The 20 Most Anticipated New TV Shows of Fall

It’s already been a bang-up year for TV, with excellent shows like A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, Wonder Man, Widow’s Bay, and Liz Meriwether’s just-concluded Furious arriving to upend our expectations about what certain genres, stars, or even streamers can do. And the rest of the year looks equally promising. While the next few months will see several eagerly anticipated returning series — including Slow Horses, Lupin (after a three-year hiatus!), and the final season of Yellowjackets — we chose to focus this list on brand-new scripted shows headed our way. Mark your calendars.

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‘Crew Girl’ (Netflix, Sept. 10)

Like all good teen dramas, this one starts with a major blow-up. West Coast high schooler Teagan Tao (Miku Martineau) feels confident in two things: her family and her competitive rowing career. Then a family scandal uproots her life, forcing her and her mom to move east. If adjusting to a brand-new school, the highbrow Easton Prep, wasn’t hard enough, it gets worse: There’s no girls’ crew team. Teagan’s only way to fulfill her rowing dreams is to serve as coxswain of the boys’ varsity squad, an unruly bunch whose dynamics are only complicated by her arrival. Can she conquer the sport and a budding love triangle at the same time? —CT Jones

‘Monster: The Lizzie Borden Story’ (FX, Sept. 17)

Previous seasons of Ryan Murphy and Ian Brennan’s psycho-killer anthology series have focused on Jeffrey Dahmer and Ed Gein, but this is the first to highlight a murdering woman. Borden (Ella Beatty) was 32 when her father Andrew (Charlie Hunnam) and stepmother Abby (Rebecca Hall) were killed with a hatchet in 1892. Though she was acquitted of their murders, her name became ubiquitous thanks to a schoolyard nursery rhyme. This retelling seems to be more based on that ditty than hard truth, but the signature Murphy anachronisms (Rosalía’s on the soundtrack) and speculative gossip — like that Lizzie and the family maid may have been more than just cohabitators of the Borden home — are sure to keep things fun. —Elisabeth Garber-Paul

‘American Hostage’ (MGM, Sept. 20)

What happens when the trusted newsman becomes the story? This is the question posed by MGM’s new based-on-a-podcast miniseries, which tells the story of Tony Kiritsis (Giovanni Ribisi), a fortysomething Indiana man who, in February 1977, took hostage the owner of a mortgage company which had recently foreclosed on his land. Not since Mad Men has Jon Hamm, who plays Indianapolis newscaster Fred Heckman, fit so snugly into the role of a man of authority from another decade; and not since Sneaky Pete has Ribisi played a criminal you kind of want to root for. Get ready for a searing examination of the tension between the violent nature of an armed kidnapping and the violence of the capitalist system that kidnapping is meant to protest. —EGP

‘A Different World’ (Netflix, Sept. 24)

Get ready to visit Hillman College for the first time in three decades. This reboot of the beloved Nineties sitcom of the same name (itself a Cosby Show spinoff), updates its fictional HBCU for the modern era. At the center of the story is freshman Deborah Wayne (Maleah Joi Moon), daughter of Dwayne Wayne (Kadeem Hardison) and Whitley Gilbert (Jasmine Guy) — meaning she carries not just the usual pressures of making friends and getting good grades, but the added weight of being a campus legacy. Hardison and Guy reprise their roles, bringing a healthy dose of nostalgia and a meaningful connection to the show’s roots. —CTJ

‘East of Eden’ (Netflix, Oct. 1)

In 1955, Elia Kazan directed James Dean in an adaptation of John Steinbeck’s East of Eden, the multigenerational novel inspired by the Biblical story of Cain and Abel. In the movie, Kazan zeroed in on the character of Cal, played by Dean, a rebel who is struggling to find his identity. Now, 70 years later, Kazan’s granddaughter, Zoe Kazan, gives the source material a feminist bent, taking a more intimate look at Cathy Ames, Cal’s mother and one of the most notorious villains in literary history. Played here by Florence Pugh, Cathy’s backstory is told in detail — an epic reframing of a female antagonist, and a heartbreaking look at the choices that can bring a family together, or tear them apart. —EGP

‘War’ (HBO, Oct. 1)

Some marriages end amiably. And then there’s the divorce of tech mogul Morgan Henderson and movie star Carla Duval, which — given the accusations of wrongdoing, the gajillions of dollars at stake, the high-priced attorneys, and the blinding spotlight of publicity — is not likely to conclude with the couple shaking hands. It may, in fact, involve those hands slinging mud or balling themselves into fists. The Wire‘s Dominic West and Sienna Miller star in this heated divorce drama that seems hell-bent on earning its title. Fingers crossed, it scratches that rich-people-behaving-badly itch that we’ve had since Succession ended. —David Fear

‘Kill Jackie’ (AMC, Oct. 2)

Once upon a time, Jackie Price was an international drug smuggler. Luckily, she left that life behind and reinvented herself as a jet-setting art dealer. Except you can never really leave that life behind, especially when some mysterious person from your past has hired the Seven Demons, the deadliest crew of hit men to ever walk God’s green earth, to murder you. It’s now up to Jackie to track down each of these assassins one by one and take them out before they take her out. Catherine Zeta-Jones officially enters her late-career action-hero era as the title character. Also starring: Ron Perlman, Borgen‘s Sidse Babett Knudsen, and master scene-stealer Daniel Ings (A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms, The Gentlemen). —D.F.

‘Tip Toe’ (Starz, Oct. 2)

We’re huge fans of It’s a Sin, Russell T Davies’ moving chronicle of London’s gay community dealing with the AIDS crisis in the 1980s, and his new limited series sounds equally compelling — if slightly more nerve-jangling. Alan Cumming is the out-and-proud proprietor of a popular bar in Manchester; The Walking Dead‘s David Morrissey is his next-door neighbor, an electrician whose opinions about the LGBTQ community are not, shall we say, particularly enlightened. Tensions between the two are kept at a simmer until the electrician begins to suspect his oldest son might be queer… at which point his homophobia kicks into overdrive and threatens to explode into violence. —D.F.

‘Carrie’ (Prime, Oct. 7)

The Mike Flanagan Extended Universe continues to expand, this time using one of horror’s most iconic stories as its foundations. This Carrie, starring Summer H. Howell, sees the title character from Stephen King’s 1974 novel transformed into a 21st-century teenager. When the death of Carrie’s father means she has to attend public school for the first time, her extreme religious upbringing does not endear her to her classmates. Then her telekinetic powers kick in. The eight-episode miniseries tracks Carrie’s journey through bullying, family trauma, and that signature bucket of blood. Familiar faces from within the Flanagan world abound, including Kate Siegel, Rahul Kohli, and Samantha Sloyan. —CTJ

‘Cupertino’ (CBS, Oct. 8)

It’s a classic battle of good versus tech companies in this new legal procedural from the creators of TheGood Wife and The Good Fight. When lawyer Michael Price (Mike Colter) is fired from his startup, he goes full burned bridges, starting his own firm to help people stand up to the worst of Silicon Valley. His partner, Olivia Siffre (Rachel Keller), has her own vendetta against the industry — she was fired from another company’s legal department after being sexually harassed — and the two build a team of experts to bring the wrath of the everyman down on the tech villains. —CTJ

‘VisionQuest’ (Disney+, Oct. 14)

Remember when the Vision, Paul Bettany’s android member of the Avengers, regained his memories at the end of WandaVision? This follow-up to the popular Marvel show picks up the character’s storyline as he tries to navigate his fractured mind for solutions to his ongoing existential crisis. He’s got some help from a number of artificial intelligence programs running in his robotic skull, including — for better or worse — the consciousness of his “father,” a.k.a. the supervillain Ultron (James Spader). Will this conflicted droid get the answers he needs? Does he have the ability to put his troubled past behind him and move on? Is this simply designed to set up some other part of an already-in-progress MCU saga? Will the Scarlet Witch show up at some point? So many questions! —D.F.

‘Crystal Lake’ (Peacock, Oct. 15)

Poor Pam Voorhees (Linda Cardellini) just can’t catch a break. Her son, Jason, had congenital abnormalities, resulting in a much larger head than normal, so the other kids make fun of him. She’s broke, working as a lunch lady during the school year and a camp cook over the summer, struggling to support her boy. After he drowns in the camp’s lake in a terrible accident, she can’t get over it; his body hasn’t even been found. She wants closure, maybe even someone to blame. It’s a familiar story for anyone who’s into horror, but this Friday the 13th prequel tries to humanize a well-known villain, introducing extra layers — conspiracies, mysteries, and romances — along the way. Turns out, Pam had a past. —EGP

‘Nocturne’ (Apple TV, Oct. 30)

Jonah Lynn (Liev Schreiber) is a tough Philly cop who’s relocated for a nice, quiet life in the rural outskirts of Pennsylvania. Except there’s a vicious serial killer (Stephen Graham) intent on terrorizing the small town Jonah now calls home and ruining the cop’s life. There’s also an FBI agent (Zazie Beetz) who’s looking for a missing victim, and who may be mixed up in all of Jonah’s personal issues, too. In addition to the cast, the offscreen pedigree of this adaptation of Lars Kepler’s popular novels is impressive: The Ballad of a Small Player producer Rowan Joffe is one of the show’s creators, and not one but two key Sopranos directors — Allen Coulter and Timothy Van Patten — are behind the camera. —D.F.

‘The Good Daughter’ (Peacock, Nov. 12)

Rose Byrne and Meghann Fahy star in this twisty crime drama as Sam and Charlie Quinn, sisters still grappling with the violent crime that left their family broken two decades earlier. When a similar attack takes place in their Georgia hometown again, it brings the estranged women, both lawyers, back together — and sees them determined to crack the case. As they begin to connect the dots, the Quinn sisters face memories they’ve worked hard to repress and reevaluate the relationships that define their adult lives. Can they find where the bodies are buried? —CTJ

’12 12 12′ (Apple TV, Nov. 13)

They say it takes 12 months to properly plan a heist, 12 hours to successfully pull it off, and 12 days to avoid capture so you get away scot-free. This crime thriller pits a master thief (Jamie Dornan) against the FBI agent (Anthony Mackie) who’s trying to bust him for breaking into a bank vault in Zurich. The catch is that the show zips back and forth among those aforementioned timelines, so we get to see the prep, the heist, and the aftermath. Nifty. True Detective: Night Country‘s Kali Reis and Titane‘s Agathe Rousselle co-star. —D.F.

‘The Altruists’ (Netflix, Nov. 19)

Based loosely on coverage that ran in New York Magazine, this eight-part miniseries explores the relationship between Sam Bankman-Fried (Anthony Boyle), his on-off girlfriend, Caroline Ellison (Julia Garner), and how their shared love of “effective altruism” led to one of the most spectacular financial collapses of the digital age. Most accounts of their cryptocurrency platform, FTX, have focused on Bankman-Fried — he was, after all, the face of the company, while Ellison stayed largely behind the scenes, running FTX’s sister firm, Alameda. But The Altruists offers a real, human story about how two people can flirt and one-up each other into fraud, conspiracy, and an $8 billion mess. —EGP

‘Dig’ (Peacock, Nov. 23)

Amy Poehler reunites with Parks and Recreation‘s co-creator Michael Schur for this new sitcom about a quartet of archeologists excavating a site in Greece. They happen upon a discovery that may or may not put them in the middle of an international conspiracy, and definitely makes for a nice wrinkle in what sounds like a first-rate workplace comedy with picture-postcard scenery. British comedy legend and House veteran Hugh Laurie co-stars, along with Thunderbolts* star Geraldine Viswanathan, Lovesick‘s Antonia Thomas, and recent Tony nominee Fina Strazza. —D.F.

‘Blade Runner 2099’ (Prime, Nov. 25)

When we last checked in with the world of replicants and blade runners — that’d be roughly 2049, for those of you playing at home — the synthetic beings were still being used for slave labor and tracked down by Homo sapien professionals when they went rogue. This Amazon Prime show fast-forwards to the end of the 21st century and finds that things have changed drastically over the past 50 years. After an uprising, replicants are now the dominant force in dystopian Los Angeles; humans have been reduced to social submissives. But those darned droids are still known to wreak havoc, which is why a replicant blade runner (Michelle Yeoh) and a human pretending to be a replicant (Hunter Schafer) team up to find a bunch of breaking-bad ‘bots. Judging from the trailer, this series has absolutely nailed the franchise’s signature cyberpunk-noir look. —D.F.

‘Youth’ (HBO, Dec. 20)

A 50-year-old divorcée and empty nester with a “dick for brains” ex (that’s how he’s listed in her phone), a (possibly sociopathic) son going off to college, an unfulfilling career, and a dating life that swings from mildly depressing to disastrous. Is there anyone you’d rather see bring this character to life than Sharon Horgan? The creator and star of comedies such as Pulling, Catastrophe, and more, Horgan is a master of writing with bracing honesty about the anxieties, insecurities, aspirations, frustrations, exasperations, and confusions of being a woman. But seeing her tackle the particular indignities of middle age with her signature wit and candor makes this series appointment viewing. Throw in Rupert Friend (Homeland, Anatomy of a Scandal) as her dopey sometimes-hookup for an extra dose of can’t-miss magic. —Maria Fontoura

‘Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone’ (HBO, Dec. 25)

It’s been, what, a quarter of a century since the first adaptation of the initial Harry Potter book hit screens? Far be it from the good folks at Warners to let a lucrative intellectual property lie dormant for too long! The question here is not why they’ve rebooted the Potter franchise so much as why it took them this long to do it. (Well, OK, we can think of afewpossiblereasons.) Newcomer Dominic McLaughlin plays the Boy Who Lived, while Arabella Stanton and Alastair Stout are the new Hermione Granger and Ron Weasley, respectively. And like the movies, this HBO series is jam-packed with a who’s-who supporting cast: John Lithgow, Kit Harington, Bel Powley, Nick Frost, Johnny Flynn, Janet McTeer, The Tick‘s Peter Serafinowicz. [Waves wand] Premiumstreamium Leviosa! —D.F.