Well here’s a link to Channel Guide Magazine‘s 2017 Fright Guide.
Click to access Fright-Guide-2017.pdf
Every year the staff at 
puts their heads together to produce the most comprehensive list of Daily Listings, Movies, Specials and this year, a bonus. Read about the 13 Most Shocking Horror Movies you may have missed.
Filmed on location in Albuquerque, New Mexico and other locations including the Castañeda Hotel, Las Vegas and Rio Roca Fria Hotel, Midnight, Texas is a cross between True Blood and Twilight.
Midnight is actually a town where those who are a little “different” can live safely, away from the outsiders who would normally give them trouble. And you know what they say about “safety in numbers.”
Manfred Bernardo is a psychic and gypsy fortune teller. He’s played by François Arnaud (you’ll probably recognize him from Blindspot and The Borgias) and is on the run from a voice on his phone and is led to Midnight, Tex. by his grandmother (a ghost who lives in his caravan RV). He’s not there long when there’s a murder and being a powerful psychic, the victim, visits him in his rented house.
The special effects are being handled by some of the best special and visual effects people in the business. They grab you and pull you in within the first three minutes of the show and won’t disappointment you during the next 48 minutes. Don’t miss the last twelve minutes if you really want to know what the residents of Midnight, Texas are all about.
The stories of the next ten episodes are in the capable hands of eight great writers including Charlaine Harris, who also penned the True Blood books and the book series, Midnight, Texas is based on.
Other cast members include Dylan Bruce, Parisa Fitz-Henley, Arielle Kebbel, and Peter Mensah, who played Kibwe in True Blood.
Midnight, Texas, 10 episodes, 10pm ET, Mondays, one hour
For the first time ever the five winter episodes are one continuous story line, and after seeing the first two, it’s playing like an impeccably acted mini-series.
It begins with a young woman and her infant son getting killed while driving through LA in the wrong colored car threw rival gang territories. When Major Crimes shows up, they discover that some of the shots are so close to the car, there’s powder residue around the holes. They also find packaged heroin and lots of cash hidden in the car.
When the shell casings Amy Sykes takes to ballistics for analyzing uncovers 12-year old wounds from a missing uzi, Sykes is forced to make the acquaintance with a disgraced LAPD detective for some inside information (Mark Hickman).
In the meantime, Rusty catches Gary following him and discovers that his mom has rehabilitated herself right out of custody and into an apartment and a program. But he’s afraid if he goes to see her, Gary will just follow him there so he and Gus concoct a high tech way of communicating with her using Talk Chat on Gus’s cell phone.
Jason Gedrick plays Mark Hickman. Credit: Doug Hyun
By the time the second episode has begun, they’ve discovered the missing uzi in the pulpit of a church that is run by one of the suspects of the 12-year old crime and Mark Hickman has been invited down to the squad for some face time.
Though he does keep his secret liaisons with Sykes quiet, he’s not so silent with his contempt for almost everyone else in the squad: Captain Raydor originally fired him; he asks Andy Flynn if he’s still cheating on his girlfriends, causing Capt. Raydor’s eyes to fly open; and of course he has a lot to say to Lt. Tao, because he was his (Hickman’s) old partner.
By the end of the second episode, their only witness, Emile Fisher is dead, and they still don’t know his connection to the girl who was killed in the car, even though she was calling his cell phone.
So either clear your Monday nights or set your DVRs, or learn how to use your OnDemand, because you won’t want to miss the winter episodes (3 to go) of Major Crimes, on TNT at 8pm CT.
If you haven’t heard, TNT has cancelled Rizzoli & Isles. It will end after a shortened season this summer.
Bones (FOX), just showed its second new episode of their 10th season; the premiere episode was well worth waiting for.
Castle (ABC), in its 7th season was flat, lifeless and hard to track. At the end of season 6, right when Kate and Castle were about to be married, Kate got called to a fiery crash which turned out to be Castle’s car. An excellent end-of-season cliff hanger.
The premiere of season 7 picks up right where season 6 left off, with Castle not being in the car (which is what I expected). Castle is missing through the entire episode which spans months. By the end of the episode, he’s found afloat in a boat from a pier owned by a Henry Jenkins (played by Matt Letscher) who turns out to be an imposter.
Matt Letscher told TVLine that while they were filming, everyone “played both sides of the fence” with him “because they wanted to leave themselves some options.” He added that Henry Jenkins is much more cunning compared to his Billy Chambers character in “Scandal” (who cares).
Bones hasn’t had many character eliminations. Zac Addy (played by Eric Millegan) was there from the beginning through season 4. Ryan Cartwright who played Vincent Nigel-Murray was one of several rotating “squinterns” who replaced Zac Addy. He was killed in Season 6, Episode 22 and his murder was the catalyst which brought Booth and Brennan together.
SPOILER ALERT!
John Francis Daley (Sweets) © FOX Network.
In the episodic premiere of the tenth season of Bones, Sweets (played by John Francis Daley) is murdered. The second episode solves his murder and the rest of the team says good-bye.
Also in the first episode, a new cast member is introduced. Agent Aubrey (John Boyd) who you may recognize if you watched “24.”
That’s all I intend to say about Bones and Castle. I hope what I have written encourages you to tune-in to these hour long dramas.
Castle is on ABC on Monday nights at 9pm CST.
Bones is on FOX on Thursday nights at 7pm CST.
▶ The Blacklist Season 2 Official Trailer | THE BLACKLIST – YouTube.
This is a busy week for new and returning fall programming. One show I personally have been looking forward to returning is The Blacklist on NBC with James Spader. This is Season 2 of the drama starring James Spader as Raymond “Red” Reddington and Megan Boone as Elizabeth Keen in the lead roles.
Though I may have mentioned in the past that I’m not one to watch a lot of network television, The Blacklist is one I won’t miss. It follows The Voice, another show I use to like watching, and may start watching again, now that they have new judges.
If you have other commitments tonight, don’t forget to set your DVR. The Blacklist comes on at 9pm CST on NBC. If you need to be convinced, check out the official trailer. Just click on the link, sit back and enjoy the show.
A&E Greenlights ‘Love Prison’ Reality Series, 3 Others – TheWrap.
Well, fall is here and so are the new shows. I managed to watch two episodes of A&E’s social experiment called “Love Prison” yesterday and was shocked they could find advertisers for that crap.
Reading some of the advanced press online, they stated one out of every three relationships begins online. Really? I did do a little bit of research on my own and unfortunately the state of online dating is not a happy one. There are just as many online dating commercials as there are bladder leakage ones.
Serviss and Siegel, contestants on Love Prison. © AETV.
The two episodes I watched were train wrecks … I couldn’t look away. Serviss (42) and Siegel (39) were dating for six months. Siegel is from California; Serviss from Long Island.
The other episode I watched was about Rosie, an LA party girl and Chris, a computer nerd from Iowa. They had been dating online for two years. She was wishy washy and he was way to passive. To give you an example, residents of the Love Prison get one phone call during the week – he called his mother.
All I could think about the entire time I was watching … they dumped Longmire for this … crap. Just to get a better skew in the 18-49 demographic. Yikes!
Rosie and Chris, contestants in Love Prison. © AETV
There is hope, however. Some of the other shows they have planned will appeal to the cerebral part of that demographic.
Dogs of War is about a nonprofit organization that pairs veterans with PTSD with adopted dogs who help the veterans transition back into regular life.
Mark Wahlberg (yes of “The Wahlburgers”) is executive producing a show for A&E entitled Big Brew Theory that follows four quirky MIT grads as they pursue their dream of opening a home-grown micro brewery. I bet their parents are proud.
The “Godfather of Pittsburgh” takes a fascinating look at a truly original character who finds it hard to walk the ‘straight and narrow’ and still succeed in business. (That’s their write-up, not mine.)
Other shows in the works include 8 Minutes (working title) which really sounds promising, The Unproduceables, which sounds hysterical and the new show by executive producer Dick Wolf, Dead Again that has a premiere date of Thursday, Oct. 2 at 9pm CT.
I’m covering Dead Again in another post.
Many say that the unscripted “reality” show came out of the 2007-2008 Writers Guild of America strike when all 12,000 screenwriters and TV writers in the guild went on strike. It started on November 5, 2007 and ended on February 12, 2008.
I would think that by now networks would realize that America has had its fill of reality shows. Love Prison airs on Monday nights, 9pm CT.
Longmire, Season 3, Episode 10. CarterMatt.
If you’re not caught up on your Longmire episodes, you better get crackin’, because the season 3 finale aires Monday, August 4 at 9pm CST. [spoiler alert]
There seems to still be a couple of things up in the air. But between Henry and Walt they’ve been eliminating suspects. Henry eliminated Malachi (Graham Greene); Walt eliminated Chance Gilbert (Peter Stormare). But now Henry’s trial has been moved up by two weeks.
Branch is still not himself; he stole a rifle, and broke out of his father’s house. Though it seems like he’s ruined every opportunity of ever returning as a productive lawman, I feel Jacob Nighthorse or David Ridges have been drugging him all this time.
Now that Vic’s husband has served divorce papers on her, the pressure is off and she can just continue to fill the role of a trusted and competent law enforcement officer and back-up Walt. If you’ve read Craig Johnson’s books, Walt and Vic have a romantic relationship and in the last one I read (A Serpent’s Tooth: A Walt Longmire Mystery, Book 9) he proposes to her.
At the conclusion of Counting Coup, Walt finished off David Ridges, even though Ridges thought he was a time traveling warrior and couldn’t be killed. My question is did Jacob Nighthorse call Walt to tell him where to find Ridges so Walt could finally take him into custody; or, did Nighthorse tell Ridges to kill Walt? Especially since it was Ridges that drove away in Walt’s truck and then came back on the horse. Either way, Nighthorse wins. For now anyway.
The photo (above), is from the final episode. Doesn’t say much, does it? But I’ve heard nothing but good things about this season of Longmire. It’s received high marks all around. I’m expecting an announcement of a Season 4 during the finale.
The modern invention … the DVR … spoils me. It also makes me a day late on my shows. It spoils me because I wait a day to watch my quality shows so I can whiz through the commercials.
Take for instance Major Crimes on TNT. It airs on Monday night, but I watched it tonight (Tuesday). Laurie Holden shows up as Ann McGinnis. Right now its a one episode gig, but who knows, it might become something else.
Hey Laurie, Rizzoli & Isles is looking for another detective.
Longmire, The Bridge, Major Crimes, Rizzoli & Isles … those are just a few of the one-hour dramas that have returned for the summer. There’s a list of new shows that will be joining those in the coming weeks. . . you should be checking to see if you have room on your DVR.
And there are some that won’t be returning. One that I guessed wouldn’t be coming back, even as I watched the season finale was The Glades. In case you don’t remember (spoiler alert) Matt Passmore was “killed” in every sense of the word, on his wedding day.
You can see him in his new USA Network drama Satisfaction coming up July 17. Kiele Sanchez moved on to the new DirecTV drama Navy St.
The Bridge on FX has a new showrunner, which is probably a good thing. It lost it’s way slightly toward the end of the first season. The new season begins Wednesday, July 9. It is set in and filmed in El-Paso, Texas.
Major Crimes on TNT is two episodes into its new season and promises to be just as gutsy and thought provoking as its two previous seasons. Jon Tenney will make some recurring appearances this season as Agent Fritz Howard and Tom Berenger will again guest star as Capt. Raydor’s estranged husband.
Rizzoli & Isles is one episode into its fifth season and will use the second episode to dramatically say goodbye to Lee Thompson Young (Det. Barry Frost), the actor who committed suicide in 2013.
Michaela Gray Wolf (Faye Viviana) demonstrates the best way to dress a deer as part of the Miss Cheyenne pageant.
Longmire on A&E has picked up where it left off, with Henry Standing Bear in jail and Branch recovering from being shot. Ever wonder how they get everything “right?”
In episode 3, Henry asks Walt to sit in as a judge at the Miss Cheyenne pageant, which is interesting as all hell. Hulu has a 6 minute web exclusive video about The Cheyenne World and Marcus Red Thunder, who is the advisor to the show.
Shows are always better when they do their homework, and Longmire would never be accused of not staying up all night studying. It’s one show that makes coming in the house on a summer evening worth it.
MacArthur in battle
The six-hour The World Wars special event series premieres tonight on History® at 9pm/8pm ET, continues Tuesday, May 27 at 9pm/8pm ET and concludes Wednesday, May 28 at 9pm/8pm ET. Later this summer, the 3-part series with premiere on H2 and more than 160 countries across the globe will have an opportunity to see it.
Narrated by 2-time Oscar nominee Jeremey Renner (The Town, The Hurt Locker), The World Wars features interviews with Senator John McCain, General Colin Powell, British Prime Minister John Major, Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti and more.
The story tells the history of the World Wars through the eyes of the most powerful men: Roosevelt, Hitler, Patton, Mussolini, Churchill, Tojo, DeGaulle and MacArthur. These men held the fate of humankind in their hands. This event series examines the two world wars as one contiguous timelines, starting in 1914 and concluding in 1945, with these unique individuals coming of age in World War I before ultimately making some of the toughest decisions in the history of mankind in World War II.
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Discussing Quality TV for Baby Boomers
Small Screen Silver Surfer 