Saturday, June 24, 2017

Around the Tubes: 6/24/2017



- TBS's newest comedy series The Guest Book is set to premiere Thursday, Aug. 3, with back-to-back episodes starting at 10:00. The Guest Book emerged from Emmy® winner and series creator Greg Garcia's habit of writing fictitious stories in the guest books of various rental cabins in an effort to freak out the next renters. Now he is bringing those stories to life on TBS. While the house and cast of characters living in this small mountain town remain the same, each episode will feature a different set of vacationing guests.


- TBS's hit comedy People of Earth will return for its second season on Monday, July 24 at 10:30. Executive-produced by Emmy® winners Conan O'Brien and Greg Daniels, along with creator David Jenkins and showrunner Norm Hiscock, the series centers on a group of alien abductees – or "experiencers" – living in the small town of Beacon, N.Y. New cast member Nasim Pedrad joins returning cast Wyatt Cenac, Ana Gasteyer, Oscar Nuñez, Michael Cassidy, Alice Wetterlund, Luka Jones, Brian Huskey, Nancy Lenehan, Tracee Chimo, ;Da'Vine Joy Randolph, Björn Gustafsson and Ken Hall.

- For the first time in 99 years a total solar eclipse will span the continental United States, the path of totality stretching from Oregon to South Carolina. The Great American Eclipse will likely be one of the most viewed events in history and Science Channel will be on the ground to capture the excitement with live coverage as it happens on Monday, August 21. In primetime, the network will premiere a one-hour special, The Great American Eclipse (wt), with same-day footage of the eclipse, on the 21st at 9:00. The announcement was made today, the Summer Solstice, by Marc Etkind, General Manager of Science Channel.

- Conan O'Brien will once again be immortalized with a set of four Pop! Vinyl figures to be available this July, when TBS's late-night series Conan returns to San Diego for Comic-Con® International. Created by Funko for TBS, a division of Turner, this year's collectible figure designs include "Conan as Spider-Man™," "Jedi™ Conan," "The Flash™ Conan" and "White Walker™ Conan." In addition, there will be a limited-edition figure entitled, "MonoConan," which will only be available through activations & giveaways taking place in San Diego. During the week of Comic-Con® International, CONAN will be taped at San Diego's historic Spreckels Theatre on Wednesday, July 19 – Saturday, July 22. Episodes will air that Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday at 11 p.m. (ET/PT) on TBS and will be available across TBS and Team Coco's digital, mobile and VOD platforms the day after airing. Fans can keep connected with CONAN during Comic-Con and share their excitement about the new Pop! Vinyl figures by using #ConanCon on social media.

- Some of the biggest names in movie and TV comedy will be making their way to YouTube Red this Fall. From a hilarious reinvention of the traditional cop drama by renowned comedy director Rawson Marshall Thurber, to an all-new comedic scripted series from Rob Huebel, YouTube Red is building up its comedy lineup with Hollywood veterans in front of and behind the camera.

In the eight-episode, half hour comedy Ryan Hansen Solves Crimes on Television*, the LAPD thinks it’s a good idea to form a task force partnering actors with homicide detectives so they can use their “actor skills” to help solve murders. Starring Ryan Hansen (“Veronica Mars,” “Party Down”) who plays himself and guest star Samira Wiley (“The Handmaid's Tale," “Orange Is The New Black”) as his no-nonsense partner Detective Mathers, the series features a who’s who of broadcast and cable television stars playing bizarro versions of themselves including, but not limited to, Joel McHale, Jon Cryer and Kristen Bell. Rawson Marshall Thurber (“Central Intelligence,” “We’re the Millers,” and “Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story”) serves as the director, writer, creator and executive producer of this super meta half hour comedy procedural which is as much about Hollywood as it is an action-comedy cop show. The series is executive produced by Thurber, Scott Stuber, Beau Bauman, Krysia Plonka and Tracey Baird.

Do You Want to See a Dead Body? is an eight-episode comedy series that follows comedian Rob Huebel (“Childrens Hospital,” “Transparent”) and his celebrity friends who begrudgingly join him on adventures that see them frolicking at the beach, getting tacos, ...oh...and seeing a dead body. Celebrity guest stars include Adam Scott, Judy Greer, Terry Crews, Craig Robinson, and John Cho along with many more. Huebel, Owen Burke, Nick Jasenovec, and Jonathan Stern serve as executive producers. The series is being produced by Abominable Pictures and Funny or Die.

- Comedian and I’m Dying Up Here star Erik Griffin (Workaholics, Blunt Talk) makes his hour-long debut in the new comedy special Erik Griffin: The Ugly Truth premiering Friday, July 7 at 9:00 on Showtime. Griffin’s hilarious special is the third standalone comedy event from the stars of the network’s newest drama series I’M DYING UP HERE, which airs on Sundays at 10:00 on Showtime.

- Hulu announced Alexis Bledel will return as a series regular for the second season of The Handmaid’s Tale. Alexis Bledel will reprise her role in the second season of Hulu’s The Handmaid’s Tale as a series regular. Bledel starred in season one as a guest star and received rave reviews for her heartbreaking performance. The 13-episode second season is scheduled to go back into production this fall and will premiere in 2018.

- Hulu announced a new cast of characters joining the upcoming second season of Hulu Original Freakish. See below for casting information as well as a special casting video released today.



- The critically acclaimed Showtime Documentary Film Whitney. Can I Be Me, originally scheduled to premiere Saturday, August 26 on Showtime, will now air on Friday, August 25 at 9 p.m. ET/PT. On August 26, Showtime will offer the much-anticipated pay-per-view boxing match between undefeated world champion Floyd Mayweather and UFC champion Conor McGregor live from Las Vegas.

Wednesday, June 21, 2017

Summer 2017 Music Preview


To curate a list of albums coming out this summer I headed over to the Pre-Order page on Google Play and on the top line was an album by Goldfinger. That pretty much sums up music these days that one of the albums coming out over the next couple months that Google is hyping the most is by a band who it would be kind of generous to call them a One Hit Wonder. There is not much else to say about this crop of albums so lets just get to the list of albums that should at very least a stream on Spotify.

June 23
Purple Rain Deluxe (Expanded Edition) - Prince
Evolve - Imagine Dragons
Mosaic - 311
New Waves - Bone Thugs-n-Harmony
Despicable Me 3 Soundtrack

June 30
The Storm - ZZ Ward
TLC - TLC

July 7
Something to Tell You - HAIM

July 14
Low Blows - Meg Mac
Ultralife - Oh Wonder
Kaleidoscope EP - Coldplay
Something's Changing - Lucy Rose
Hitchhiker - Neil Young

July 21
Lust for Life - Lana Del Rey
Sacred Hearts Club - Foster the People
Barefoot In the Head - Chris Robinson Brotherhood
The Knife - Goldfinger
Defying Gravity - Mr. Big

July 28
All I Ever See In You Is Me - Jillette Johnson
Everything Now - Arcade Fire
Powers of Piece - Santana and The Isley Brothers
Paranormal - Alice Cooper

August 11
Anchors - Will Hoge

August 25
A Deeper Understanding - The War on Drugs
Beast Epic - Iron & Wine
Villains - Queens of the Stone Age

September 8
Shade - Living Colour
Sleep Well Beast - The National

September 15
Prophets of Rage - Prophets of Rage
Concrete and Gold - Foo Fighters
Walk into a Storm - The Lone Bellow
M A N I A - Fall Out Boy

September 29
Shania Now - Shania Twain

TBA
Music For Cars - The 1975
From A Room: Volume 2 - Chris Stapleton
Aretha Franklin
Nas
Paul McCartney
Steve Perry
U2

And of course this could be the quarter that Dr. Dre drops Detox.



Sunday, June 18, 2017

57 Channels and Only This Is On: 6/18/2017



Orphan Black: I needed that "previously on" segment to be longer. This show just got way too complicated over the years.
You can download Orphan Black on iTunes.

Fear the Walking Dead: Well preppers are an interesting character study in an actual apocalypse, but has society ended that quickly? They were on a boat and in Mexico for maybe a month and society has already fallen? And didn’t the Mexican daddy burn up last season? I guess this could be a hallucination. And where is his daughter? She is still in the credits.
You can download Fear the Walking Dead on iTunes

I’m Dying Up Here: Oh my, Let’s Make a Deal. I was going to say how seventies, but I think there was a reboot recently with Wayne Brady as host. But what a horrible show.

Casual: Oh Leon, you need to be on this show more. Oh course you are into Magic: The Gathering. And oh hey, Judy Greer: always a plus.
You can stream Casual on Hulu.

Pretty Little Liars: Last week when Hannah and Caleb got engaged, following Aria and Ezra’s engagement (still icky) and Emily and Allison bizarrely having a kid together, I felt bad for Spencer whose one night stand with a detective has gotten worse and worse. But of course Toby came back this week so they could do one huge Lairs’ sex montage. Le sigh. Only two more episode until I can start wearing my I Watched Every Episode of Pretty Little Liars and all I Got Was This Stupid T-Shirt t-shirt.
Pretty Little Liars on iTunes.

The Challenge: Champs vs. Pros: Oh wow, I actually thought Kameron maybe could win that challenge by himself. But poor Ashley and Lolo, going into every elimination this season.
You can download The Challenge: Invasion of the Champions on iTunes.

The Handmaid’s Tale: So why exactly are they taking Offred? The easy answer is that it is because of the stunt she pulled in the stoning. But that was everyone who refused to throw a stone, they are not going to round up all the Handmaids are they? It could be because of the package, which was kind of lame, just a bunch of letters. There could be a very small chance the resistance is poising as the black van people. But my best working theory is that the driver, who is part of the eye, is getting who he thinks is his baby mama out of a dangerous situation. Wherever Offred ends up going, I just hope she runs into Rory Gilmore, my one complaint is she got hauled away early in the season and we never got to see what happened to her. And with a season of great musical cues, American Girl was another one. Remember America is not much of a thing anymore, but Offred but the show reminds us as the show goes on hiatus that Offred is still an American girl ay heart.

The show has been cruel since the beginning but they really racheted that up for the finale. Making the Handmaids stone one of their own (but “don’t throw too hard” was a great line), the Waterfords were equally harsh to each other. But number one on that list was Mrs. Waterford driving Offred over to where Offred’s daughter is being kept, Waterford talked to the daughter within sight but out of earshot completely out of spite. But here is the thing: that is secretly a gift because now Offred knows where her daughter is. I can imagine Offred will find her way there in season two.
You can stream The Handmaid's Tale on Hulu.