, 2025
Stories

PBS fun: music, dance and Van Dyke’s 100th

After re-fighting some wars, PBS will retreat to a cheery holiday mood.
It will have new editions of two holiday mainstays — the Tabernacle Choir and the “Nutcracker” ballet. It will also have some fun on the 100th birthday of Dick Van Dyke (shown here in “Mary Poppins”) and some Christmas warmth with “Call the Midwife.”
Lately, the network has focused on Ken Burns’ epic “American Revolution” (concluding Friday, Nov. 21), a Burns follow-up discussion (9 p.m. Nov. 24) and a quietly moving film with Michael Caine as a D-Day veteran (9 p.m. Nov. 23). After that, things get lighter with: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / November 20, 2025
Stories

CBS adds marshals, CIA agents and chefs

After a long pause — and a lot of “Survivor” events — CBS will get busy in late February.
It will debut two dramas (one a “Yellowstone” spin-off, shown here) plus a cooking competition. It will also move “Watson” back to Sundays, so it can double up on Dick Wolf dramas on Mondays. Read more…

By Mike Hughes / November 18, 2025
Stories

At mid-season, Fox remembers scripted shows

When the second half of the TV season starts in January, Fox will rediscover the notion of scripted shows.
This fall, it only had two of them (animation excluded). Soon it will have five (incliuding a “Doc Martin” reboot, shown here) … plus a three-Sunday mini-series … plus restocking its cartoons.
The two scripted non-cartoons this fall are “Murder in a Small Town” (with only a 10-episode season) and “Doc,” which will rest for a month, then return Jan. 6. It will be joined by: Read more…

By Mike Hughes / November 12, 2025