SUNDAY
APRIL 1
2018

BIANCULLI’S BEST BETS

 

NBC, 7:30 p.m. ET

SERIES PREMIERE: No sooner did the mammoth ratings come back for the premiere episode of ABC’s reboot of Roseanne than networks scrambled to launch their own instant nostalgia series – as close to Roseanne as possible. NBC is first out of the gate, thanks to Saturday Night Live creator Lorne Michaels, who had both the vision and the contacts (not to mention the broadcast rights) to revive, almost instantly, TV’s second most famous Roseanne: The wild-haired, cranky news commentator Roseanne Roseannadanna, played so memorably, during the original-cast years of SNL, by Gilda Radner. For this revival – which, like Garry Shandling’s The Larry Sanders Show, follows its titular star off camera as well as on TV – the part of Roseanne goes to Emma Stone, who already had played her once for Michaels and SNL, so was ready, as well as willing, to go for this instant sitcom series, which NBC is launching just before tonight’s live concert version of Jesus Christ Superstar.

 
  
 
 

CBS, 8:00 p.m. ET

SERIES PREMIERE: All the networks are going crazy for reboots and revivals at the moment, and CBS, which already has tasted success this year with its Big Bang Theory spinoff Young Sheldon, tonight launches another prequel spinoff – this one, appropriately, not just an extended flashback, but a time-traveling continuation of the Big Bang story line. Sheldon and Leonard, playing around one day after watching a marathon of time-travel movies, attempt to build a time machine with spare parts available in their apartments. They fall asleep before they can test it, but comic book store owner Stuart (Kevin Sussman) pops by, turns it on, and whisks himself back to the drug-fueled basement of That ’70s Show – where Stuart finds himself surrounded by a group of less sarcastic friends. He also spends most of his time, at least in the pilot episode made available for preview, purchasing all the 1970s comics he can get his hands on, to make him rich upon his return trip.
 
  
 
 

FXX, 8:00 p.m. ET

SERIES PREMIERE: The final season of FX’s The Americans began last week, surfacing at a time when tensions between the United States and Russia are more heightened than at any time since the end of the Cold War. FX’s sister network, FXX, is aware of the free publicity to be gained by any Russian-based programming – and since ABC has just revived Fox's former music-competition American Idol powerhouse, Fox is importing a spring cycle of the latest edition of the international phenomenon’s RT television hit, Russian Idol, for its smaller, lower-risk cable network. Viewers here, like viewers in Russia, will get to vote on the singers in the final round. The difference in this version, though, is that the judges, like Vladimir Putin, already know who’s going to win.
 
  
 
 

PBS, 9:00 p.m. ET

SPECIAL PREMIERE: Many British programs, between seasons, offer up one-shot specials on Christmas Day, presenting stand-alone episodes of some of England’s most popular long-running programs. Doctor Who is one such show given the holiday special treatment, and Call the Midwife is another. This latest special has been withheld from U.S. distribution until now, because PBS programmers feared it might be too bleak for the holidays. Its plot, which skips forward a year, finds several of the midwives abandoned by their former husbands, and left alone caring for their own newborns. Why PBS thought Easter and Passover weekend was a better time to import this particular, well-titled special is beyond me. Don’t bother checking local listings.

 
  
 
 

CBS All Access, 12:00 a.m. ET

NETWORK LAUNCH: Blame this on Stormy Daniels, and on the media’s never-ending reverence for anniversaries. The CBS streaming network All Access has been unabashed and unapologetic from the start about cashing in on the CBS broadcast network’s inventory and legacy to lure subscribers to its pay site. It started with The Good Fight (a spinoff continuation of The Good Wife), and later this year will launch a reboot of The Twilight Zone, helmed by Jordan Peele. But with the massive ratings for Anderson Cooper’s recent 60 Minutes interview with porn star Stormy Daniels, CBS All Access is using that, and the fact that 2018 is the golden anniversary of the launch of 60 Minutes in 1968, to clear its schedule for spring and summer to present, in sequence, every episode of 60 Minutes from the past 50 years, beginning with original co-hosts Mike Wallace and Harry Reasoner. For the occasion, CBS All Access is calling the special marathon 1440 Minutes – because that’s how many minutes are in a day. Start watching beginning at midnight, and don’t be late. The clock will be ticking…

 
  
 
 
 
 
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David Bianculli

Founder / Editor

David Bianculli has been a TV critic since 1975, including a 14-year stint at the New York Daily News, and sees no reason to stop now. Currently, he's TV critic for NPR's Fresh Air with Terry Gross, and is an occasional substitute host for that show. He's also an author and teaches TV and film history at New Jersey's Rowan University. His 2009 Dangerously Funny: The Uncensored Story of 'The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour', has been purchased for film rights. His latest, The Platinum Age of Television: From I Love Lucy to the Walking Dead, How TV Became Terrific, is an effusive guidebook that plots the path from the 1950s’ Golden Age to today’s era of quality TV.