Tommy Lee Jones and Ethan Hawke in The Lowdown season 2.
Courtesy of FX
The top primetime show last week was a football (American version) game. That’ll be the case for most weeks from September through mid-February, but it probably won’t be until the college and NFL seasons start in earnest in early September.
For one thing, there aren’t a ton of nationally televised preseason NFL games. ESPN, Fox, Prime Video and CBS have one each between now and Aug. 23, and one of those could theoretically land at or near the top. The rest are on ESPN’s streaming service and the NFL Network — not places that draw big audiences.
The Hall of Fame game that kicks off the preseason is also usually the most watched preseason game. So you’ll see a sprinkling of those, but the network charts will continue to be the usual snoozy summer mix of game and competition shows and 60 Minutes reruns.
A bit of news from the last couple days:
• Season 2 of The Lowdown premieres Oct. 14 on FX and Hulu. The first season was one of the best shows on TV last year, and the upcoming one will once again feature Ethan Hawke, Keith David, Ryan Kiera Armstrong, Kaniehtiio Horn and Rafael Casal. The new season will also star Betty Gilpin as a public defender who Lee (Hawke) works with on a case and Tommy Lee Jones as “Lee’s estranged grifter father, Lee Raybon Senior, who unexpectedly arrives in town.” TOMMY LEE JONES AS LEE’S DAD. Hell yeah.
• Prime Video released a trailer for Neagley, a Reacher spinoff, on the same day that Reacher began its fourth season. Nice bit of marketing there.
• From the great Lesley Goldberg at The Ankler, DC has stopped development on a couple of shows: Waller, a Peacemaker spinoff that was to center on feature Viola Davis’ Amanda Waller, and Paradise Lost, a Wonder Woman prequel. Both DC and Marvel continue to have trouble with how to integrate their larger universes in TV — to which I would say, what if they didn’t? What if they just made some cool shows (like the un-renewed Wonder Man) without needing everything to tie into a larger plan?
The top network and cable shows for last week are below, along with the top 10 sports telecasts of the week. Streaming ratings will come in a separate newsletter tomorrow evening.