TV news roundup for Week 18 of 2019

Welcome to the weekly TV news round-up, where we go into the latest TV news regarding renewals, cancellations, and pick-ups. This week we have massive Marvel news, renewals, trailers and no cancellations.

Renewed

American premium channel Showtime has renewed the Chicago-set inner-city drama The Chi for a third season.

American broadcast network Fox has opted to renew the hip-hop music series Empire for a sixth season. This had been in doubt for some time, because of controversy around star Jussie Smollett.

American streaming service Hulu has renewed the comedies PEN15, about 13-year-old outcasts in 200, for a 14-episode second season and Ramy, about stand-up comedian Ramy Youssef, for 10-episode second season.

YouTube Premium might be ending in its current paid subscription form, but Cobra Kai will return! The sequel series to The Karate Kid movie series will get a third season.

American broadcast network ABC has renewed comedy series Black-ish for a sixth season. There is also more news on this series when we talk about picked up series.

American cable channel FX has renewed the TV spin-off of Taika Waititi’s horror mockumentary What We Do In The Shadows for a second season! Season 1 currently airs on FX and will soon start in the UK on BBC Two.

Picked up

American cable channel the Paramount Network has given a 10-episode series order for military drama 68 Whiskey. The series, based upon an Israeli format, will follow a group of army medics in Afghanistan who work from a base called “The Orphanage.”

Nicole Kidman (Aquaman) will star in Hulu’s TV series adaption of Liane Moriarty 2018 novel Nine Perfect Strangers. The novel tells the story of nine strangers who meet at a remote health resort. The ten days there will be among the most challenging they ever faced. Kidman’s involvement is not that surprising, as she won an Emmy Award for HBO adaption of Moriarty’s other novel Big Little Lies. Big Little Lies executive producer David E. Kelley also returns for this series.

And that not the only pick-up news from Hulu. Massive Marvel news, as the streaming service has ordered two supernatural Marvel Cinematic Universe-set TV series. The first is the much-requested Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. spin-off for Ghost Rider Robbie Reyes (Gabriel Luna), which Variety confirmed. The second will be a series for Daimon and Ana Helstrom, the children of Satan in the Marvel comics, called Marvel’s Helstrom. Paul Zbyszewski (Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.) will serve as showrunner for the series in which the siblings will hunt the worst of the worst. Interesting is that Zbyszewski also will be showrunner on Marvel’s Ghost Rider. A crossover at some point seems therefore inevitable. Both series will premiere in 2020.

ABC has picked up Mixed-ish, a prequel spin-off of comedy series Black-ish. The prequel is set in the 1980s and stars a 12-year-old version of Tracee Ellis Ross’ Bow, played by Arica Himmel. The title is a nod to Bow’s mixed heritage. This is the second spin-off series for Black-ish, as on Freeform there is also college-set Grown-ish, which happens concurrently with the parent series.

Other developments

Julian Fellowes’ (Downton Abbey) next series The Gilded Age has been picked up. Wait, again?! Yes, again. The 1885 New York City-set series was in development for NBC for what felt like forever. The series was picked up by NBC, but now it will move to HBO. Hopefully, it will now actually happen.

Trailers

Hulu has released a new trailer for The Handmaid’s Tale Season 3, which starts on Wednesday, June 5.

Hulu also released a teaser trailer for the revival of Veronica Mars, starring Kristen Bell (The Good Place). Season 4 will start on Friday, July 26.

HBO has released a teaser trailer for the second season of comedic drama Succession. Season 2 starts in August.

ABC has released a new trailer for Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. Season 6! The trailer has a major spoiler for the end of Season 5, so be warned. We understand the new season picks up about a year after Season 5. Going with the fact that Season 5 ended moments before Avengers: Infinity War’s Snap, references to that and Avengers: Endgame surely will be made. The new season starts on Friday, May 10.

CBS has released a trailer for upcoming adventure series Blood & Treasure, starring Matt Barr (Sleepy Hollow), Sofia Pernas (Jane the Virgin) and Oded Fehr (The Mummy). Season 1 starts on Tuesday, May 21.

Starz has released a trailer for Vida Season 2. The series about two Mexican-American sisters in Los Angeles Eastside will premiere new episodes on Sunday, May 26.

Netflix has released a trailer for their broadcast network saved from cancellation series Designated Survivor Season 3. The new episodes of Kiefer Sutherland (24) as the President of the United States are released on Friday, June 7.

Showtime has released a trailer for City on a Hill, a Boston, Massachusetts-set crime drama starring Kevin Bacon (The Following) and Aldis Hodge (Black Mirror: Black Museum, Star Trek: Short Treks: Calypso). The series premieres on Sunday, June 16.

FX has released a trailer for the third and final season of X-Men comics based Legion. The first of the last episodes premieres on Monday, June 24.

HBO has released a teaser trailer for comedic series The Righteous Gemstones. The series starring John Goodman (The Connors), Danny McBride (Alien: Covenant), Adam Devine (Workaholics) and Edi Patterson (Vice Principals) will premiere sometime in August.

That’s it for this week, but join us next time when we round-up the TV news of that week.

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