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Thoughts on the ABC Network this week seeing new cast members onboard on respective new shows as well as season renewal verdicts on the comedy side

by Sports Benches

It’s been a while since Easter but we have heard quite a lot over the last week from ABC regarding its shortlists of new shows hoping to impress management ahead of the Fall season later this year other than Dr. Odyssey, which went straight into series.

Kat Dennings joins Tim Allen who will play his character’s daughter Riley on Shifting Gears

She might not have been acting that much other than Dollface over the last couple of years, but the 2 Broke Girls star is ready to make her way back into prime-time TV now as she will be playing the daughter of Tim Allen’s character Matt on Shifting Gears. We know so far before her announcement that Matt, a successful car restoration owner, is set for a restoration of his own after his daughter was forced to move into his home alongside her teenage kids. Now her character’s name is Riley whom she had a strained relationship with her dad growing up before she married her boyfriend she hated while having two kids along the way, which turned out to be a divorce & now she moves back in hoping to make it work with her dad this time.

This is something we have yet to see when it comes to the Allen-Dennings working chemistry but they have got great experience performing in front of a studio audience before as is the setting Shifting Gears will go with where ABC doesn’t have a recent history of multi-camera sitcoms other than tons of single-camera stuff since The Conners back in 2018.

Thoughts on The Conners and Not Dead Yet renewal bubble

While most of the current drama shows have recently been given the renewal to stay on for next season other than Station 19 & The Good Doctor, we are still waiting whether two of the current comedy shows The Conners and Not Dead Yet will also be joining Abbott Elementary for later this year or not. First of all, The Conners has been great to ABC for a few years having recovered well from the Roseanne Barr controversy as their renewal would rest on 1-2 new multi-camera pilots. Meanwhile, Not Dead Yet is right now 50/50 since the ratings aren’t there but has a great following though with Gina Rodriguez (Nell) as they could come back for Season 3 depending on the network’s line-up on Wednesday nights that would best fit their viewers.

It would be great if they can give The Conners’ creator Sara Gilbert one last season to perfect a brilliant ending to the show in a way that would put great respect to the network as I guess this show will stay on a bit longer. We saw CBS axe The Talk last week, a daytime talk show she was involved with from the beginning for the majority, as they will have a shortened 15th season to wrap things up at the end of this year before a new African-American soap comes in by January called The Gates.

With that being said, The Conners will stay, Shifting Gears would be a definite yes & Forgive & Forget is dependent on Not Dead Yet’s fate as well as potentially other new comedy pilots coming into play soon enough but ABC’s further investment into multi-camera sitcoms would give them a slight advantage despite Burrell’s success with single camera stuff like Modern Family. And more viewers would drop out even more before it’s too late if Not Dead Yet stays on for a third season where there’s worse shows than this who didn’t rate well at the start and had to be abruptly be cut away before it even finished.

Phillipa Soo and Don Johnson join Joshua Jackson for ABC’s new drama show Dr. Odyssey

And lastly, we have two new additions for ABC’s new drama show Dr. Odyssey which is going to be a medical serial but this time it will be set on a cruise ship. So far it’s a straight into series order with Joshua Jackson playing the lead character & will also be executive producing who relies on charms to make things work. Now Don Johnson and Phillipa Soo has came onboard as additional leading cast members; Again, we don’t know which characters they will be playing as Dr. Odyssey is still developing before shooting its first scenes later this year. However, I guess Soo will be lead woman/the doctor’s lover while Johnson will be the veteran working with the doctor. Speaking of Soo, she’s been with ABC before when Dangerous Liaisons didn’t make it as a pilot ten years ago while she was on Hulu’s Dopesick for a few episodes back in 2021 under 20th Television studios. Don’t forget her husband Stephen Pasquale also appeared on ABC’s cancelled straight series pilot Avalon two years ago as the leading male cop alongside Neve Campbell’s Nic Searcy – also under 20th Television. It looks like the new show’s social media accounts is beginning to pop up now with the network’s text logo and its covers on it saying “new series coming soon on ABC and Hulu”; The new show and ABC are even following each other on Instagram which is good news despite no welcome post announcement. The same goes with High Potential whose new drama show will also arrive later this year despite staying idle for so long due to last year’s strikes,. Now here’s hoping for ABC to learn their lessons by not changing their minds on cancelling a straight series order ever again like it was over the last few years such as Avalon (2022), two untitled Alec Baldwin comedy projects (2018 and 2021) & even While You Were Breeding (September 2023) via Freeform.

What’s next before we finish April and enter May?

I guess ABC Signature is currently seeing their current broadcast TV shows like Grey’s Anatomy, Station 19, The Rookie and The Good Doctor reaching its finish line soon for this shortened prime-time season thanks to the writer’s and actors’ strikes for most of last year, which is probably the reason why they haven’t come up with the next season pilots just yet. But I guess we will at least see one new drama and comedy pilot coming up from their end and hopefully, they get a new logo and outro since ABC updated their on-air ident for a few years now. And if any new shows are to join past the pilot stage, I expect to see 1-2 new comedy pilots depending on Not Dead Yet as well as at least one new drama show replacing The Good Doctor (High Potential doesn’t count since it’s from last year and Dr. Odyssey would fit in between 9-1-1 & Grey’s on Thursday nights).

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Thoughts on the ABC teaming up 9-1-1’s Ryan Murphy again in a brand new straight-to-series medical drama Dr. Odyssey with Joshua Jackson onboard for late 2024

by Sports Benches

ABC has just made a big call today and it’s going to be a brand new straight-to-series drama show being led by 9-1-1’s Ryan Murphy that will begin later this year alongside High Potential called Dr. Odyssey. If they need a new medical drama to fill in for the soon-to-be-finished The Good Doctor, it’s gotta be at the right place at the right time in none other than this show where 9-1-1 meets The Love Boat on a cruise ship. More details will come at a later date including filming dates with Joshua Jackson playing the main character (definitely Dr. Odyssey who relies on charms to get what he wants) and will also do a bit of behind the scenes work as an executive producer with Murphy under the Disney owned 20th Television studios umbrella.

Great to see 9-1-1 finding its strong ground at ABC after Season 7 began last Thursday, having been with FOX over the first couple of seasons and ABC going for a new medical show with someone (Murphy) who can craft all about medical/first responders stories well is simply excellent timing after a few unsuccessful medical pilots over the past few years such as Triage and The Hurt Unit. I can see this replacing the also soon-to-be-outgoing Station 19 fire drama soon enough and have it sandwiched between 9-1-1 and Grey’s Anatomy on Thursday nights or like for like in place of the Good Doctor on Tuesdays.

Let’s hope since there has been another restructure within the network executives upstairs over the past year, I’m sure they won’t make another reverse cancellation of these straight-to-series orders like it has been in the past & instead give these new ones like Dr. Odyssey a go. Now with two upcoming series order dramas & two new comedy pilots being lined up for Fall in September/October, we have yet to see any involvement from ABC Signature other than the guaranteed High Potential show regarding the choice of these next pilot orders (comedy and/or drama) with the main network but it will come sooner rather than later. For now, congratulations to Ryan Murphy and Joshua Jackson with the new medical drama show Dr. Odyssey.

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Thoughts on Ty Burrell’s new comedy project Forgive & Forget moving onto the pilot stage at ABC after it began developing in early 2023

by Sports Benches

Last week, one star name has returned to ABC in Tim Allen (The Santa Clause, Home Improvement, Last Man Standing & Toy Story) who will be playing Matt for a new comedy pilot being considered for the 2024-25 TV season called Shifting Gears. His new project will be about a widow and a father running a restoration car shop while also undergoing his own personal matter once his daughter and her kids move into his home. Now the network has made a 2nd comedy pilot order today and Forgive and Forget will be up for contention with Modern Family alumni Ty Burrell leading the way as Hank who unexpectedly has dementia and wants to reconnect these memories again with his adult son Hank, having first started this project just over a year ago. Don’t forget both Allen and Burrell will also play a part in their respective new projects beyond acting as executive producers behind the scenes and both of the new comedy pilots will be under 20th Television with no new ABC Signature linked projects just yet. I’m sure there will be a couple more comedy pilots to consider before filming begins and then be assessed soon enough. However, it remains to be seen which brand new drama pilot will be up next in the hope of impressing the ABC executives & join the long-awaited High Potential in September-October over the next few weeks through April-May.

Looking at Forgive and Forget, like the idea of someone – who would have to getting used to living with the condition – wants to make the most of his new memories in the hope of being forgiven & forget what happened prior to his diagnosis as if he hasn’t done anything before & unable to recall anything from a long time ago since there’s no cure. If the show goes forward, it hopes to inspire others & raise awareness for those currently living with the disease as well as spreading the word to prevent it & add further medical research. The final decision will will depend on The Conners (Season 6 now with the possibility of bowing out but maybe 1 more) and Not Dead Yet (currently season 2 but too early to tell right now) also at the same time while Abbott Elementary has been their No.1 comedy show for a few years now and will be back for another season. But ABC likes to pick quality than quantity since two of the 2023 comedy pilot candidates Keeping It Together (another US attempt of the UK Motherland show) & Public Defenders unfortunately didn’t pass the screening test that wouldn’t benefit much with the wider audience & they would also have a huge focus on unscripted content/reality TV going forward post-2023 Writers & Actors strikes. Other than that, it’s great to see Burrell back after a great run as Phil on Modern Family (2009-2020).

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Thoughts on Freeform’s future as a basic cable channel with a bunch of new reality TV rather than scripted content along the way

by Sports Benches

Lots of unscripted stuff coming Freeform’s way over the last 12 months with two new ones being added this week, while some in their current original scripted library, Good Trouble has just finished its book after five seasons & 88 episodes on air & Grown-ish’s 2nd half of the sixth and final season will resume on Wednesdays from the 27th March to May 22nd. Where to go to from here after this? Having reversed their plans to have While You Were Breeding on the air late last year despite having a finished production of all 10 episodes. 

All we know so far over the last two years is that they shot a pilot called AZNBBRL, a teenage drama following three Asian-American girls with a desire to follow their own way rather than their parents. But we haven’t heard much since then & it looks like that won’t be going forward & lots of people would have moved on by now since Freeform went with a different direction over time, which led to the reverse cancellation of While You Were Breeding. Freeform also added just two in-development projects throughout last year. One was Knife’s Edge (a horror drama where a Mother & Daughter is against vampires based on a book) just before the Strikes began in April & another most recent back in November was RUSH (a High School drama from Israel called The Station about their lives as first responders). Again, not much progress for both since then with no direction being finalised for Freeform’s original scripted programming over the next few months.

A few weeks ago, Craig Enrich who is the president of Disney Television Group & looks after Disney’s family of networks, said that Freeform won’t be going anywhere for the foreseeable future. He didn’t say much about what they will do about scripted stuff going forward but he did point out about the success of having reality content amongst a female focused audience & that the syndicated repeats & movie event nights are also here to stay. So there you have it, despite people cutting the cord in recent years, reality TV, repeats and movies has kept Freeform alive today until things go south & they find no other way to keep that channel going at some point in the near future. I guess RUSH & Knife’s Edge would still play a role onto the pilot stage & hope things will work out since there’s not much to offer on the comedy side, but it looks like it would be a thing of the past if Freeform think it would cost too much $$$ to chuck in a bunch of new scripted content like it used to be.

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Thoughts on Tim Allen’s potential return to ABC with the network’s new first comedy pilot order for 2024 called Shifting Gears

by Sports Benches

It’s been a long time since we haven’t heard any pilot orders for about a year now when the strikes took place for most of last year but now ABC has made its first move on what is going to be a huge year ahead for the Fall 2024 window and it’s going to be a half-hour comedy pilot led by the legendary Tim Allen called Shifting Gears whose studios and distribution will be run by 20th Television (a subsidiary of Disney). He will be playing Matt & will also be an executive producer of the show, who runs his own classic car restoration shop and is a widow where things about to change for his own personal restoration once his estranged daughter & her teenage kids move into his house – Interesting. As said, the network will stick with quality than quantity when choosing new shows including mid-season for January-February 2025 with the first step is looking at new show projects/ideas that is worth looking at for a year, then some will be selected to be put into the test (pilot run) & hope for the best before only a few will be given the chance to stand things out on TV. After this show, let’s see which new drama pilot will be up next while we haven’t heard much in-development progress since the end of 2022 with the Front Line (another medical drama involving Michael Strahan), a reboot of Ally McBeal from the late 90s & a legal drama from The Rookie’s Alexi Hawley.

ABC hasn’t produced any new comedy shows since Not Dead Yet in February last year where two of the 2023 candidates Keeping it Together and Public Defenders unfortunately didn’t meet the standard they were hoping for that was set by Abbott Elementary. So there’s some chance Shifting Gears might not make it depending on what other new comedy pilots they will order in the next few weeks/months, but with Allen as the star show and as long as the plot/writing is good, it’s about time they make the move as if they really made a straight-to-series order just like they did to High Potential at the same time in May last year (a police dramedy adopted from France whose mother of three has a huge IQ in solving cases which was originally set for October last year but the strikes have pushed back to this October). It’s great seeing Allen getting back along with the network regardless of the outcome, having been with them before such as Home Improvement (1991-1999) & Last Man Standing (2011-17 for six seasons on ABC & 2018-2021 with last three on FOX). And he also played Santa again this time as a Disney + show after huge success on The Santa Clause movies back in the 1990s-2000s. Yes, there’s rumours that the series might not come back just for this year but maybe next year considering the scripted world is catching up right now.

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Thoughts on ABC Network continuing to order scripted TV pilots while CBS & FOX are leaning on new shows straight off the bat

by Sports Benches

The talk of having pilots coming out for the next US TV season in late 2024-early 2025 has emerged recently with CBS choosing not to make any orders & will select future shows via the long-term development process just like Fox whose system nowadays relies on the straight-to-series order process. But ABC will keep on ordering pilots both for the drama and comedy side as they will continue to choose quality over quantity (like 1-2 new shows for drama & comedy) once they’ve reviewed them following the pilot stage.

No surprise there considering they will have one new show that was postponed from last year in High Potential (a crime comedy drama based from France) whereas most of this Fall will focus on the storylines from most returning dramas and comedies that was interrupted during the first half of this 2023-24 prime-time TV season due to the Hollywood strikes including a few more reality/unscripted content. With that being said, a couple of new shows after High Potential would be introduced in January-February of 2025.

We don’t know which shows will be up in contention as time will tell later on but they did have a couple of comedy pilots being lined up after they decided not to order any new sitcoms into series last year when Keeping It Together & Public Defenders failed to meet the requirements they were hoping for being set by Abbott Elementary. 

So all in all, ABC won’t follow Fox & even CBS for the foreseeable future by having all of their future shows being available to the public when most unsuccessful pilots are locked up somewhere in a vault & will most likely never been seen again. I wish they can have all of their yearly unsuccessful pilots being put out only online though like they did with Bad Management (an unsuccessful half-hour sitcom pilot) back in late 2013 but don’t think they will do that again I’m afraid.

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Thoughts on the ABC Network finally unveiling their weekly scripted programming line-up a few days ago for the rest of the shortened 2023-24 Prime-Time TV season

by Sports Benches

Finally this week, ABC has now able to finalise their weekly scripted programming schedule that will run between February and around the middle of 2024 following a long & painful six month hold up from the writers and actors strikes. As it stands during winter to spring on weekends, Saturdays is for sports and Sunday is full of non-scripted and reality tv stuff including its long-time return of What Would You Do? straight after two hours of American Idol at 10pm. Plus, Fridays will always be Shark Tank at 8 before ending the weekday week with two hours of true crime reporting of 20/20 between 9-11pm.

But some shows will have brand new time slots this time on a different day of the week. We will now see The Good Doctor on Tuesday nights at 10am beginning on the 20th of February after The Rookie (9pm) and Will Trent (8pm) as Mondays will all be reality and non-scripted starting in late January with the two-hour Bachelor show at 8pm as well as a limited 20/20 spin-off true crime series (name TBA). Then Wednesdays will always be the home of comedy with a plethora of half-hour sitcoms kicking off a few weeks beforehand (1st to 2nd week of February) such as new seasons of The Conners (1/7), Not Dead Yet (1/7) & Abbott Elementary (1/14) between 8-9.30pm. Although the new season episode of Abbott Elementary will go for an hour, it remains to be seen what the 9.30-10pm slot will be like at a later date – probably a repeat of Abbott unless ABC can find something else to fit in since Home Economics won’t be coming back after 3 seasons. We will also get to see an hour in all-new season of Judge Steve Harvey at 10pm as well. And there will one newcomer moving in after six season from a different network (FOX) called 9-1-1 on Thursdays, which focuses on Los Angeles’s first responders department. Meanwhile, the Grey’s Anatomy franchise has shuffled a bit where the flagship show remains at 9pm after 9-1-1 while spin-off firehouse drama Station 19 will now be at 10pm rather than 8pm. All of these action packed shows will be back on March 14th.

Post-Notes

Interesting take there considering The Good Doctor has followed Dancing With The Stars from being on Mondays for a long time to Tuesdays now. If The Good Lawyer came in which the strikes have saw them miss the cut, then it would’ve been a 10pm Tuesday night show that follows on a day after the main show. The Thursday line-up is fine while Mondays will be the new reality by sharing with Monday Night Football & I guess Wednesday is a little difficult for ABC in regards to the 9.30-10pm time slot. But I guess with The Conners approaching its end & depending on the Season 2 performance of Not Dead Yet, they might to bring one new comedy show going forward – having not taken any new ones from their recent pilot cycle earlier this year. I do assume though by Fall next year, High Intellectual Potential (adopted from France) will be a perfect fit at 10pm on Wednesdays replacing A Million Little Things since it’s a crime comedy show. And I’m sure another new drama or two will be up on Sunday nights during the months go by in 2024 for the next pilot cycle as scripted programming is here to stay but the main focus for ABC going forward is that they will go or chop & change after each year for quality than quantity.

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Thoughts on ABC Network’s axing of comedy show Home Economics after Season 3 & High Potential being moved to Fall next year

by Sports Benches

First few days post-strike for writers to get back to work and the first thing ABC has done is not renewing comedy show Home Economics after three seasons on the air. It’s no surprise considering ABC wants quality rather than quantity of comedy content led by Abbott Elementary, having chosen not to put any of these new shows onboard for the next cycle (which was usually meant to be this Fall but now has changed after what happened over 5 months ago due to the strikes).

So it might have taken that long but Home Economics has probably reached its plateau before the announcement today as the seasons goes by. That means, we will expect to see new season episodes of The Conners, Abbott Elementary & Not Dead Yet for sometime next year before we wait & see what happens in the next cycle window.

Then moving onto the drama side of things and they still have yet to make decisions whether or not if The Rookie: Feds will get a 2nd season as well as giving The Good Lawyer spin-off show of The Good Doctor a full-season order after airing the backdoor pilot earlier in March this year. Meanwhile, ABC has set a premiere date of the American High Intellectual Potential crime comedy drama to Fall next year rather than rushing up at the wrong time during Spring or Summer. 

I’m pretty sure they’re definitely not going to do an Avalon here when they first made a straight to series order early last year for the initial 2023 mid-season window, then it was moved to Fall of this year because of Will Trent & The Company You Keep and eventually by November last year, they reversed that decision & chose not proceed Avalon into a series order following a screen test of the pilot. I also don’t think any other network would rescue a passed pilot which is rare as well.

But we could see Season 7 of 9-1-1 alongside all other existing drama shows that is returning a few months earlier than that since it was previously aired on FOX for a few years (although they kept 9-1-1 Lone Star) prior to making the move here. 

I guess it’s still too early to tell since the actors strike isn’t done yet with hope of seeing light at the end of the tunnel early next week. Well, obviously the comedy side is correct timing for the network to make as said above not long after the writers strike was finally over with Home Economics being given the chop. Now I’m not sure what ABC has said in more detail about The Rookie: Feds, so hard to tell considering they still got the main show after a few years on the air since 2018.

On the other hand, The Good Lawyer is something they liked after the screen test came back really well off the back from the backdoor pilot episode as it would be a perfect lead-in for the main show at 8 or 9pm Mondays. If the strike didn’t happen at all, then it would’ve been on the air by now. Other networks have already their plans set when it comes to the next available scripted programming cycle, but this one is a bit unusual and if the actors strike doesn’t end anytime soon; ABC would have no choice but to put that Good Lawyer idea into the bin. This is the one to keep a close eye on that would hopefully boost their Monday programming block’s performance with the audience & its storylines/content.

For now, we wish that crew the best of luck as you can go watch all three seasons of Home Economics only on Stan here in Australia as well as Hulu in the US.

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