9 TV Shows to Watch Now
It's TV's harvest time, boasting new shows and comebacks
Simon Mein/NBC
The cast of "The Brave," Tate Ellington as Noah Morgenthau, Anne Heche as Patricia Campbell and Sofia Pernas as Hannah Archer
The fall TV season is upon us, and it's time for TV's biggest audience — people over 50 — to find out what's good to watch. Here are some of the most promising shows premiering this week:
The Brave (NBC, Sept. 25)
Under the Dome’s Mike Vogel leads an elite undercover military special operations unit, while no-nonsense Anne Heche calls the shots from Washington, D.C. Originally called For God & Country, it may please red state fans of Clint Eastwood's American Sniper (the hit that inspired many patriotic military shows this season) more than blue staters, who might prefer History Channel's Six, by China Beach creator Bill Broyles.
Me, Myself & I (CBS, Sept. 25)
On TV's most-watched network, quintuple Emmy winner John Larroquette stars in a well-written comedy about a rich retired guy reassessing life after a mild heart attack. It skillfully alternates scenes of him at 14 in 1991, starring Jack Dylan Grazer (nephew of super producer Brian Grazer and star of Stephen King's hit It), at 40 in the present, starring SNL's Bobby Moynihan, and at 65 in 2042, starring Larroquette, who's 69, but looks younger.
Law & Order True Crime: The Menendez Murders (NBC, Sept. 26)
Law & Order, which earned zillions by ripping stories from the headlines and fictionalizing them, rides the new true-crime wave (FX's American Crime Story, Netflix's Making a Murderer) by dramatizing the lurid trial of the Menendez brothers, who killed their parents, allegedly for sexual abuse. Edie Falco, 54, stars as the brothers’ ruthless attorney, Leslie Abramson.
NCIS (CBS, Sept. 26)
The long-running procedural is still one of CBS’s sure things after 14 seasons. Longtime star Mark Harmon, 66, is back as Agent Gibbs, with newcomer Maria Bello, 50 (A History of Violence), as a mischievous Afghanistan vet and ace forensic psychologist.
This Is Us (NBC, Sept. 26)
Last year, America loved sobbing along with this tearjerker about a family with real problems, and it won't be any less popular now that it's earned four Emmy nominations and a best-actor win for Sterling K. Brown, who'd already won an Emmy for The People v. O.J. Simpson. Hog those shiny dolls and viewers will follow.
Fox
Queen Latifah, guest star in Season 4 of "Empire," along with cast members Terrence Howard and Taraji P. Henson.
Empire (FOX, Sept. 27)
On the smash melodrama by Shonda Rhimes, 47, author of Scandal and Grey's Anatomy, patriarch Lucious Lyon (Terrence Howard) has amnesia from a murder attempt. Will he remember? Will his mom (Leslie Uggams, 74) feel bad about committing murder? Expect some twists from one of TV's liveliest, most plot-driven soaps.
Chris Haston/NBC
The "Will & Grace" cast is back together again with Eric McCormack as Will Truman, Debra Messing as Grace Adler, Sean Hayes as Jack McFarland and Megan Mullally as Karen Walker.
Will & Grace (NBC, Sept. 28)
Clever, gay-friendly Will & Grace was adored for eight seasons before signing off in 2006. Its entire bitchily quippy cast is back, including Debra Messing, 50 next summer, Sean Hayes, 47, Eric McCormack, 54, and Megan Mullally, 58.
Tin Star (Amazon, Sept. 29)
Tim Roth, 56 (Twin Peaks, Selma, three Tarantino films), is a small-town detective and Mad Men's Christina Hendricks an oil company shill in a quirky show that's kind of like Netflix’s Goliath meets Northern Exposure. Roth, a fish-out-of-water Brit, battles a dastardly conglomerate’s plans to turn the town into tar sands — and then his five-year-old is mysteriously shot dead.
HBO
Larry David in "Curb Your Enthusiasm"
Curb Your Enthusiasm (HBO, Oct. 1)
Larry David’s cringe-inducing, hilarious comedy returns after six years, with comedy stalwarts David, Jeff Garlin, Susie Essman, Richard Lewis, Ted Danson and Mary Steenburgen playing fictionalized versions of themselves.