The Cloudland Company
It was a quiet week for new TV series premieres as the Summer begins to wane and networks prepare their new Fall slates, but there were two new scripted cable series that premiered this week that had multiple season runs that also garnered some attention from the Emmys. 2004 gave us a prestigious series about the lives of firefighters in New York City post-9/11 and a Big Brother-type of game show, while 2014 gave us a superhero show for kids, two docuseries and one cooking competition. Scroll down the list to see what premiered this week and tell us if any of your favorites are on the list.
1954
- No new series premiered this week in 1954.
1964
- No new series premiered this week in 1964.
1974
- No new series premiered this week in 1974.
1984
- No new series premiered this week in 1984.
1994
- No new series premiered this week in 1994.
2004
- July 21 – Rescue Me (FX, Seven seasons, 93 episodes)
- July 22 – Studio 7 (The WB, One season, 8 episodes)
Rescue Me was co-created by its star Denis Leary. A series of ten Minisodes streamed on Crackle between Seasons 4 and 5 in 2008 that were mostly stand-alone segments. The Minisodes bridged a year-long gap between the seasons that was caused by the 2007-2008 Writers Guild strike. The show earned eight Emmy nominations during its run, winning one in 2009 for Michael J. Fox as Guest Actor in a Drama Series. Leary received two Emmy nominations and one Golden Globe nomination.
Studio 7 was a hybrid reality-game show, hosted by Pat Kiernan, in which seven mostly college-age contestants lived together in New York City for four days prior to the taping of the show. They were given material to study on which they would be quizzed. The WB initially ordered two seasons of the show that were to air back-to-back, but the second season was cancelled during the first season’s run due to low ratings.
2014
Nickelodeon Productions
- July 22 – Food Fighters (NBC, Two seasons, 18 episodes)
- July 23 – BAPs (Lifetime, One season, 4 episodes)
- July 26 – Henry Danger (Nickelodeon, Five seasons, 121 episodes)
- July 27 – Escaping Alaska (TLC, One season, 6 episode)
Food Fighters, hosted by Adam Richman, was a reality-based cooking competition that pitted a home chef against five professionals for a chance to win up to $100,000.
BAPs was a docuseries that followed privileged and affluent African American friends who identified as BAPs, or Black American Princesses/Princes.
Nickelodeon initially ordered a 20-episode first season of Henry Danger, but extended the order to 26 episodes. The series premiered with a one-hour episode. Frankie Grande appeared in four episodes including a musical special. The series spawned two spin-offs set in the ‘Dangerverse”, 2018’s animated The Adventures of Kid Danger, and 2020’s Danger Force, which featured Cooper Barnes and Michael D. Cohen reprising their roles from the original series. Paramount Plus announced a Henry Danger movie in 2022 with Jace Norman reprising the title role.
Escaping Alaska was a spin on the Breaking Amish format which featured a group of young Inuits secretly leaving their communities to experience the world outside of Alaska and decide whether to return or not.
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