Monthly Archives: September 2025

Sep 26 2025
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Books, DVDs, Movies, Music, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more! Sept. 26 – Oct. 2

Family secrets, Halloween’s almost here and ‘The Simpsons’ plunge into season 37!

“Edward Scissorhands” kicks off a month of Halloween-themed fun on Freeform.

FRIDAY, Sept. 26
Hispanic Heritage Awards
38th annual event celebrates Latino history and culture with performances by some of the most talented acts in Latin music (9 p.m., PBS).

All of You
Best friends (Brent Goldstein and Imogene Poots) spend years trying to resist the urge to couple up despite the undeniable feeling that they belong together (Apple TV+).

SATURDAY, Sept. 27
Unlocked: Family Secrets
New reality series focuses on “hidden” things families find (and find out about) their loved ones in their homes (9 p.m., Own).

SUNDAY, Sept. 28
America’s Funniest Home Videos
Think you’ve had all the home-video yuks possible since this show started airing 36 years ago? Not by a long shot, as tonight’s start for the new season will show you! (7 p.m., ABC).

The Simpsons
Hear, hear: Tonight begins season 37 (!) of the iconic animated grown-up comedy series, in which Lisa gets hooked on Marge’s ‘90s wardrobe and becomes part of a fashionista bling ring (8 p.m., Fox).

MONDAY, Sept. 29
Epic Ride: The Story of Universal Theme Parks
Three-part docuseries spotlights the new theme park, Universal Epic Universe in Orlando, Fla., touted as the “theme park of the future,” and the broaders theme park legacy of Universal (Peacock).

Murder Before Evensong
Matthew Lewis (from Harry Potter and All Creatures Great and Small) stars in this new murder mystery series set in 1980s England after a dead body turns up in a church. Holy s*&%! (Acorn TV).

TUESDAY, Sept. 30
Chad Powers
Glen Powell stars in this new series (above)—with Peyton and Eli Manning among the producers—as a washed-out college football star who takes on a new identity for a struggling Southern team (Hulu).

Hard Hat Riot
Learn how a group of workers clashed with Kent State University protestors in 1970, just days after four of the students were shot dead by National Guardsmen, in a disturbance that came to define and reshape the era’s political climate for decades to come (9 p.m., PBS).Hard Hat Riot

Mark Wahlberg and LaKeith Stanfeld

WEDNESDAY, Oct. 1
Play Dirty
Mark Wahlberg leads the cast as an expert thief planning a mega heist who runs afoul of the New York mob this action drama that also features LaKeith Stanfeld, Nat Wolff, Keegan-Michael Key and Tony Shalhoub (Prime Video).

31 Nights of Halloween
The network’s month-long fun fest of scary movies begins tonight, with Edward Scissorhands, The Haunted Mansion (2003), Casper (1995), Beetlejuice and Hocus Pocus (Freeform).  

THURSDAY, Oct. 2
Karen Pirie
Outlander’s Lauren Lyle returns for season two in this Brit series in the role of an investigator looking into a brutal high-profile 1984 kidnapping…and a murder (BritBox).

BRING IT HOME

Get ready for Halloween with the new Nightmare on Elm Street 7-Collection (Warner Bros. Discovery), a roundup of Freddy Krueger’s greatest hits from 1984 into the ‘90s. Watch for some familiar faces in between the blood spatters, including Johnny Depp, John Saxon and Ronee Blakley. Special features include closer looks at the movies and their cultural impact.

Tom Hiddleston stars in The Life of Chuck (Decal/Neon), a creatively awesome  tale adapted from a Stephen King story about three chapters in the life of an ordinary man who discovers the importance of the connections he’s made in his lifetime. It’s also got a lot to chew on about art, science, music, life and death, ghosts…and dancing. With Mark Hamill, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Karen Gillan, Jacob Tremblay and Mia Sara (who played Sloan, the girlfriend, in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off).

A New York City matchmaker (Dakota Johnson) thinks she has love down to a formula when she unexpectedly falls for a dapper “unicorn” (Pedro Pascal), which throws her relationship with her boyfriend (Chris Evans) into a tailspin. It’s all part of the urban, urbane tangled-love-triangle comedy in Materialists from director Celine Strong (Past Lives).

For the living, we’ve sure thought a lot about the dead. In The Undead in World Mythology and Folklore (McFarland), author Theresa Bane digs into our long, deep fascination with the idea of zombies—and nearly 400 other kinds of creatures, from the ancient abhartach to Frankenstein’s monster—that have for centuries sparked our imaginations, shaped our stories…and fueled our nightmares.

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Twenty-two years after its initial release, Cher’s The Farewell Tour (Warner Bros.) makes a remastered appearance on vinyl with more than 20 songs recorded live, including “If I Could Turn Back Time,” “Believe,” “Half-Breed” and “Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me).” Cher this new with a friend who loves Cher!

Jam again to the British prog-rock of The Zombies, newly remastered in glorious mono to sound just like they did back in 1968. The retooled vinyl for Odessey and Oracle—originally released as the band’s second LP—reminds us of how it became a cult favorite and a classic of the era’s pop-psychedelic scene, largely with its iconic track “Time of the Season.” And the deep track “This Will Be Our Year” found life beyond the album with later use as a soundtrack song on Mad Men, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and Schitt’s Creek.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

What makes a house a home? Get some great ideas in The Family Home (Hardie Grant Books), in which authors Courtney and Michael Adamo share how to create living spaces that address personal stylistic choices while meeting the evolving practical needs of a growing family. Packed with photos and inspiration from just about everywhere, from California houses to inner-city London pads, it shows how to make a house a home for the everyone under its roof.

Get your oom-pah-pah’s out with The Perfect Tuba (Bloomsbury), author Sam Quinones’ rousing look at musicians who play the tuba—from symphony members to high school marching bands—and how they weave a very specific musical thread into America’s cultural fabric. And, lest you think the tuba is only one kind of instrument, you’ll learn about its three varieties!

Sep 19 2025
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The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more, Sept. 19 – 25!

A Batman marathon, Farm Aid returns & inside the event that was Lilith Fair

FRIDAY, Sept. 19
Night of the Reaper
A year after a young woman is brutally murdered, her sister returns home—as does the killer—in this network original nail-biter (Shudder). 

Happy Mess Method
Organizational expert Sabrina Soto and New York Times bestselling author Jennifer McCartney help celebrity and non-celebrity clients in this new series to find realistic and sustainable methods for keeping their homes tidy (Roku).

SATURDAY, Sept. 20
Batman Day
Celebrate the caped crusader with a marathon of movies, starting with Batman, followed by Batman Returns, The Batman and Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice. And if you want more, well, bat’s all, folks! (11 a.m., TNT).

Farm Aid 40
The concert event to help farmers hits the big 4-0 this year, live from Minneapolis with performances by original founders Willie Nelson, Neil Young and John Mellencamp, plus Dave Matthews and Margo Price (7 p.m., CNN)

SUNDAY, Sept. 21
A Grammy Salute to Earth, Wind & Fire Live: The 21st Night of September
Honoring the genre-bending Chicago-based band whose hits include “Sing a Song,” “Fantasy,” “Let’s Groove,” “Shining Star” and “Boogie Wonderland” (8 p.m., CBS).

Lilith Fair: Building a Mystery
Feature-length documentary offers the untold story of the groundbreaking music festival (above) that featured only female artists, started by Canadian singer-songwriter Sarah McLachlan and her team in the 1990s in opposition to systemic barriers to women in the music business (Hulu).

MONDAY, Sept. 22
The Bitter Pill
Documentary follows an attorney who takes on pharma giants in the wake of the vast devastation cause by opioids in his West Virginia community, resulting in the largest civil litigation in U.S. history (PBS).

The Voice
NBC’s four-time Emmy Award-winning musical competition series returns with all-star coaches Michael Bublé, Snoop Dogg, Niall  Horan and Reba McEntire reclaiming their red chairs for season 28 (7 p.m., NBC).

TUESDAY, Sept. 23
The Lowdown
New series follows the gritty exploits of a citizen journalist (Ethan Hawke) whose obsession with the truth always seems to get him in trouble, especially when he noses around after the suspicious suicide of a powerful family’s “black sheep” (Tim Blake Nelson) (FX, Hulu).

Murder in a Small Town
A new police chief (Rossif Sutherland) relocates to a quiet coastal town in this new series, but quickly learns that the paradise-like setting holds many dark secrets (8 p.m., Fox).

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 24
The Golden Bachelor
Two-hour season premiere features a new leading-man hunk, Mel Owens, lookin’ for love on the hit dating reality show (8 p.m., ABC).

99 to Beat
New game show hosted by Ken Jeong and Erin Andrews pits 100 contestants in a gauntlet of games and competitions, with one of them eventually winning $1,000,000 (9 p.m., Fox).

THURSDAY, Sept. 25
The Amazing Race
38th season premiere kicks things off tonight with racing competitors from TV’s Big Brother (9 p.m., CBS).

Special Forces: The World’s Toughest Test
Celebs from all genres and walks of life take on, and try to survive, demanding training exercises just like “real” special forces agents in tonight’s season four launch (9 pm., Fox).

NOW HEAR THIS

38 Special, the Southern rockers who gave the world the hits “Hold On Loosely” and “Caught Up in You,” celebrate five decades of musical togetherness with Milestone, their first album in more than 20 years. Guest stars Randy Bachman (from Bachman-Turner Overdrive) and Pat Monihan (from Train) join the party, and the band is touring in support of the new release. Rock on, Southern boys!

Soul master Ray Charles’ long-out-of-print 1963 album Ingredients in a Recipe of Soul is newly released on vinyl, with a tasteful blend of genre-hopping pop and soul that made him a hitmaker and signaled his musical director for the decades to come. It’s a feast for the ears with tracks including  “Busted,” “That Old Lucky Sun,” “Over the Rainbow” and “You’ll Never Walk Alone.”

BRING IT HOME

Superhero mythology gets a Mesoamerican tweak in Aztec Batman: Clash of Empires (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), which puts a new animated version of the caped crusader against a backdrop of deep-dish Mexico history—and into a tale of a young Aztec boy who experiences tragedy when his father is murdered by Spanish Conquistadors.

Marvel anew to the stop-motion mastery of director Tim Burton’s Corpse Bride (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), the newly mastered 2005 classic featuring the voices of Emily Watson, Tracey Ullman, Albert Finney, Richard E. Grant and Christopher Lee.

Look! Up in the air! It’s Superman (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment), the latest big-screen incarnation of the iconic Man of Steel. Director Peter Gunn (of Guardians of the Galaxy fame) creates a vibrantly imagined DC universe with epic action, humor and heart, delivering a new Superman (David Corenswet) driven by compassion and an inherent belief in the goodness of humankind.

One of crime fiction’s greatest detective sidekicks—Sherlock Holmes’ loyal assistant—was reinvented earlier this year for TV in a modernized version. Now you can own the first season of the CBS series Watson (Paramount Pictures), starring Morris Chestnut as a former London detective now running a clinic and cracking medical mysteries.  

Fortified with new upgrades, the rampaging robot dolly makes her return in M3GAN 2.0, this time fighting a new military-grade techno-horror. With Allison Williams, Violet McGraw and Jenna Davis.

READ ALL ABOUT IT

Get busy rockin’ and readin’ with Rockin’ Round the Christmas Tree (Harper Collins Focus), a nostalgic guide to holiday celebrations inspired by the classic yuletide classic from Brenda Lee. Filled with recipes, drinks, crafts, activities, games and topics like the history of mistletoe, how to choose a tree and ornaments, it’s an ideal holiday companion for just about anyone. And you’ll even get Brenda Lee’s own recipe for Praline Pumpkin Pie!

Forget about fussing around in the kitchen, you should be paying more attention to the company in your living room. That’s the message, or part of it, in Let The Biscuits Burn (Nelson Books), author Abby Kuykendall’s advice to hosts and hostesses about putting hospitality and home entertaining at the fore, and how welcoming others into your home makes for a richer, fuller life. And what’s God got to do with it? You’ll find out that, too.

What’s it like to live in a tropical paradise? Well, most of us won’t ever know first-hand, but The Iconic Tropical House (Thames & Hudson) architectural photographer Patrick Bingham-Hall shows off homes in exotic spots in India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Thailand and other far-flung ports of call, explaining why they look so, well, tropical—a combination of climate, location, colonization and modernism. So kick off your shoes, relax, feel the breeze, and let the 350 high-quality photographs take you there.

Here kitty, kitty! In Cat Tales: A History (Thames & Hudson), you’ll learn from anthropologist Jerry D. Moore all about our long, incredible and even improbable history of relationships with felines, and how they became one of the most popular domesticated animal companions in the world. From fearsome prehistoric predators to spoiled house pets, it’s all here. And it asks the purr-fect question, Who domesticated who? Illustrated with photos, maps and artwork. 

Since the beginning of time, humans have longed to fly, like the birds. Iver P. Cooper‘s But Will It Fly? (McFarland) is a sprightly history of the many unconventional ways our predecessors tried to get off the ground, with muscles, steam, sails, oars, flapping wings and rockets. Find out all about it in this colorful, richly detailed history of our long history of trying to get up in the air.

Sep 18 2025
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Him”

Stylish horror show stabs at the brutality of a sport worshipped by Americans every weekend

Him
Starring Marlon Wayans, Tyric Withers and Julia Fox
Directed by Justin Tipping
Rated R

In theaters Friday, Sept. 19

With phantasmagoric imagery, religious references and vicious stabs into the heart of American football, this high-toned horror show wants to make you think about the destructive brutality of the game that a young college quarterback (Tyric Withers) feels like he was destined to play.

Withers’ character, Cameron Cade, grew up with a football-obsessed father idolizing a (fictitious) NFL team, the Saviors (religious reference!), and their star quarterback, Isaiah White (Marlon Wayans). Ever since he was a child, little Cade dreamed of being the GOAT, the greatest-of-all-time QB. “I’m him!” he shouts.

When Cade gets a concussion, his plans of becoming the new Saviors quarterback are sidelined and he goes to train for a week at White’s private compound. There he enters a nightmarish swirl of violent drills, unsettling visions and bloody psychological games. Wayans, best known for his comedy work, shows that he’s more than capable playing a menacing, duplicitous mentor—a buddy-bro friend one moment, a grinning demon the next—in a HQ that looks like a cross between the lair of a James Bond villain and a massive desert monastery. And turns out White isn’t so ready to give up his own GOAT mantle.

Director Justin Tipping—working under the banner of producer Jordan Peele’s horror-centric Monkeypaw Productions—throws in a mad swirl of stylistic touches, mostly to heighten the sense of Cade’s increasing disorientation. Was Cade attacked (twice!) by a pickaxe-wielding mascot? Did he choke an overzealous fan to death, or was that a bad dream? Was he really seduced by White’s sexy wife (Julia Fox)? Are those NFL owners actually wearing pig masks? Sometimes it feels like an extreme Twilight Zone, or an episode of the British series Black Mirror, with dabs of grotesque, Fellini-esque weirdness—like a quick flash of a dinner staged to look like Jesus and his disciples in da Vinci’s The Last Supper.

At a party, the team doctor toasts Cade with what the New Testament notes as Jesus’ last words on the cross: “It is finished” (yet another religious reference.) But Him isn’t finished until it’s drilled home the intense commitment—and sacrifices—required to become a professional football star. “No pain, no gain,” we hear more than once. It’s a sport where players are “groomed” to conform to rules and learn to be ruthless, to become “killers”—or to get grievously injured. It’s a sport with violence and combative terms in its very vocabulary; a pass can be a “bomb” or a “bullet,” or “lobbed,” like a grenade. And it’s a sport that encourages the glorification—bordering on deification—of its star performers.

But it’s no rah-rah endorsement of the game, by any means. It reminds viewers that football can chew up its players, break them inside and out. When it all ends, in a grand-guignol splash of severed heads, fountains of blood, slit throats and a body sprawled atop a pentagram, on a playing field surrounded by faceless cheerleaders and pompoms, it’s not exactly a rousing halftime show.

Him is a clash of the titans, a gladiatorial battle to the death, an angels-and-demons war exposing the ruthless soul of a sport that many Americans openly “worship.” And somehow, it makes sports mascots even creepier than they already are.

—Neil Pond

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Sep 12 2025
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Books, DVDs, History, Movies, Music, Photography, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more! Sept. 12 – 18

A new morning for ‘The Morning Show,’ honoring TV’s top performers & meet the real ‘Top Guns’

Reese Witherspoon & Jennifer Aniston return to ‘The Morning Show.’

FRIDAY, Sept. 12
Lost in the Jungle
True story about a deadly plane crash that stranded four young siblings deep in the Columbia rain forest, sparking a dramatic rescue mission in a race against time (9 p.m., National Geographic).

Vampirina: Teenage Vampire
New series about a tween bloodsucker (Mykal-Michelle Harris) who leaves the safety of Transylvania to attend an arts boarding school and cultivate her passion for music (8 p.m., Disney Channel). 

SATURDAY, Sept. 13
A Husband to Die For
The horrifying story of a pregnant woman who is savagely attacked in her home and left for dead, only to discover it was all orchestrated by her very own husband. Starring Keana Lyn Bastidas and Marilu Henner (Lifetime).

Grace for the World
Live performances from Pharrell Williams, Jennifer Hudson, Andrea Bocelli, John Legend, Jelly Roll and more will air from St. Peter’s Square, marking the first time such a musical televised event has ever occurred from the heart of Vatican City (streaming on Disney+, Hulu and ABC News Live) 

SUNDAY, Sept. 14
The Ride With Norman Reedus
Climb aboard for season seven with motorcycle enthusiast and Walking Dead star Norman Reedus on more epic road trips around the world (AMC and AMC+).

The Emmy Awards
Comedian Nate Bargatze hosts tonight’s 77th annual presentation honoring the year’s top TV shows and talent (8 p.m., CBS).

MONDAY, Sept. 15
Celebrity Weakest Link
Jane Lynch returns as host of the cutthroat game show with stars from TV, sports and standup comedy (8 p.m., Fox). 

Antiques Roadshow
The durable docuseries continues its 29th season with all-new “vintage” episodes, looking back at memorable objects from 15 years ago and accessing what they’re worth today (8 p.m., PBS).

TUESDAY, Sept. 16

The Real Housewives of Salt Lake City
Season six begins with a supersized crossover episode as the girls prepare to charter the boat and crew of Below Deck Down Under for a glamorous cruise (8 p.m., Bravo).

Top Guns: The Next Generation
There’s no Tom Cruise, but this new six-part series does take you inside the U.S. Navy’s elite aviation program to meet the student pilots and go inside their rigorous  training program (8 p.m., National Geographic).

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 17
Academy of Country Music Honors
Carly Pearce hosts this celebration of country superstars, including Clint Black, Tim McGraw, K.T. Oslin, Mary Chapin Carpenter (8 p.m., Fox).

Electric Bloom
New music-themed comedy mockumentary series about the young women (above) who make up the “world’s biggest band” (Disney +).

The Morning Show
Reese Witherspoon and Jennifer Aniston return to lead the star-stuffed cast for season four of the award-winning drama about goings-on (AI, love triangles, coverups, cutthroat competition, corporate meddling and ghosts of the past) at a NYC TV network in a highly polarized America (Apple TV+).

THURSDAY, Sept. 18
Sounds of Summer
Feel-good true story about Swedish pop sensation Gyllene Tilder, one of the most successful bands in Sweden ever, led by Pat Gessle, who would go on to co-found the group Roxette (Viaplay).

Black Rabbit
A rising-star restaurateur (Jude Law) is forced into New York’s criminal underworld in this limited thriller series when his chaotic brother (Jason Bateman) returns to town with loan sharks on his trail (Netflix).

READ ALL ABOUT IT

Since the beginning of time, humans have wondered what it would be like to fly above the earth, like birds. The new 25th anniversary edition of Earth from Above, by Yann Arthus-Bertrand, combines original images with new photography and contemporary insights from environmental experts to show worldwide, bird’s-eye-view splendors of our planet while gauging our progress as caretakes over the past three decades.

Here, kitty kitty. Feline fanciers will love City Cats of Instanbul (Thames & Hudson), a photographic journey by photographer Marcel Heijnen into the lives of the felines that live on the streets of Turkey’s largest metropolis, one of civilization’s oldest outposts.

Take an eye-popping tour of some prize-winning buildings in Assemble: Building Collective (Thames & Hudson), a look at some 40 major works from a design group that’s been called the future of architecture for its emphasis on community-based, collaborative projects in Great Britain, rural Japan and France.

You’ve no doubt hear about “making a deal with the Devil.” Devil’s Contract (Melville House) by Ed Simon takes a deep dive into the history of the Faustian bargain—from ancient times to bluesman Robert Johnson, into modern day—illustrating how sacrificing our principles in pursuit of power can invite all kinds of social ills. It’s a fascinating plunge into the many twists of the enduring mythology of selling our souls.   

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Celebrate the 40th anniversary of Phil Collins’ hit 1985 album No Jacket Required (Atlantic) with this newly remastered 4-LP box set. In addition to the hits repressed on 180-gram hi-fidelity vinyl (“Sussido,” “One More Night,” “Don’t Lose My Number,” “Only You Know and I Know”), there are additional live tracks, including demos and a recording from Collin’s appearance at Live Aid.

Version 1.0.0

Get a taste of down-home Texas Blues with The Last Real Texas Blues Album (Antone’s Records), honoring the 50th anniversary of the iconic Austin nightclub Antone’s. Fittingly, the album is filled with artists who’ve performed there, including The Fabulous Thunderbirds, Jimmie Vaughn, Charlie Sexton, Lil’ Ed Wilson and McKinley James, performing classics like “You’ll Lose a Good Thing,” “The Sky is Crying,” “Flip, Flop and Fly” and “Going Down.” Put it on, turn it up, and dig it.

Sep 10 2025
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale”

Concluding big-screen period-piece drama shows change afoot in Crawley Manor and its upstairs/downstairs world

Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale
Starring Michelle Dockery, Joanne Froggatt, Elizabeth McGovern, Hugh Bonneville & Paul Giamatti
Directed by Simon Curtis
PG

In theaters Friday, Sept. 12

It’s time for one more—and one last—trip back to post-Edwardian England to gaze upon the Crawley family as they deal with a final, brow-furrowing wave of high-society scandal, a financial fiasco…and the hubbub of an American celebrity coming to dinner.

In this seqel to the 2022 movie, it’s 1930 and the Downton estate is rocked when everyone finds out Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery) is a divorcee—gasp! Then her uncle (Paul Giamatti) arrives on a visit from America, bearing some not-good news about the family’s investment assets. Can a posh dinner—with a guest appearance by flamboyant American playwright Noel Coward (Arty Froushan)—restore some high-society shine to this upper-crust Yorkshire world created some 15 years ago by British writer Julian Fellowes?

Downton Abbey, which began as a PBS series back in 2010, ran for six seasons before leaping onto the big screen. Fellowes returns in this third movie adaptation as screenwriter, and director Simon Curtis mostly picks up where he left off with 2022’s Downton Abbey: A New Era.


Laura Carmichael as Lady Edith and Michelle Dockery as Lady Mary

Fans will recognize a slew of familiar faces—in addition to Dockery and Giamatti—reprising their TV and movie roles. There’s Hugh Bonneville as Lord Grantham, showing the stress of years atop “the throne” of Downton alongside his wife, Lady Grantham (Elizabeth McGovern). Joanne Frogatt is Anna Bates, a Downton servant now expecting a baby with her valet husband (Brendan Coyle). There’s Mr. Mason (Paul Copley), a farmer married to a Downton cook (Leslie Nicole). And Daisy (Sophie McShera), a rising star in the kitchen, finds her voice in the community at large. Missing, though, is Dame Maggie Smith, who died in 2024. But her framed portrait, as matriarch Violet Crawley, looms large.

Among the new characters is Alessandro Nivola as a dashing, horse-racing “Yank” who captures Lady Mary’s fancy. But what are his true intentions? Can Lady Mary prove herself suitable to take over as the admin of Downton, to usher it into the next generation? How will the extended Downton “family” cope with the changes afoot in a world rocked with upheaval—a World War, the stock market crash of ’29, plus rising hemlines, same-sex relationships and the sloughing off of old stigmas, like marriages that just don’t work out?  

The Downton series and its movies have always depicted its era’s strictly enforced “segregation” of classes, from the upstairs aristocracy to the downstairs workers, and this one shows change afoot, as well, down in the servant quarters. Will Downton’s lords and ladies eventually progress to the point of having to (yikes!) cook for themselves?

It’s a posh, sumptuous-looking period piece, festooned with rich details, from dresses and ball gowns to top hats and a fleet of shiny vintage vehicles. There’s a fancy ball, a day at the races and a spirited county fair, where the two “classes” meet on common ground, a merry-go-round metaphor for equal social footing as Great Britain heads into its future.

There are no earthquakes, no space aliens, superheroes or serial killers. Just the retro highs and lows of a bygone era, a concluding look inside the lush manor where everyone looks sumptuous, tea is served in fine china and gleeful kids play cricket on manicured lawns. It doesn’t look like anything in anyone’s real experience, and that’s always been part of Downton Abbey’s deep-dish fan-fantasy appeal. And this dressed-up version of the past couldn’t last forever, and now it’s time for everyone to move on.

“It’s hard to accept that it’s time to go,” says Lord Grantham, facing the inevitable. In one scene toward the end, Paul Giamatti’s character sends up a rousing cheer for a moment of joyous entertainment, giving it hearty “Bravo!”  Most Downton Abbey fans will probably feel the same way.

—Neil Pond

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Sep 05 2025
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Books, DVDs, Movies, Music, Photography, Pop Culture, Television

The Entertainment Forecast

What to watch, and more, Sept. 5 – Sept. 11!

More ‘Murders,’ weather detectives, celebrity sex tapes and Charlie Sheen tells all!

Selena Gomez, Martin Short & Steve Martin return for more murder-mystery shenanigans in the new season of ‘Only Murders in the Building.’

FRIDAY, Sept. 5
Highest 2 Lowest
Denzel Washington stars in director Spike Lee’s neo-noir crime drama as a New York titan music mogul who finds himself in a life-or-death dilemma. With Jeffrey Wright, ASAP Rocky and Ice Spice (Apple TV+)

Dish It Out
Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsey’s daughter, Tilly, steps out from her famous dad’s impressive shadow her own cooking show (Prime).

SATURDAY, Sept. 6
The Girl Who Vanished
Lily and her parents are shocked when Emily, abducted when she was just a child, is found and returned to the family. But as strange events begin to unfold, they begin to question whether the past is truly behind them (8 p.m., Lifetime).

SUNDAY, Sept. 7
MTV Video Music Awards
What were the best music videos of the year? Find out in tonight’s three-hour simulcast, hosted by LL Cool J, of the iconic “Moon Man” trophy fest—and see what big award will be going to Mariah Carey (8 p.m., CBS, and streaming on Paramount+).

Task
Mark Ruffalo stars in this new series an FBI agent heading a task force to put an end to a string of violent robberies (9 p.m., HBO).

MONDAY, Sept. 8
Weather Hunters
Emmy-winning weatherman Al Roker is joined by Sheryl Lee Ralph, Holly Robinson Peete and LeVar Burton as voices in this new animated series about a “weather detective” and her family (PBS Kids).

Celebrity Sex Tapes
Want some juicy tabloid-y dirt? This provocative new docuseries looks at the most infamous, career-altering celebrity “leaks” of our time, including those from Pamela Anderson and Tommy Lee (above), Kim Kardashian, Colin Farrell and more (9 p.m., A&E).

TUESDAY, Sept. 9
Only Murders in the Building
Season five starts tonight of the dramedy starring Martin Short, Steve Martin and Selena Gomez as amateur sleuths and flatmates now discovering a dangerous web of secrets connecting billionaires, old-school mobsters and more (Hulu).

Becoming Thurgood: America’s Social Architect
Learn about the iconic lawyer and civil rights leader who became the first Black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court (10 p.m., PBS).

WEDNESDAY, Sept. 10
Downtown Abbey Celebrates the Grand Finale
Cast members celebrate the show’s final chapter (above) and look ahead to the feature film about the phenomenally successful series, in theaters Sept. 12 (9 p.m., NBC).

Charlie Sheen
The actor revisits his journey through fame and addiction with unflinching honesty (and some epic stories) in this new original documentary ((Netflix).

THURSDAY, Sept. 11
Tyler Perry’s Zatima
This Sistas spinoff follows the characters Fatima (Crystal Renee Hayslett )and Zac (Devale Ellis)  as they prepare for parenthood while navigating deep emotional scars and explosive entanglements (BET+).

NOW HEAR THIS

Groove again to one cool cat with On the Road to Findout: Greatest Hits (A&M/UMe), the first-ever collection of music spanning the entire career of Cat Stevens/Yusuf. You’ll hear “Peace Train,” “Wild World,” “Morning Has Broken,” “Moonshadow,” “Old Schoolyard” and dozens of other tracks from albums ranging from 1967 to 2023, plus a 24-page booklet with reflections from Stevens.

War, the genre-defying ‘70s band, is celebrated in The CD Collection: 1971-1975 (Rhino), a roundup of five essential albums by the California-based soul band: War, All Day Music, The World is a Ghetto, Deliver the Word and Why Can’t We Be Friends. Groove again to the tunes, including “The Cisco Kid,” “Slippin’ Into Darkness” and “Gyspy Man.”

BRING IT HOME

Find out why the third season of HBO’s hit high-society satire broke viewership records by reliving all the drama, surprises and fan-favorite characters in The White Lotus: The Complete Third Season (Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment), set in Thailand with a cast including Carrie Coon, Leslie Bibb, Walton Goggins, Michelle Monaghan, Parker Posey, Patrick Schwarzenegger—and a gollywhopper of an appearance by Sam Rockwell.

Get your retro groove with Spenser: For Hire: The Complete Series (Warner Bros. Discovery Home Entertainment), marking the 40th anniversary of the 1980s ABC-TV drama starring hunky Robert Urich as a Boston P.I. looking into a new murder each episode. This new set marks the first time all three seasons—65 episodes—of the show have corralled into one collection.

The dinos roar again in Jurassic World: Rebirth (Universal Pictures Home Entertainment), the latest entry in the franchise that began back in 1993. Featuring an all-new set of characters, this one stars Scarlett Johannson, Mahershala Ali and Rupert Friend coming across some mutated, mega-nasty CHI dino beasties on a tropical island—and planning to swipe some embryos for a “buyer” back home. Extras include a doc about making the movie, plus deleted scenes, an alternate opening and more.

Rebel Wilson, Anna Camp and Anna Chlumsky star in Bride Hard (Magenta Light Studios), a rollicking comedy about a wedding’s party that turns the tables on a mercenary group with designs on taking the guests hostage.

One of the year’s best horror flicks, Clown in a Cornfield, is now available in a 4K Steelbook edition. Katie Douglas, Aaron Abrams, Will Sasso and Kevin Durand star in the terrifying tale of a small community menaced by, yes, a clown in a cornfield, who comes to cleanse the town of its burdens, one victim at a time.

How did Brenda Lee go from being a teeny teenage singing sensation—Little Miss Dynamite—to later become a global icon, the first woman to enter both the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame? You can find out in Brenda Lee: Rockin’ Around (Mercury Studios, TH Entertainment and Nashville PBS), which covers her life and career, and her interactions with The Beatles, Patsy Cline and Elvis. Rock on, Brenda!

READ ALL ABOUT IT

In Grime (City Lights), author Thea Matthews uses poetry to create an unflinching coming-of-age portrait of the glamour and the grit of San Francisco’s notorious “tenderloin district” and the squalor of its poverty and addiction. It’s a story of dirt and detritus, but also of survival, triumph and resiliency in the face of overwhelming odds.

Get an early jump on the Christmas spirit with the newly revised edition of Norman Rockwell’s Christmas (originally released in 1977), which pairs more than 80 pieces of timeless artwork from the archive of the iconic painter with a variety of Christmas poems, stories and carols…plus a “vintage” Christmas dinner recipe from 1896! (Abrams)

Sep 02 2025
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Movie Reviews

Movie Review: “The Long Walk”

Latest Stephen King movie adaptation is a bleak, unpleasant slog

The Long Walk
Starring Cooper Hoffman, David Johnson, Charlie Plummer & Roman Griffin Davis
Directed by Francis Lawrence
Rated R

In theaters Friday, Sept. 12

A bleak dystopian parable set in a too-close-for-comfort future, The Long Walk depicts America as a militaristic totalitarian police state and an entire generation so traumatized by war and economic collapse that a death march seems like a good idea.

Based on an early novel by Stephen King (the first he ever wrote, back in the 1960s when he was a freshman at the University of Maine), it’s about a grueling annual walking contest in which young men are “chosen” from every state to compete on a course of more than 300 miles. There’s no stopping for any reason, and everyone receives penalty “warnings” for rule-breaking infractions—like pausing to pee or poop, walking too slow, falling behind, collapsing, or stepping off the pavement. Get three warnings, and you’re eliminated. That’s permanently eliminated—blam, you’re shot. The walk is over when there’s only one walker left alive—the ostensible winner.

The thought of winning—surviving—is the carrot on the stick, the thing that keeps the men trudging ahead: The lone survivor will receive whatever their heart desires, “more riches than you could possibly imagine,” says the Major (Mark Hamill) who runs the show. The walkers fantasize about what they’d do with such limitless wealth.

And it’s all televised.

King is widely recognized as a maestro of the macabre for the many adaptations of his work that became horror touchstones, like Carrie, It, The Shining, Children of the Corn, Salem’s Lot, Creepshow and Cujo. But others of his writings—like the ones that became The Shawshank Redemption and Stand By Me—were slim on the supernatural and rooted instead in human drama.

It isn’t a horror movie, per se, even though it depicts some truly horrific human drama, like young men getting brain-spattering kill shots to the head. And the walk itself is a monstrous event, ghoulish entertainment for looky-loos desperate for any kind of diversion. But it won’t ever bask in the same glow as The Shawshank Redemption or Stand By Me.  

You might recognize some of the walkers. Cooper Hoffman, the son of the late actor Philip Seymour Hoffman, made an impressive debut in Licorice Pizza back in 2021. David Johnson had a recurring role in HBO’s Industry. Roman Griffin Davis was the kid, Jojo, in Jojo Rabbit.

There are messages swirling around, about brotherhood and friendship, family, forced allegiance, how a society can easily slide into madness, our appetite for “extreme” entertainment. Director Francis Lawrence certainly knows dystopia; he helmed four flicks of the Hunger Games franchise, with a fifth in the works for next year.

But lofty messages can’t rise above the mire of this relentlessly dreary downer. It’s basically a movie about guys walking…and walking…and walking. And talking… talking… talking. Dying, dying, dying. There are exploding heads, pools of blood and other awfulness; a bloated, maggot-filled animal carcass on the roadside, a crucified crow strung up on a fence, a walker crushed to gristle underneath the treads of an armored car. It’s an ugly world; we get it. But the messaging is mired in the downer murk of one of the most visually unpleasant movie experiences of the year.

The Long Walk wants to lead viewers into a socially relevant cautionary tale. Too bad it takes such a nasty, depressing road-trip slog to get there.

—Neil Pond