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Back in the early days of the broadcast networks, natural history shows were a part of the programming diet: NBC ran “Mutual of Omaha’s Wild Kingdom” for much of the 1960s, and around that time ABC brought “The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau” to U.S. audiences. Over the past several decades, however, those kinds of programs mostly became the domain of PBS (“Nature”) and cablers like Discovery (“Planet Earth”). More recently, streamers like Netflix (“Our Planet”) entered the space.

With a few exceptions (Fox’s “Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey”), the broadcast nets have shied away from documentary-style nature events — which makes NBC’s current stab at one, “The Americas,” all the more notable. “It is an experiment,” says Toby Gorman, the president of Universal Television Alternative Studio. “We will learn a lot. But when I think about the hits of broadcast, it’s got to be four quadrant,” he adds,...

“As we investigated the story, the bones of the story itself, what we discovered was that it was ready made for the stage,” explains Glen Ballard of “Back to the Future: The Musical.” The famed songwriter collaborated with composer Alan Silvestri to bring one of the most beloved movies of the 1980s to the stage. The road to Broadway was long, but full of creative potential. “We thought it was a delicious opportunity,” admits Ballard. Watch the exclusive video interview above.

The project came with many appealing assets, with perhaps the most important one being Silvestri’s iconic score to the film. The duo transformed the films’ title theme into a catchy opening number, appropriately called “It’s Only a Matter of Time.” A new set of lyrics that introduce the audience to Marty McFly (Casey Likes) fits neatly into the infamous melody line. “I think one of the first...

Are you looking for the greatest TV programs ever made? If so, this is exactly where to find them! Did your favorite show make the list of best TV series of all time?

We have researched and compiled a list of 10 amazing series based on IMDb ratings and viewership data. Ranging from crime dramas to animations – no matter your preference, there’s something here for everyone. So grab some popcorn & settle in; it’s time for an awesome TV marathon experience.

IMDb utilizes its user rating systems to create seemingly never-ending lists of top shows around all genres. One particular list is termed the “Top 250 TV Shows,” thanks again to these scoring methods used by contributors online daily. Below are listed out ten highest-rated TV series according to those stats.

10 Highest-Rated TV Shows of All Time The Sopranos (1999–2007) – 9.2 Game of Thrones (2011–2019) – 9.2 Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey (2014) – 9.3 Avatar: The Last Airbender (2005–2008) – 9.3 The Wire...

“Family Guy” creator Seth MacFarlane is developing a television adaptation of the seven-book graphic novel series “The Shrouded College” for Peacock.

MacFarlane’s Fuzzy Door production company and UCP, a division of Universal Studio Group, acquired the rights for “The Shrouded College” from authors Charles Soule and Will Sliney. Usg’s Creative Acquisitions and IP Management team, led by Jordan Moblo, alongside Fuzzy Door president Erica Huggins, were instrumental in securing the rights.

“The Shrouded College” series tells the stories of various characters enlisted to become secret agents fighting a supernatural cold war on the side of the Shrouded College, a down-and-out organization on the edge of destruction.

The show will be executive produced by Soule and Sliney alongside MacFarlane, Huggins, and Rachel Hargreaves-Heald for Fuzzy Door.

Also Read:

Seth MacFarlane Signs With WME

The first graphic novel in “The Shrouded College” universe, “Hell to Pay,” commenced publication from Image Comics...

WME has signed prolific creator and multihyphenate Seth MacFarlane and his Fuzzy Door production company for representation, the agency announced on Wednesday.

MacFarlane is returning to WME after being repped by CAA since 2017.

MacFarlane became the youngest showrunner in television history at just 24 years old when his animated series “Family Guy” aired on Fox. The show, which aired its 400th episode late last year, has been renewed for its 22nd and 23rd seasons. It has garnered MacFarlane five Emmy Awards, four of which being in the outstanding voice-over performance category, making him a tied record-holder for the most voice-over Emmy wins of all time. MacFarlane also serves as co-creator, executive producer, and voice actor on “American Dad!,” which recently aired its 17th season finale.

Also Read:

Endeavor Promotes Maura McGreevy to Chief Communications Officer

Fuzzy Door, helmed by MacFarlane and president Erica Huggins, is a leading production powerhouse shepherding a...

Exclusive: Physicist and author Alan Lightman has been pondering some major questions. For instance, “Where do we humans fit in the grand scheme of things? Are we just atoms and molecules, or something more? How does consciousness arise from the material neurons in our brains?”

The MIT professor and novelist goes looking for answers to those conundrums in the upcoming three-part documentary series Searching: Our Quest for Meaning in the Age of Science. The series, directed by Geoffrey Haines-Stiles, premieres on public television stations on January 7, the same date it begins streaming on PBS.org for a 60-day window.

Could there be a better name for a physicist than Lightman?

Lightman’s areas of inquiry are as vast as the universe and as tiny as the smallest particle of matter.

“We travel with him to the prehistoric caves of Font-de-Gaume in France, where drawings and symbols suggest that—as long...

Neil deGrasse Tyson, a prominent astrophysicist, has rubbished the legitimacy of a scene in Top Gun: Maverick.

Tyson, who has headed up several science-based TV programmes including StarTalk and Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey, shared his opinions on the film on social media.

Writing on Twitter, Tyson questioned a scene in which Tom Cruise’s character Maverick survives a major ejection from an aircraft.

“Late to the party here, but in this year’s Top Gun, Tom Cruise’s character Maverick ejects from a hypersonic plane at Mach 10.5, before it crashed,” Tyson tweeted on Sunday (9 October).

“He survived with no injuries. At that airspeed, his body would splatter like a chainmail glove swatting a worm.”

In a series of tweets, Tyson explained that at that speed, the air would feel “like a brick wall” and would mean complete destruction for a human body.

He continued: “When Maverick ejected at Mach 10.5, he was going 7,000 mph,...

Amazon Prime Video has a host of new offerings to sift through in October. New to the streaming service this month is a brand new film from writer/director Lena Dunham, “Catherine Called Birdy” (available Oct. 7), as well as a pair of new release films from 2022 making their debut on the streaming service.

“The Northman,” the Alexander Skarsgard-fronted Viking saga, comes to Prime Video on Oct. 11 after first streaming on Peacock, and “Downton Abbey: A New Era” arrives on Oct. 28 (after also streaming first on Peacock).

In terms of new Prime Video TV shows, “Westworld” creators Lisa Joy and Jonah Nolan present “The Peripheral” on Oct. 21. The futuristic series stars Chloe Grace Moretz and Jack Reynor and is based on the novel of the same name by William Gibson.

Check out the full list of what’s new on Amazon Prime Video in October below.

Also Read:

‘Catherine Called Birdy...

With its list of new releases for October 2022, Amazon Prime Video isn’t fully aboard the spooky season train but it is at least spooky adjacent.

The biggest release this month is Prime Video original series The Peripheral on Oct. 21. While not outright horror, it does sound more than a little unnerving. Based on a 2014 sci-fi novel by William Gibson, The Peripheral stars Chloë Grace Moretz as a woman in a near-future society who may have just discovered an alternate reality. Fittingly, Westworld‘s Jonathan Nolan and Lisa Joy serve as executive producers.

The other TV series of note in October is The Devil’s Hour on Oct. 28. This British thriller comes form Steven Moffat and tells the story of a woman who wakes up at 3:33 a.m. (the devil’s hour) each night to receive a disturbing vision.

October is home to a couple of Amazon movies of note as well.

With fall well underway and spooky season rearing its haunted head, now is the perfect time to curl up on the couch with a good movie. While horror typically reigns supreme this time of year, there are still plenty of incredible films well worth your precious viewing minutes, especially from the science fiction genre.

Regardless of how much we love heavy hitters like the "Star Wars," "Star Trek," and "Alien" franchises, sci-fi films encapsulate far more than just stories set in space. Time travel, neo-futurism, artificial intelligence, and other forms of speculative fiction all birth some of the most fascinating stories ever put to film. Fortunately for those looking to broaden their sci-fi horizons, the streaming offerings this October have a world of options. Here are five of the best sci-fi films available to stream this October, and where to watch them.

Circle (2015)

Science fiction probably isn't the genre evoked...

After dropping the epic “Lord of the Rings” television series on Prime Video last month, it’s no surprise the streaming giant is taking it easy this October. They still have plenty of new shows and movies coming out, though none quite on the scale of their journey to Middle Earth.

That being said, they’re transitioning from the world of fantasy to science fiction with their new series “The Peripheral.” Touted as being from the creators of HBO’s “Westworld,” Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan, the time-traveling series is based on author William Gibson’s bestselling sci-fi novel.

Per an official synopsis: “The Peripheral” centers on Flynne Fisher (Moretz), a woman trying to hold together the pieces of her broken family in a forgotten corner of tomorrow’s America. Flynne is smart, ambitious, and doomed. She has no future; until the future comes calling for her. “The Peripheral” is...

Though their “’80s Horror” lineup would constitute enough of a Halloween push, the Criterion Channel enter October all guns blazing. The month’s lineup also includes a 19-movie vampire series running from 1931’s Dracula (English and Spanish both) to 2014’s A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night, the collection in-between including Herzog’s Nosferatu, Near Dark, and Let the Right One In. Last year’s “Universal Horror” collection returns, a 17-title Ishirō Honda retrospective has been set, and a few genre titles stand alone: Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte, The House of the Devil, and Island of Lost Souls.

Streaming premieres include restorations of Tsai Ming-liang’s Vive L’amour and Ed Lachman’s Lou Reed / John Cale concert film Songs for Drella; October’s Criterion editions are Samuel Fuller’s Forty Guns, Bill Duke’s Deep Cover, Haxan, and My Own Private Idaho. Meanwhile, Ari Aster has curated an “Adventures...

Framestore has tapped “Top Gun: Maverick” VFX supervisor Ryan Tudhope as one of its newest creative director.

Tudhope, who is a member of the Television Academy and AMPAS, co-founded VFX studio Atomic Fiction, where he was also CEO. The studio had over 350 employees across L.A. and Montreal, working on projects including “Deadpool,” “Rogue One” and “Game of Thrones.”

Tudhope’s experience spans two and a half decades, in which he has worked on over fifty feature film and episodic projects including “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power” for Amazon Studios and “Spiderhead,” working as production-side VFX supervisor alongside director Joseph Kosinski. He was nominated for an Emmy for his work on “Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.”

Among the projects Framestore has recently worked on or is currently working on are “The Little Mermaid,” “The Sandman” and “Thor: Love and Thunder.”

Ryan Tudhope courtesy of Framestore

“Anyone – and...

“When you read the scripts, it’s pretty clear that this season is going to be more challenging and bigger than the others,” describes “Stranger Things” visual effects supervisor Michael Maher. Season 4 of the hit Netflix series expanded the scope of the storytelling and forced the effects team to lean into a darker, more mature tone. Maher and his colleagues Marion Spates and Jabbar Raisani discussed all the ways in which they created monsters and digital human doubles in order to drag viewers further into the world of the Upside Down. Watch the exclusive video interview above.

Maher is also the senior concept illustrator for “Stranger Things,” which means he is the man responsible for your latest nightmare about Vecna, the “Big Bad” of season 4. He began drawing the villain as far back as August 2019, working off of the Duffer Brothers mandate for a humanoid that felt part “Nightmare on Elm Street,...

Multi-hyphenate creative and producing executive Seth MacFarlane struggled to explain the complicated relationship he currently has with the Fox Network Sunday at the 13th annual Produced By conference.

Fox is long the home of many of MacFarlane’s signature television ventures, like Family Guy and Cosmos. The conflict is as a result of his feelings about Fox News, while also revealing that he’s had a refreshingly easy partnership with Disney after it took ownership of many of his properties.

Speaking remotely at the conference – which ironically was held at the Fox Studios lot – alongside Erica Huggins, president of his production company, Fuzzy Door, MacFarlane took a moment to articulate the continually ambivalent feelings he has about the network. He parted ways with Fox to pursue a lucrative pact with NBCUniversal’s UCP in 2020, largely over his objections to the tone and content of sister division Fox News.

“It’s...

Evángelos Odysséas Papathanassíou, known to cinephiles around the world as Vangelis, has died this week at a hospital in France, his reps announced in a statement. He was 79.

Vangelis is best known for the iconic theme and soundtrack to the Best Picture-winning sports film “Chariots of Fire,” for which he won an Oscar for Best Original Score while the soundtrack reached the top of the U.S. Billboard charts. He also composed the score for Ridley Scott’s sci-fi classic “Blade Runner,” for which he was nominated for a BAFTA and a Golden Globe.

Born in Athens, Greece, Vangelis got his start playing keyboards for a pop band called Forminx in the 1960s and later with the prog rock band Aphrodite’s Child, which found success on the European charts. Meanwhile, he entered the film world as a composer for Greek films, expanding beyond that in the 1970s with scores...

Vangelis, the electronic-music pioneer who won an Oscar for “Chariots of Fire” and composed such other landmark film scores as “Blade Runner,” died Tuesday, the Athens News Agency reported. He was 79.

The self-taught musician enjoyed a long career in European pop music before the magical colors and textures of his 1970s solo albums brought him to the attention of film and TV producers. The use of a track from his 1975 album “Heaven and Hell” as the theme for Carl Sagan’s PBS series “Cosmos” brought his name and music into prominence in America.

But it was his music for the 1981 film “Chariots of Fire” that brought him worldwide fame. Producer David Puttnam made the unorthodox choice for his period sports drama after hearing Vangelis’s music for the French nature documentary “Opera Sauvage” and the studio album “China.”

As he often did, Vangelis performed all of the instruments, including synthesizer,...

Academy Award winner Russell Crowe directs and stars in the upcoming thriller Poker Face, from a script he co-wrote with Stephen M. Coates (John Doe: Vigilante). The cast includes Emmy nominee Liam Hemsworth, Elsa Pataky and Wu-Tang Clan’s RZA. Set in the world of high stakes poker, Crowe stars as billionaire gambler Jake Foley who gives his best friends a night they’ll never forget, a chance to win more money than they’ve ever dreamed of. But to play, they’ll have to give up the one thing they’ve spent their lives doing everything to keep….their secrets. As the game unfolds, the friends will discover the real stakes they’re playing for, the biggest stakes of them all. The film, which was shot in New South Wales, Australia, is currently in post-production.

Poker Face is produced by Gary Hamilton (Arclight Films) and Keith Rodger (Fear Of...

Six top TV cinematographers will reveal secrets behind their projects when they join Gold Derby’s special “Meet the Experts” Q&a event with 2022 Emmy Awards contenders. They will participate in two video discussions to premiere on Wednesday, May 18, at 4:00 p.m. Pt; 7:00 p.m. Et. We’ll have a one-on-one with our senior editor Christopher Rosen and a roundtable chat with all of the group together.

RSVP today to our entire ongoing Emmy contenders panel series by clicking here to book your free reservation. We’ll send you a reminder a few minutes before the start of the show.

This “Meet the Experts” panel welcomes the following 2022 contenders:

Halo (Paramount+)

Synopsis: Aliens threaten human existence in an epic 26th-century showdown. TV series based on the video game ‘Halo.’

Bio: Karl-Walter Lindenlaub was an Emmy nominee for “Houdini.” Other projects have included “Independence Day,” “The Princess Diaries,” “The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian,...

Cinematographer Stephen H. Burum will be honored at EnergaCamerimage with the festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award.

Set to run in Torun, Poland, on Nov. 12-19, Camerimage, which focuses on films and cinematography, will celebrate its 30th anniversary this year.

Burum is best known for his collaborations with director Brian De Palma, which yielded such classics as “The Untouchables” (1987), a tale of the battle between good and evil; Vietnam War drama “Casualties of War” (1989); ”Carlito’s Way” (1993), which portrayed deep social divides; the iconic “Mission: Impossible” (1996); “Snake Eyes (1998); and “Mission to Mars” (2000).

His body of work also includes Joel Schumacher’s “St. Elmo’s Fire” (1985), Danny DeVito’s “The War of the Roses (1989), and Ken Kwapis’ and Marisa Silver’s “He Said, She Said” (1991).

Born in rural California in 1939 to a family of that owned and worked on several small newspapers, Burum became interested at an early age in film and shot his...

Sailor Moon Eternal, a duology of feature length animated films adapting the manga’s Dream arc, premiered in Japan back in January 2021 and dropped on Netflix the following June. This duology was highly anticipated since Sailor Moon Crystal was effectively cancelled after its well-received third season, and while some were concerned it might lack the runtime to adapt the arc authentically, the response was overwhelmingly positive. The only question that remained was when the final arc of the manga, Stars, would get the same treatment. Now, nearly a year later, we have our answer.

Set for a Summer 2023 release, a new duology of films titled Sailor Moon Cosmos will finish what Sailor Moon Crystal began, a faithful—at times perhaps too faithful—adaptation of Naoko Takeuchi’s iconic manga. This final arc will bring in fan favorite characters (and fetish ball inspirations) the Sailor Starlights, the polarizing Chibi Chibi, the ultimate villain,...

You can’t blame anyone for wanting to look backward instead of forward in these times, but we really need to do something about these reboots. It has become painfully evident that all this looking back comes with a price — namely, ruining the memories and legacies of the stories we once held dear.

While subpar reboots are thick on the ground of pop culture at the moment — “The Matrix Resurrections,” “Scream,” “How I Met Your Father” — nowhere is this more evident than in the “Sex and the City” reboot on HBO Max, “And Just Like That …”. As we have approached the finale, available Thursday, the points of contention have built to a crescendo: Why introduce all of these new characters if you’re not going to give them real storylines? Why did our favorite sensible character, Miranda, become such a flibbertigibbet in this iteration? How did the new character Che...

Oscar-winning costume designer Ruth E. Carter is partnering with Black and woman-owned, online vintage marketplace Thrilling on a Vintage Studio Services program, aimed at connecting stylists, designers and production companies with vintage and secondhand items for film and TV projects.

Nearly 1,000 shops across the U.S. will be accessible through the initiative, which is looking to help bolster small businesses, while encouraging eco-friendly and sustainable practices within entertainment.

As Thrilling’s first-ever brand ambassador, Carter has pledged to utilize the company and its new program in her upcoming projects for 2022. In celebration of the program’s launch, Thrilling has also unveiled a campaign comprised of styles inspired by Ruth’s work across 40+ film and television projects, which illustrates the role fashion plays in setting the stage for some of cinema’s most memorable scenes.

Naturally, Carter describes her partnership with the marketplace as “thrilling.

“I really want...

This article contains spoilers for the first four episodes of “And Just Like That.”

The most striking homage to the legacy of “Sex and the City” in the new series “And Just Like That” lands like a bit of bitter irony, or a joke too caustic by half.

“Sex and the City” ended, in 2004, with a montage of its characters having found fulfillment through romance and, crucially, self-acceptance, all set to the 1980s single “You Got the Love.” Two movies complicated but largely left intact what Candi Staton’s music had underscored; now, though, this anthem plays after the realization that Carrie Bradshaw is, once again, alone. What was once a song of celebration is now an ironic counterpoint to bitter loss. It’s as if “And Just Like That” can’t find its own tone without just reversing what came before.

Carrie’s Manhattan was easily reduced to an endless parade of Cosmos,...

Stars: Tom England, Ellila-Jean Wood, Charlotte Ritchie, Nina Wadia | Written by Richard Miller | Directed by Grant Archer, Richard Miller

Repeat is one of those films that falls somewhere between science fiction and a tale of the supernatural if not one of outright horror. In this case using technology to speak to the dead. That’s been done before, but unlike Frequencies, or the more recent Dead Air, this isn’t just a radio with supernatural powers. It’s a device developed by cognitive psychologist Ryan (Tom England; Cosmos).

But despite this potential breakthrough his life is in shambles. His daughter Sam (Ellila-Jean Wood) has been missing for over a year. The effects of this have strained his marriage to Emily and his experiments have caused his reputation as a professor to suffer. The one bright spot in his life is the fact he hasn’t been able to contact her with his device,...

Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.

Bergman Island (Mia Hansen-Løve)

Parenthood, relationships, and the creative process: three key elements of the cinema of Mia Hansen-Løve casually combine in Bergman Island, a playfully self-aware meta-portrait of the filmmaker and, indeed, of filmmaking itself. Introspective, inventive, and effortlessly calm; it follows a couple, both screenwriters, on an idyllic work retreat to Fårö, an island in the Baltic Sea (population: 498) just off the South East of Sweden. It’s the place Ingmar Bergman called home for the majority of his life, where he made many films and eventually died. – Rory O. (full review)

Where to Stream: VOD

Dune (Denis Villeneuve)

Denis Villeneuve has surmounted this slew of bad omens, by arguably––in filmmaking terms––making the most impersonal adaptation possible. For all his skill and talent,...

Video Version of this Article Photo/Video: Carl Sagan/Hollywood Insider YouTube Channel A lyrical wordsmith and a person who was able to make even the most difficult scientific notions easily digestible, Carl Sagan was a one of a kind, and a great influence on science and entertainment. No one else has been able to master the crossroad between art and science so wonderfully balanced with educational benefits within an alluring, nurturing, aesthetically pleasing entertainment package. From his countless books that weave between literature and educational science books, and his hit TV show, ‘Cosmos: A Personal Voyage’, that’s actively being made with updated information starring Neil Degrasse Tyson, and now titled ‘Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey’, Carl Sagan brought the most complex scientific notions into the mainstream by condensing them into fitting layman's terms, a skillset that hadn’t been seen before by the general public until him. Related article:...

“I May Destroy You,” “The Flight Attendant” and “Killing Eve” were among the top winners as the Banff World Media Festival revealed the winners to this year’s Rockie Awards International Program Competition. Announced Tuesday via a live, streamed virtual event, this year’s Rockie Awards saw the United Kingdom take home the most kudos, with 11, followed by the United States with ten. Host country Canada won five.

“I May Destroy You” earned the top Grand Jury prize, which is selected from the top-scoring programs across the entire field of nominees, and chosen by the Rockies Awards Grand Jury. The Michaela Coel series, from HBO, also won the Rockie Award for limited series.

YouTube personality Jasmeet Raina hosted this virtual edition of the Rockie Awards, which featured 142 nominations from 37 countries including the UK, USA, Canada, France, Germany, Australia, and The Netherlands. Also, this year’s Banff World Media Festival Rockie...

The Covid-19 pandemic was barely a week old when Fox moved to enlist L.A.’s Finest — meaning, Spectrum’s Jessica Alba/Gabrielle Union cop drama — to fill one of the programming holes that would inevitably be caused by the swift shutdown of TV and movie productions.

“I knew that it was [originally] developed for broadcast television, it had two stars…. So before the end of March 2020, I was negotiating for it,” Dan Harrison, the EVP of Program Planning and Content Strategy at Fox Entertainment, recalls for TVLine.

More from TVLineRatings: 9-1-1 Tops Monday Following 6-Week Break, American Idol Stays...

Distributor Neon has scooped up North American rights to a new movie from “Anomalisa” director Duke Johnson. Titled “The Actor,” the film is being billed as a noir and will star Ryan Gosling. It’s based on the bestselling novel “Memory” by Donald E. Westlake, and Charlie Kaufman (who co-directed “Anomalisa” with Johnson) is also on board as an executive producer. According to Deadline, the buy was in the seven-figure range.

Here’s the synopsis from Neon: “Stranded in 1950s Ohio after a brutal attack, actor Paul Cole (Gosling), suffering from severe memory loss, struggles to find his way back to his life in New York and reclaim what he has lost. ‘The Actor’ follows a thrilling journey we must all make, to find home, to find love and ultimately to find ourselves.”

This will mark Duke Johnson’s first solo feature film directing credit. He most recently served as...

As The Walking Dead begins dropping its Season 10 bonus episodes, we have our first casting for the AMC drama’s 11th and final season.

According to our sister site Deadline, Blood & Treasure‘s Michael James Shaw has been made a series regular as Mercer, a mohawked former Marine who, in Robert Kirkman’s comic books, is the leader of the Commonwealth military and, ultimately, Princess’ boo. If the exceptionally grim Reapers introduced in Sunday’s Season 10C premiere last the season, the badass could be key to eliminating the threat they pose.

More from TVLineThe Walking Dead Showrunner Demystifies the Reapers.

Bill Nye will host and exec-produce a new science series called The End is Nye for Peacock, the streamer announced today.

Brannon Braga will serve as showrunner and executive producer and direct all episodes.

Nye, the Emmy-winning television host (Bill Nye the Science Guy), science educator, mechanical engineer and author, will explore various epic global disasters imaginable, both natural and unnatural, with each episode of The End is Nye examining the mystery and reality of such threats as viruses, volcanoes, asteroids, authoritarianism, climate change and chemical warfare.

The series is produced by Universal Television Alternative Studio and UCP, divisions of Universal Studio Group, and Seth MacFarlane’s Fuzzy Door. MacFarlane and Erica Huggins executive produce for Fuzzy Door. Rachel Hargreaves-Heald is executive in charge of production for Fuzzy Door.

Nye is represented by Nick Pampenella at N/Prjcts.

Peacock picked up a new science series from Bill Nye and “Cosmos” producer Seth MacFarlane, the streamer announced Tuesday.

Hosted by the longtime TV scientist, “The End Is Nye” is billed as a “scientific blueprint for surviving anything that comes our way.”

According to Peacock’s description, the series sends Nye “into the most epic global disasters imaginable – both natural and unnatural – and then demystifies them using science to show how we can survive, mitigate, and even prevent them.” Topics will range from “viruses to volcanoes, asteroids to authoritarianism, and climate change to chemical warfare.”

The series will be executive produced by Nye and MacFarlane. “Cosmos” alum Brannon Braga will serve as executive producer, showrunner and director on all episodes.

Universal Television Alternative Studio and UCP, where MacFarlane’s Fuzzy Door production company has an overall deal, will produce the series. Fuzzy Door’s Erica Huggins also executive produces for Fuzzy Door,...

Peacock has ordered a new series hosted by world-famous science educator Bill Nye, Variety has learned exclusively.

Each episode of the show, titled “The End is Nye,” dives into the myths and realities of both natural and unnatural threats, from viruses to volcanoes, asteroids to authoritarianism, and climate change to chemical warfare. The show offers a scientific blueprint for surviving, mitigating, and preventing such catastrophes from occurring.

Brannon Braga will serve as showrunner and executive producer on “The End Is Nye” in addition to directing all episodes. Nye will also executive produce in addition to hosting. Seth MacFarlane and Erica Huggins of Fuzzy Door Productions will executive produce. Rachel Hargreaves-Heald is executive in charge of production for Fuzzy Door. The series is a co-production between Universal Television Alternative Studio UCP. Fuzzy Door currently has an overall deal with NBCUniversal.

Nye first rose to fame in the 1990s as the host...

Above: French petite poster for Mirror. Designer unknown.I first saw Tarkovsky’s Mirror—a film I consistently name as my favorite film of all time—in December 1987, at the Cosmos Theater on the Rue de Rennes in Paris. The Cosmos was a large Art Deco theater that had opened in 1934 as the Lux Rennes and in 1962 had been purchased by Jacques Tati and renamed L’Arlequin. In 1978 it was bought by a company that specialized in imports from the Ussr; they changed its name to Le Cosmos and for the next 14 years focused on screening Soviet films. It was during that period that I saw Mirror though I knew none of that history at the time. (In 1992 it was renamed L’Arlequin and still operates under that name today.) The poster above, which I assume dates from the film’s first release in France in 1978, was probably the poster...

Elan Mastai is developing a series adaptation of his novel “All Our Wrong Todays” at Peacock with Seth MacFarlane onboard as an executive producer.

The project is described as a mind bending time travel love story that explores alternate versions of ourselves in dramatically surprising and often unexpected ways.

Mastai will adapt the novel for the screen. MacFarlane and Erica Huggins will executive produce via Fuzzy Door Productions, with Fuzzy Door’s Rachel Hargreaves-Heald overseeing the project. Amy Pascal and Rachel O’Connor of Pascal Pictures will also executive produce. UCP will serve as the studio. Fuzzy Door is currently under a rich overall deal at UCP.

Mastai currently works as a writer and supervising producer on the hit NBC drama series “This Is Us.” His feature credits include “What If” and “The Samaritan.” “All Our Wrong Todays” was originally published in 2017 and has since been translated into 24 languages.

He is...

At this point, we’re almost legally obligated to start off TV roundups with some variation on this idea that there’s a lot of TV out there, but it really is impossible to keep up with everything. And calling attention to it doesn’t make it any less true!

So, given that TV time is reaching astronomical heights in 2020, how does one find something to watch, let alone focus on just the best of the best? That’s where we come in.

Keeping track of the dizzying amount of television we’ve reviewed so far in 2020 is a task in and of itself, so we’ve tried to make it as easy as possible. Below, we’ve gathered each of our 2020 TV reviews, each with a season number and the network/service where the new episodes first aired for U.S. audiences. Hopefully, this will help you decide what...

As 2020 winds down and the holidays near, the TV landscape is filled with season finales, fall finales and lots of reruns — but there’s still The Bachelorette! The ABC reality dating competition aired the first of two parts for its Season 16 finale delivering a 1.2 in the adults 18-49 demographic and 4.93 million viewers. The Bachelorette climbed two-tenths in the demo from last week’s episode to top a quiet Monday night. ABC ended the night with a repeat of the CMA Country Christmas special.

Fox’s penultimate episode of NeXt before Tuesday’s two-part series finale held steady since its last fresh episode with a 0.2 in the demo matching its series low while netting 1.19 million viewers. Cosmos also held steady in the demo with a 0.2 and added more eyes to its audience with 913,000.

Among reruns of The Neighborhood, Bob Hearts Abishola and Bull CBS aired the Kid of the Year (0.2, 1.40M...

Disney Plus has treated its subscribers to some early Christmas gifts this week, as the Mouse House’s streaming service served up its biggest haul of the month today. This time around, 14 new movies and TV shows have gone up on the site, delivering a range of content that’ll satisfy you no matter what you’re looking for.

After some ambient screen-fillers? Then stick on Arendelle Castle Yule Log for a Frozen-themed festive atmosphere or Dory’s Reef Cam to turn your TV into an aquarium. Elsewhere in the world of animation, don’t miss Cosmos: Possible Worlds, a CG series imagining how alien worlds could look. And feel free to check out Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventure season 3 and new episodes of The Wonderful World of Mickey Mouse.

For more, here’s the full list of everything that’s new on D+ today:

Arendelle Castle Yule Log (Premiere...

With Christmas just around the corner, this weekend is stacked full of great new releases on the various major streaming services. Netflix, Disney Plus, HBO Max, Hulu and Prime Video are offering up a bunch of fresh content over the next few days – Friday, December 18th to Sunday the 20th – which should entertain subscribers no matter what they’re in the mood for.

For starters, Netflix has nine new movies and TV shows being added today. This includes a bunch of Jeopardy!, which is the perfect way to honor much-missed host Alex Trebek, while there’s also season 2 of Norwegian series Home for Christmas, South Korean horror show Sweet Home and Pauly Shore comedy movie Guest House. The highlight of the day’s haul, though, is undoubtedly Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, the Viola Davis vehicle that features Chadwick Boseman’s final performance and is expected to make a sweep...

In the latest TV show ratings, ABC’s The Bachelorette drew 4.3 million total viewers and a 1.0 demo rating, down two tenths in the demo week-to-week but still topping Tuesday in that measure.

Leading out of that, Big Sky‘s fall finale (3.9 mil/0.6, TVLine reader grade “A-“; read post mortem) added eyeballs while steady in the demo.

More from TVLineThe Voice Winner Carter Rubin Talks Air-Hugging Gwen Stefani, Nailing a Muppets Classic and His One LetdownBig Sky's John Carroll Lynch Talks Fall Finale Shocker: 'Karma's a Bitch'The Voice Top 5 Results-Show Recap: And the Winner of Season 19 Is...

Elsewhere….

NBC | The Voice...

The Bachelorette “Men Tell All” special episodes and the first part of The Voice season finale shared the top spot Monday in the primetime ratings.

At ABC, the two-hour Bachelorette special hit season lows as the men spilled the tea amid trying to win the heart of Tayshia. This was a lead-in to the 20/20 news special The Shot: Race For the Vaccine.

NBC served the first part of a two-art season finale of The Voice, up two tenths up from last week and the night’s most-watched show. The new medical drama Nurses also saw a boost compared with last week’s premiere. NBC’s final numbers will likely be adjusted due to local NFL preemptions.

CBS’ Monday night ticked down with The Neighborhood, Bob Hearts Abishola and a new episode of Bull. Meanwhile, All Rise held steady.

A fresh episode of...

Ok, so maybe not L.A.’s Finest. On Monday, Fox fell below both Univision and Telemundo in ratings among adults 18-49, airing “L.A.’s Finest” and “Cosmos: Possible Worlds.” To be fair to Fox, both of its shows have previously aired elsewhere: “L.A.’s Finest” on Spectrum and “Cosmos” on National Geographic — but Fox’s broadcast network is the far-larger platform in both cases. Atop the Nielsen sheets last night was NBC, with its “The Voice” Season 19 performance finale. ABC and “The Bachelorette” were the evening’s runners-up. Also Read: The CW's 'Pandora' Finale Settles for a 0.0 Rating - and So Does 'The Outpost' NBC was first in ratings with a 0.9 rating/5 share in the advertiser-coveted 18-49 demographic and in total viewers with an average of 6.3 million, according to preliminary numbers. “The Voice” from 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. drew a 1.0/6 and 7.6 million viewers. “Nurses” at 10 received a 0.6/4 and 3.7 million viewers.

NBC got some mileage out of its latest Canadian import Nurses in the latest ratings.

Nurses Season 1 Episode 2 drew 3.7 million total viewers and a 0.6 rating in the demo, steady in total viewers but up 50% week-to-week in the demo.

Did the series get some good word of mouth?

We don't know, but we do know that NBC was pre-empted in some markets, meaning The Voice and Nurses did not air.

The Voice even had an upswing, rising to 7.6 million viewers and a 1.0 rating, an increase of 25% week-to-week.

We will update the post later with the finals for NBC.

Elsewhere on the night, CBS took a big hit.

The Neighborhood, Bob Hearts Abishola, All Rise, and Bull all came down to season lows in the demo.

There was increased competition on the night, and we're also approaching late December, so it may well be that fewer people were watching TV.

Still, down is down.

Disney Plus is serving up 14 new movies and TV shows this coming Friday, which is exactly one week before Christmas. The Mouse House’s streaming service will be updating its library with a bunch of exciting fresh additions that cater to all tastes, including a load of television series and a couple of films.

Check out the full list of everything that’s dropping this week in the list below, and then scroll down for a run through of the highlights that you won’t want to miss.

Arendelle Castle Yule Log (Premiere) *Disney+ Original

Buried Truth of the Maya

Cosmos: Possible Worlds (S1)

Disney Channel Holiday House Party

Disney Parks Sunrise Series (S1)

Disney Rapunzel’s Tangled Adventure (S3)

Dory’s Reef Cam (Premiere) *Disney+ Original

Eddie the Eagle

Extras – Beyond the Clouds: Creating Zach’s World *Disney+ Original

Into the Woods

Miraculous World: New York, United Heroez

On Pointe...

Michael Bay’s “Songbird” now available on-demand, is a pandemic thriller shot in Los Angeles during lockdown. The film stars Demi Moore, Paul Walter Hauser and Craig Robinson and takes place years in the future, in which a mutated strand of coronavirus, called Covid-23, continues to wreak havoc on the world’s population.

As the country-wide lockdown stretches into its fourth year, infected Americans are forced into quarantine camps. Amid the dystopia, one courier (portrayed by “Riverdale” star Kj Apa) who is immune to the virus, falls in love with an aspiring artist (Sofia Carson), who is believed to become infected.

The King Soundworks team: Gregory King, Re-Recording Mixer, Jon Greasley, Re-Recording Mixer and Supervising Sound Designer and John-Thomas Graves, Supervising Sound Editor discuss how the sound of isolation, nature and a pandemic came together for Bay’s thriller.

With the lockdown, the soundscape of Los Angeles has changed so...

Thanks to Covid postponements, we ended up with another Tuesday night football game this week. While Dallas Cowboys fans may be unhappy with the result, Fox certainly isn’t. The NFL game was one hell of a ratings upgrade from last week’s Tuesday primetime lineup of “Cosmos: Possible Worlds” and “Next.” The Baltimore Ravens win provided stiff competition for the rest of broadcast television, with ABC’s “Big Sky” being among the biggest sufferers week to week. Due to the nature of live sports, the below Nielsen numbers should be considered subject to significant adjustment. Also Read: Ratings: NBC's 'Nurses' Premiere Beat a 'Bull' Rerun, at Least Fox was first in ratings with a 2.8 rating/16 share in the advertiser-coveted 18-49 demographic and in total viewers with an average of 10.1 million, according to preliminary numbers. That was all the Nfc East’s Dallas Cowboys vs. the Afc North’s...

Fox’s special Monday edition of I Can See Your Voice topped primetime in early Nielsen Live+Same Day numbers, delivering a 2.0 in the adults 18-49 demographic and netting 6.78 million viewers in stats boosted by overrun from the network’s coverage of the Washington-Pittsburgh NFL game in some of the country.

The network’s special programming following the game, which also included an installment of Cosmos (0.4, 1.38M), was up significantly from last week’s lineup that included L.A.’s Finest and the finale of Filthy Rich.

On ABC, the regularly scheduled Monday Night Football took up all the real estate in primetime as Buffalo beat San Francisco in the 49ers’ temporary Arizona home in a game simulcast on ESPN. Like all live sporting events, the numbers for both Fox and NBC are expected to be adjusted in the finals.

NBC kicked off its night with The Voice, which was down from last week.

Where do you even begin with a year brimming with as much exciting music as 2020 had to offer? Even if you limit it to what made it to TV screens, it’s still a daunting collection of possibilities.

To start, there were the undeniable musical charms of “Central Park,” “The Eddy,” and “P-Valley,” all of which drew heavily on original songs to help tether their stories to a distinct time and place.

Phillip Glass, Harold Budd (“I Know This Much is True”), Alan Silvestri (“Cosmos: Possible Worlds”) and Atticus Ross all added to their robust, ever-growing bodies of work.

Musicians who have helped define the atmospheres of their respective series — like Ramin Djawadi for “Westworld” or Jesse Novak for “BoJack Horseman” — continued to do so as the characters in focus faced monumental changes. In the middle of it all, Jeff Russo held onto his title of the busiest musician in...

Disney Plus’ “The Mandalorian,” Marvel’s “Avengers” films and Netflix’s “Stranger Things” are the top entertainment franchises, according to a new survey from the National Research Group.

Beginning in January 2019, Nrg, a global insights and strategy firm, conducted more than 350,000 interviews about 700 entertainment franchises to discover which were considered the most bold, inspiring and thought-provoking by U.S. consumers. The results were analyzed to determine which franchises are most likely to withstand the test of time and continue to evolve and reinvent themselves to remain relevant to their global fans.

“Consumers are ready for entertainment franchises to lean into important cultural conversations and create a new reality — one in which optimism, diversity and curiosity unite rather than divide us,” says Jon Penn, CEO of Nrg.

To little surprise, Disney and Marvel dominated the top 20 entertainment franchises with 70% of the entries, which included titles from the film, TV and video game industries.