The Attack of Fall Television

This season of television isn't even over yet (gee, thanks, CW) and I already need to do a post on the upcoming Fall season. Yikes.

If you haven't heard, Fox has already dropped some of their upcoming shows, and the list of the season in general.

Let's see some of the highlights.

THE RETURNING

Lucifer will be back in the spring. If you don't know this show already, it's really quite inoffensive ... okay, Lucifer is an arrogant hedonistic egomaniac with a chip on his shoulder the size of Plymouth Rock, and always does the right thing when he realizes that even he benefits from it, but it's like working a redemption story with the unredeemable. Next year will probably be fighting more supernatural threats -- when Lucifer refers to "mom" escaping, I presume he means Lilith, because that's the only thing that makes sense, really. At least he's more likable than House.

And that's ... the only show on Fox I care about, really. You'd have to pay me to watch Gotham.

THE NEW ... ISH

The Exorcist (Friday Nights, Fall)

Yes. Really. What the hell? No pun intended. I'm not sure what's stranger: That this is actually a series, or that Geena Davis is in it.  Yes, the mother is Geena Davis. I don't recall the film that much -- was the mother such a big role that they got movie-quality star power for it?  Or is Geena Davis not doing that well in this point of her career?

They want to make this a psychological thriller, following two priests tackling one case of demonic possession. There's Father new priest of Chicago, all shiny and new and "progressive," and probably screwed. The other is ... sigh ... "a modern-day Templar Knight, an orphan raised since childhood by the Vatican to wage war against its enemies. Father Marcus is everything Father Tomas is not: relentless, abrasive and utterly consumed by his sacred mission." While I have no problem with that, there are so many ways to spin that as a negative that I'm almost certain they're going to make him look like an utter nutcase by the end of the day.

And "it's the house"? Yeah. Sure. Thanks. I think I heard this movie was called The Amityville Horror. The original incident of The Exorcist (yes, based on a true story) had a little boy playing with occult crap that ended up playing with him.

Pros? If William Peter Blatty -- author of the original book -- is involved, this should be awesome. We should be seeing the entire process of what it takes to get an exorcism performed in this day and age. MRIs, psychologists, every expert scientist in every field should come on the show, run tests, and come up with alternate solutions for what's wrong with ... whoever this child is, I guess.

Cons: If they make this another stupid horror show like The Following or Sleepy Hollow, I'll throw rocks at the screen.

Lethal Weapon (Weds night, Fall, 2017)

All right, hold on. When I wrote that post "The Return of everything," I didn't think that I would be that predictive. Stop it already. First Rush Hour, then The Exorcist, now this?

No, seriously, was this inspired by the Rush Hour TV show? You know, "If CBS can make this crappy movie into an ok TV show, we can do it with better original material?"

While I grew up with the Lethal Weapon films, has anyone watched them recently? Sure, they almost started the genre of "opposite personality syndrome" in cops shows (I don't recall it in DragNet, The FBI Story, The Untouchables, The Naked City, or Hill Street Blues), but wow, those films do not hold up as well. Far too shallow, and far, far too superseded by movies that came after them and did it better.

But now it's Damon Wayans? Remind me, is he trying to get a career as a serious actor? Because "insane cop / bad comedian cop" doesn't sound like a show I want to see.

I'll give it a try.

This time they want to make Riggs a former Navy SEAL, and they want Murtaugh to have recently had a heart attack.

Pros: There's a lot of room for improvement on the originals.

Cons: There's also a lot they can do terribly, terribly wrong.

The Rocky Horror Picture Show.... 

Do I even need to say any more about this?

Didn't think so.

Let's move on.

Prison Break

I guess Wentwood Miller and Dominic Purcell made an impression on The Flash.

24: Legacy

I am so conflicted about this one. On the one  hand: YES, MORE 24, BWAHAHAHAHA

On the other hand ... WHERE'S MY JACK BAUER. I WANT BAUER BACK NOW DAMNIT! THERE'S NO TIME!

Anyway, again, another terrorist attack is coming to United States soil. After killing an Osama knockoff, the Rangers from the mission have been targeted by not-Osama's followers. With the help of Eowyn (Miranda Otto, “Lord of the Rings”), he's going to strike back. Here, Eowyn is "a brilliant and ambitious intelligence officer who has stepped down from her post as National Director of CTU to support her husband (Jimmy Smits) in his campaign for President of the United States."

Dear Hollyweird, while I appreciate you bringing back one of my favorite shows, could you please read a book or something and make a tv show out of that? And not for premium cable?

Cons: Our lead looks like a kid. He could be the brother of Jax from Berlanti's Arrow-verse. He's supposed to be an officer, with a wife and family? What happened to the veteran?  Oh yes, and least I forget, WHERE'S JACK BAUER? ... oh, wait, he's producing.

Pros: It's more 24, with several solid actors, even some bit players.

THE NEW: YES, REALLY

APB (Spring, 2017)

So, Tony Stark took over a police department, and he's now on his way to taking over the police department of the entire city.

Do you want to create RoboCop? Because this is how you get RoboCop.

Seriously, this feels like someone saw the 90s show The District, and just threw in Tony Stark.

However....

The executive producer is the same one from Lucifer, and the creator of Burn Notice, Matt Nix.

All right, they have my attention.

"Inspired by true events" ... huh. Okay.

Pros: This looks like insane fun. With the guys from Lucifer, Burn Notice, and Ernie Hudson.

Cons: Too many possibilities to take this into Mary Sue territory ... which they may have deflated in the last scene of the trailer, so who knows, there may be hope for this.