A sequel to Howzat, a Schapelle Corby biopic, two more cooking shows (ugh) and more of the same old reality crap are just a few of the programming highlights Channel Nine have scheduled to go to air next year after revealing their 2013 programming lineup at the network’s Upfronts yesterday in Sydney (following on from Ten, SBS and Seven’s 2013 Upfronts earlier this year).
The follow-up to one of this year’s most popular mini-series, Power Games: The Packer Murdoch Story will take on the relationship between the two media mogul liver spots who met at a tennis party in the 1960s, so expect some excellent costuming, barely-there tennis whites and prosthetics galore! Sadly nanny-hating volleyball champ Wendi Deng won’t get a walk-on smack-down cameo as Wendi Deng because she was born halfway through the series’ fifteen year timeframe (1968) 🙁
The Great Australian Bake Off (self-explanatory) will be fronted by Kenny (Shane Jacobsen, why?) and the woman who hosted Junior Masterchef (Anna Gare), so expect a few mouth-watering moments and some atrocious fondant creations as Australians try to bake their way through the craze that won’t die. Also coming out of the oven is The Taste, an American format that pits four teams of four cooks mentored by four chefs against each other in blind tastings, and presumably cookings. It sounds confusing and delicious. Nigella Lawson and Anthony Bourdain are signed on to mentor so expect some serious cussing and some suggestive everything.
Australia’s Got Talent has shed itself of Channel 7 and any excess weight it was carrying with Kyle Sandilands as a judge. It still won’t be watchable, probably.
A revamp of 1983 tele-drama Return To Eden sounds like an aptly-timed, thinly veiled dig at Gina Rinehart. Here’s the plot: Australia’s richest businesswoman with a troubled past and a dysfunctional family life survives a brutal attack on her outback property and goes into hiding in fear of her life. Presumed dead, her family fortune is up for grabs and her teenage children are bereft. She hatches an audacious plan to seek revenge on those who have wronged her. And with a second chance at life, she vows to be a better mother and person too. Does that not sound exactly like a Rinehart future biopic? Except for the bereft children and better person bits.
Nine looks to be trying to emulate the success of Underground: The Julian Assange Story with a biopic inspired by the trials and tribulations of one Schapelle Corby, the incarcerated beauty therapist from the Gold Coast and the world’s most famous Schapelle. Schapelle the show takes it narrative cues from the bestseller Sins of the Father by investigative journalist Eamonn Duff and will no doubt draw big audiences.
Imported viewing fare includes Tom Stoppard’s HBO/BBC adaptation of Ford Madox Ford’s novels from the 1920s, a four part WWI love triangle epic called Parade’s End, starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Rebecca Hall and Australian actress Adelaide Clemens. Everything tastes better with Kevin Bacon, who stars in FBI thriller The Following. There’s also the broody comic book adaptation of Arrow about a Bruce Wayne replicant with billions of dollars, incredible marksmanship and the ability to salmon ladder with the best of them.
Returning Nine content includes The Voice, which is still sans a fourth host. Delta, Seal and Joel have all signed on to coach the second season, but that ole tease Nine still won’t tell us who the new judge is. An all-stars series of The Block will be followed by another series with a supersized cast of eight couples, causing sixteen times as many renovation-related headaches. Big Brother and The Celebrity Apprentice are also back because nobody ever truly learns from their mistakes, as is another series of House Husbands, Underbelly (Squizzy) and more Hamish & Andy branded stubble/content.
Nine has also announced that it is producing “the most ambitious drama in Australian television history” by taking on the story of Gallipoli in 2015, just in time for the 100th anniversary of the Gallipoli landing. It’s being produced by John Edwards, Imogen Banks, and Robert Connolly, whose combined credits include Howzat! Kerry Packer’s War, Beaconsfield, Paper Giants, Puberty Blues, Offspring, Balibo, The Boys, Underground: The Julian Assange Story and The Slap; or basically everything that has ever been watchable on Australian TV in the last two years. Should be good!
Unfortunately, The Big Bang Theory, 2 Broke Girls, Anger Management, and Two and a Half Men are also returning, but not even the cast of Two and a Half Men want you to watch that crap anymore.
via TV Tonight
