You have questions. I have some answers.
Q: I loved “Alaska Daily” and it disappeared. It was on ABC, but will it be back somewhere else?
A: The journalism drama starring Hilary Swank will be back for what ABC is calling its “winter premiere” on Feb. 23.
This is the time of year when many shows take breaks to make room for holiday programming (and when many TV viewers are instead busy with their holiday preparations). The last episodes before the breaks are often billed as winter finales, midseason finales and the like, which can cause confusion for viewers worried about the mention of finales. But such shows do return eventually. A few examples: “9-1-1” has finished its fall run but according to Fox will be back in the spring.”The Good Doctor,” following a cliffhanger-laden episode on Dec. 12, will resume on Jan. 23. And “NCIS” will have new episodes starting Jan. 9 with a night of crossovers among it, “NCIS: Hawai’i” and “NCIS: Los Angeles.” (That date, by the way, is a change from the previously announced date of Jan. 2.)
Q: I really love watching the “FBI” series on Tuesday nights but wonder what became of Luke Kleintank who plays Scott Forrester. He sometimes appears briefly or is referred to but is mostly absent. The show is not the same without him.
A: Kleintank, a regular on “FBI: International,” has been taking care of some business at home. Showrunner Derek Haas told Givememyremote.com that “Luke had a baby — he’s an awesome guy and an awesome dad. And we planned this arc around the fact that [with] a newborn, he would want some time to be a dad. .. We figured out, okay, for the episodes he’s gonna be off, let’s do two things: One we can enhance all the other characters and let them have some episodes where they can shine on their own. And two, put Forrester’s career in jeopardy. He’s being bounced around and not working with the Fly Team and he’s going to want to know why. This is going to lead to a major second half character arc.”
The drama, along with “FBI” and “FBI: Most Wanted,” begins a round of new episodes on Jan. 3.
Q: Will the new version of “The Wonder Years” be back on the air?
A: Yes, though not soon. While it was expected to be part of ABC’s midseason plans (as I mentioned a few months ago), recent reports have had ABC delaying it until summer 2023. The air date has not yet been announced, but it will be about a year after the Season 1 finale aired.
Q: Are Elvis Presley movies considered to be “B” pictures?
A: The King had some good films — “King Creole” and “Jailhouse Rock” are a couple — and a lot of bad stuff, but I wouldn’t classify the bad ones as B-movies. Ephraim Katz’s “The Film Encyclopedia” defines a B-movie as “a low-budget film, usually shown on the lower half of a double feature,” often from small, independent studios. While the worst of Elvis movies have the feel of B-movies in their cranked-out, formulaic way, they were still glossier, higher-profile projects than B-movies.
Q: My cable company has two, maybe three, Hallmark channels and every year starting in October they show these sappy Christmas movies made for TV. I NEVER watch them. However they preempt the “Murder, She Wrote” episodes and I really hate this. Why can’t they show their lousy movies only until “MSW”comes on? They do this EVERY year. Not every viewer wants to see those shows.
A: Maybe not every viewer, but a lot of them. Holiday movies — which, to borrow from the previous question — are often cranked out, formulaic and so popular that Hallmark and other channels fill their lineups with them. They’re the green bean casseroles of TV movies, awful to some but pure comfort food to many others (I’ll be making my own green bean casserole soon). There have been battles among networks to get the biggest holiday-movie stars, controversy about the lack of diversity in some content, and still more movies every year — in sum, a lot more than comes with “Murder, She Wrote” repeats.
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