Summer used to be the time of year where reruns reigned supreme and very few, if any, television series premiered new episodes. Now not only are reality TV shows popular, new scripted series are debuting, both on cable and the Big Four broadcast networks. I’ve profiled fifteen series to watch this summer, ten of which are new series and five are returning favorites.
New Shows
CeeLo Green’s The Good Life
CeeLo Green became famous worldwide for his music as one part of Gnarls Barkley. A solo career and a judge’s seat on The Voice followed. Now he goes back to his roots and reunites with his old group The Goodie Mob to record an album, finding out that he can go home again.
Starring: CeeLo Green, Khujo, T-Mo, and Big Gipp
Premiere Date: June 23 on TBS
Mystery Girls
It’s a Beverly Hills 90210 reunion! Jennie Garth and Tori Spelling star as actors of a 1990s detective drama, who reunite 20 years after their show is canceled, when the only witness to a violent crime will only speak to the two ladies, forcing them to solve a mystery for real!
Starring: Jennie Garth, Tori Spelling, Miguel Pinzon
Premiere Date: June 25 on ABC Family
The Leftovers
Two percent of the world disappears when a Rapture-like event takes some people to the afterlife. The people who are left behind wonder what happened and are forced to accept that there are forces they cannot control at work in the universe.
Starring: Justin Theroux, Amy Brenneman, Carrie Coon, Christopher Eccleston, Liv Tyler, Ann Dowd
Premiere Date: June 29 on HBO
Reckless
This sultry nighttime soap revolves around lust and intrigue in Charleston, South Carolina, as a lawyer from the South Side of Chicago is brought down south to represent a cop who has fallen from grace. She clashes with the debonair city attorney who exudes a gentlemanly swagger and lots of sex appeal.
Starring: Anna Wood, Cam Gigandet, Adam Rodríguez, Shawn Hatosy, Georgina Haig
Premiere Date: June 29 on CBS
Extant
Twenty-five years after her acting debut in Living Dolls, Halle Berry returns to TV as Molly Woods, an astronaut who just completed a thirteen month solo space mission. To her surprise, she finds that she is pregnant. Molly’s life and the fate of the world is at risk as she carries an alien baby.
Starring: Halle Berry, Goran Visnjic, Pierce Gagnon, Camryn Manheim, Hiroyuki Sanada, Grace Gummer, Michael O’Neill
Premiere Date: July 9 on CBS
The Hotwives of Orlando
A parody of the “Real Housewives” franchise, six “hot housewives” terrorize Orlando, getting into fights while spending all of their husbands’ money. The women bond over their love of shoes, designer clothes and Botox, but don’t get it twisted; they will scratch each other’s eyes out at the drop of a hat!
Starring: Casey Wilson, Danielle Schneider, Tymberlee Hill, Andrea Savage, Angela Kinsey, Kristen Schaal
Premiere Date: July 15 on Hulu
LeAnn and Eddie
Singer LeAnn Rimes and actor Eddie Cibrian have been front and center in countless tabloids ever since they fell in love — while both were married to other people! This reality series allows the couple, now married, to showcase their lives and tell their story on their own terms.
Starring: LeAnn Rimes and Eddie Cibrian
Premiere Date: July 17 on VH1
Bachelor in Paradise
If you’re a fan of the ABC summer mainstays The Bachelor, The Bachelorette and Bachelor Pad, this reality offering promises more shenanigans. Past contestants of the aforementioned shows live together in a house and hope for love to blossom amongst each other.
Host: Chris Harrison
Premiere Date: August 4 on ABC
The Knick
A period drama set during the early 1900s at New York’s Knickerbocker Hospital, the series focuses on the lives and loves of its staff, all while twentieth-century scientific and technological advances irrevocably change how the doctors and nurses of this hospital provide care.
Starring: Clive Owen, Jeremy Bobb, Andre Holland, Eric Johnson, Juliet Rylance, Joseph Scarpino, Cara Seymour, Chris Sullivan
Premiere Date: August 8 on Cinemax
Legends
Based on the novel by Robert Littell. A CIA agent is forced to infiltrate terrorist cells in order to save innocent civilians, and in each different time and place, he has to portray a completely new person with a new personal history. Can he save the world while keeping everything straight? Will he forget who he really is?
Starring: Sean Bean, Ali Larter, Amber Valletta, Mason Cook, Tina Majorino, Rob Mayes, Steve Harris
Premiere Date: August 13 on TNT
Returning Favorites
Rookie Blue
Last We Left Them: Andy, Chloe and Oliver are all ambushed when they respond to a 911 call and it quickly turns into a hostage situation and they’re the ones in need of saving. The shooter takes people’s lives into his own hands, namely Oliver’s life. Dov and Wes clash over Chloe.
Series Status: Missy Peregrym and Gregory Smith lead an ensemble cast which starts its fifth season this summer.
Premiere Date: June 19 on ABC
Big Brother
Last We Left Them: This show chugs along and delivers great ratings a decade and a half on. Last year, Andy became the first gay contestant to win the American version of Big Brother, after he took universally disliked loudmouth GinaMarie to the final two. Fan favorite Elissa, sister of former winner Rachel, only made it to the final six.
Series Status: Julie Chen will be pulling double duty between Big Brother and The Talk when the former returns for its sixteenth installment.
Premiere Date: June 25 on CBS
Under the Dome
Last We Left Them: The monarch butterfly causes the dome to turn black, casting the town into complete darkness. Julia is forced to choose to save Barbie or the lives of the other townspeople. As the season ends, Julia chooses to save the lives of everyone else, and it becomes certain Barbie will die…or will he?
Series Status: Mike Vogel and Rachelle Lefevre lead an ensemble cast in the show’s second season.
Premiere Date: June 30 on CBS
Witches of East End
Last We Left Them: Mother witch Joanna finds out who the Shifter is and finds herself in a trap she can’t get out of. Dash and Freya are about to be married — but news from Victor causes Freya to doubt how good of an idea it is to go through with the nuptials.
Series Status: Julia Ormond, Jenna Dewan Tatum, Rachel Boston and Mädchen Amick all return for the show’s second season.
Premiere Date: July 6 on Lifetime
The Real Housewives of New Jersey
Last We Left Them: Teresa and her brother Joe make up after Teresa admits — as much as she knows how — that she spread rumors about him and Melissa simply because she hates Melissa as a person. The family reunites at a barbecue shortly after Teresa’s home, damaged from Hurricane Sandy, is repaired.
Series Status: Teresa Giudice and Melissa Gorga return with former housewife Dina Manzo and three new ladies for the show’s sixth season.
Premiere Date: July 13 on Bravo
