As far as television goes, the summer season has officially begun. That typically means the cable networks will have their time to shine, but I'm not sure we'll see too much of that this year. Many of the networks have already rolled out their strongest shows over the spring. This summer will probably see the takeover of typical long-running veterans and events that pop up randomly (mostly super early Presidential debates and other breaking news like these ridiculous storms all over the country).

This is the kind of week where I would normally do a full list, but current circumstances in my life have and will continue to keep me away from doing any kind of substantial writing for the near future. Anyway, Game of Thrones hit series and network high ratings for the series finale. It was a bit expected, but now HBO and television as a whole probably laments that they don't have anything that looks like it will catch fire the way few shows have over the last decade. HBO has been fortunate enough to benefit from these mainstream successes for much of the last 20 years. We're in a new era now and it will be a surprise to see any future show become nearly as successful as this one.

The cancellation of Star was by far the most shocking news from the last week. I found it shocking, but my first thought was that the cancellation only made sense if Empire ended next season (FOX made that announcement official yesterday). Going by already released schedules and the habits of networks still to come (CBS and The CW at the time of this post), next fall will see the networks taking a highly conservative route; going with known entities and plotting graceful exits for some long-running shows. Unfortunately, that means everything after January will be a mess with the normal slew of awards shows and sports events plus coverage of the 2020 Presidential primary elections. My view is that the Broadcast networks know that they don't have too much to rely on as far as shows go and they may just try to survive next season by acquiring and promoting as many live events as possible.

It took me until 2:45 this afternoon to realize it's Tuesday. At least this post isn't super late today.

It's about that time to start the new list for 2018. You know how this goes. All shows appear in the order in which they premiered, the specials appear at the bottom of the list and shows with split seasons are marked under the original listing. The list will be updated at least once per week and shows with 2017 premiere dates but aired episodes in 2018 will be found in the 2017 list (which will also be updated weekly until the conclusion of those seasons) [Updated 5/7/19].