I fondly recall the special edition of TV Guide that previewed all the new Fall Prime Time Shows. I’d read it over and over again picking out new shows that I wanted to sample. We kept that guide for several months before throwing it out.
We had a tv guide subscription throughout my childhood and I kept a subscription as a young adult. We didn’t cancel it until about 1990. Hated the format change from the small compact book.
How is everyone learning about the new shows now?
Do you still put together a list of the new shows that you want to watch?
Are there any good web sources? Especially ones that group the shows by night? Like heres the new shows for Thursdays?
I redeemed some frequent flier miles for a subscription to Entertainment Weekly. There’s a section on new fall shows in the Sept. 6 issue. Interestingly, the show I’m most looking forward to is the new Arsenio Hall show.
I read Alan Sepinwall’s blog “What’s Alan Watching.” He reviews new shows as they come out. I will watch at least one episode of whatever he says is good.
Network prime time doesn’t matter anymore. I too remember being excited by the new TGIF lineup on ABC. Now the good shows aren’t even on TV, let alone on prime time TV.
Here’s what I’ve pieced together from several sources I found with a Yahoo! search on “Fall 2013 TV schedule” and checking out the various hits.
The Americans: Season 2 to debut in January 2014
Justified: Season 5 to debut in January 2014
Louie: Season 4 to debut in May 2014
The Newsroom: Season 3 renewal is a sure thing
Downton Abbey: Season 4 premieres Jan. 5, 2014
Ray Donovan: Season 2 Officially renewed
Rectify: Season 2 to debut in 2014
Boardwalk Empire: Season 4 to debut Sept. 8
Sons of Anarchy: Season 6 premieres Sept. 10
Derek Available on Netflix Premieres Sept 12
Bones: FRI 8/7c SEP 16
Survivor: Premieres Wed., Sept. 18 8/7c
The Blacklist NBC Premieres: Monday, Sep. 23 at 10/9c
Nashville: Wednesday 10pm on September 25, 2013
Blue Bloods: Premieres, Friday, Sept. 27 10/9c
The Good Wife: Premieres, Sunday, Sept. 29 9/8c
The Mentalist: Season Premiere, Sunday, Sept 29 10/9c
Homeland: Season 3 to premiere Sept. 29
Masters of Sex: Season 1 premieres Sept. 29
I’m a little cautious about watching a new series from it’s debut. They often get cancelled just as I get hooked. It’s safer to wait and see what will last a full season.
I watch very little live TV so am unaware of shows as they come out. I hear about shows through word of mouth from my friends and can tell what shows create buzz based on Cafe Society threads. For me this works because the shows I do watch tend to be of exceptional quality and more likely to make it through their run, though the downside is that I’m usually several seasons behind my friends when they’re talking about it so I have to go through some marathon watching if I want to be “live” when shows are airing.
Most of my sources these days are online, including reading industry news that reports on things like the networks upfronts. The best ones are Deadline.com, EW (print and online), Marc Berman’s TVMediaInsights.com, the Hollywood Reporter, The Futon Critic (http://thefutoncritic.com/), the various critics like Alan Sepinwall (Entertainment – UPROXX), and Michael Ausiello (http://tvline.com/). Deadline.com is especially good about covering pilot season and what gets picked up.
Once the various shows get scheduled, a lot of online sites will cover the shows and make available a night-by-night schedule. You can search google and find a lot. Here are some links: Wikipedia, The TV Addict, TVLine
And yes, I still pick out the new shows I’m interested in to try out and make my own schedule of new and old shows.
I find them out of boredom. Seriously. I might watch something because of an actor, but I rarely follow actors enough to notice. The descriptions in the preview guides are usually too generic to be useful for me, and my tastes differ from the general public enough that general buzz and popularity usually don’t help either.
If I don’t have anything to watch, sometimes I do some channel surfing. If something catches my eye, I watch it.
Format change aside, TV Guide does still do a rundown of the new fall shows, as does Entertainment Weekly, and you can find a lot of that information on line (though the magazine usually goes a bit more in depth):
EW Fall TV 2013: Links to the network schedules on the left will bring up a day-by-day grid of the fall schedule (ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, CW).
Oh, and just to note: the Entertainment Weekly issue dated September 6 (the cast of How I Met Your Mother on the cover) has a short feature on returning shows; the TV Guide issue dated September 9-15 (Sarah Michelle Gellar and Robin Williams on the cover) has a “Sneak Peek” piece on the fall shows, but neither of these is the full-fledged Fall Preview editions these magazines usually do (which should be coming out very soon, given that premieres for some shows are already happening).
I usually see what the AV Club is reviewing and will check out an episode or two. I do the torrent thing (shh) so I can get stuff whenever I feel like it, I don’t have to remember to record it.
I do read a reality TV site (realitytea.com) since I do watch some reality shows, and I’ll catch wind of a new reality show from there that I’ll check out. Usually I just end up watching an episode or two then reading the snarky reviews for the rest of the season instead.
I miss the regular schedule back yonder when new shows started in the fall, continued through the spring, and then you had reruns in the summer. It’s very easy to miss new shows with the way the un-schedule works now. Things start in January, or the first episode of the season will run for two or three weeks in a row. Also, new shows are canceled quickly, before they find their footing or their audience. Sometimes I don’t find them until they have been canceled and are in reruns. Finding new shows is a haphazard process.