TV Bits: ‘Everybody Hates Chris’, ‘Dad Stop Embarrassing Me!’, ‘Better Call Saul’, ‘Reacher’, and More

In this edition of TV Bits:

An animated version of Everybody Hates Chris is on the way.
Watch the Dad Stop Embarrassing Me! trailer for the new Netflix sitcom starring Jamie Foxx.
Better Call Saul digital series Employee Training will be back, along with the animated Slippin’ Jimmy.
Reacher, based on the Jack Reach series, adds more cast members.
Looney Tunes Cartoon executive producer Pete Browngardt signs new deal with Warner Bros. Animation and Cartoon Network.
The Witcher adds seven new cast members.
FX has renewed Snowfall for season 5.
David Duchovny will star in series based on his Truly Like Lightning book.
Netflix buys the A24 Steven Yeun & Ali Wong series Beef.
Paul Feig remaking BBC series Motherland for the U.S.

Everybody Hates Chris, the sitcom based on the life of Chris Rock, is returning – in cartoon form. Deadline broke the news, reporting that Rock would once again return as narrator. There’s no home for the show yet, but it’s being developed by CBS Studios. In the original live-action series, we followed young Chris Rock as he grew up in 1980s Brooklyn with “eccentric family members, including frugal father Julius, intimidating mother Rochelle, spoiled sister Tonya and younger brother Drew, who is more popular than Chris.”

Jamie Foxx started his career on TV with In Living Color. Since then, he’s become a major movie star and even won an Oscar. And now he’s returning to TV with the Netflix sitcom Dad Stop Embarrassing Me! It looks very sitcom-y, and that’s fine if that’s what you’re looking for. In the series, “Brian Dixon (Jamie Foxx), successful business owner and bachelor, just became a full-time father to his teenage daughter Sasha (Kyla-Drew). Determined to be the best father he can be, Brian’s going to need all the help he can get from his dad (David Alan Grier) and sister (Porscha Coleman) — and Sasha’s going to need all the help she can get learning how to deal with her new, lovingly chaotic.” The show is “inspired by Foxx’s real-life relationship with daughter Corinne Foxx, who also serves as executive producer,” and hits Netflix on April 14.

There's more Saul coming your way.

A new season of 'Employee Training' and a brand new animated series, 'Slippin' Jimmy' are officially in development. pic.twitter.com/r0plScSVtI

— Better Call Saul (@BetterCallSaul) March 19, 2021

We’re going to have to wait until 2022 to see the final season of Better Call Saul, and that sucks. But it looks like we’ll at least have something to hold us over because as the tweet above states, there’s a new season of Employee Training on the way, and an animated series called Slippin’ Jimmy. These are both digital extras that will take us further into the world of the show, and while it won’t be as good as getting to watch the new season, I’ll take what I can get at this point. Hopefully we’ll know more soon.

Reacher, the Amazon series based on Lee Child’s Jack Reacher books, has added some cast members. Per Deadline, Malcolm Goodwin, Willa Fitzgerald, and Chris Webster are now part of the show, which stars Alan Ritchson as the title character, a former military man who roams the United States taking odd jobs and kicking some ass. Goodwin will play “Chief Detective Oscar Finlay, a Harvard-educated, tweed suit-wearing Northerner who recently relocated to the small town of Margrave to take a job in the Margrave Police Department. Fitzgerald is “Roscoe Conklin, who was born and raised in Margrave and is a smart and proud officer in the Margrave PD. She is resilient and is intimidated by nothing and no one.” And Webster is playing “KJ, the spoiled son of businessman and town benefactor Kliner. KJ thinks the town and townspeople, especially Roscoe, belong to him.” The series is drawing primary inspiration from the first Reacher novel, The Killing Floor. Tom Cruise previously played Jack Reacher in two films that weren’t exactly faithful to the books.

Pete Browngardt, executive producer of HBO Max’s Looney Tunes Cartoons, just signed a new deal with Warner Bros. Animation and Cartoon Network Studios. Per Deadline, the deal will allow Browngardt “flexibility across both companies’ character and franchise libraries and give him the opportunity to pursue projects intended for both kid and adult audiences across WarnerMedia platforms and third party networks and streamers.” Browngardt said: “I have been lucky enough to call each of these studios my home at different points in my career. It’s only fitting that I begin this next run with the best of both worlds—returning home to Cartoon Network Studios and continuing my partnership with Warner Bros. Animation, which has been one of the most fulfilling of my career.”

Netflix’s The Witcher has added seven new cast members for season 2, as reported by THR. Here’s who’s who:

Adjoa Andoh (Bridgerton, Silent Witness) in the role of Nenneke. In the books, she’s a priestess of Melitele, and the head of the Temple of Melitele.
Cassie Clare (Brave New World, The Bisexual) in the role of Philippa Eilhart. She’s an advisor to Redania’s King Vizimir II and leader of the Lodge of Sorceresses. This casting was previously reported as joining the show on several fan sites, but this is the first time her casting has been confirmed by Netflix.
Liz Carr (Silent Witness, Devs) in the role of Fenn. Fenn was a partner in a law firm and detective agency in Dorian.
Simon Callow (A Room with A View, Four Weddings and a Funeral) in the role of Codringher. Fenn’s partner.
Graham McTavish (Outlander, The Hobbit) in the role of Dijkstra. He was a master spy and head of special forces for the kingdom of Redania.
Kevin Doyle (Downton Abbey, Happy Valley) in the role of Ba’lian. Another casting that was previously reported on fan sites and being confirmed for the first time. This is apparently a new character.
Chris Fulton (Bridgerton, Outlaw King) in the role of Rience. A a mage who was instructed to find Ciri after she disappeared during the slaughter of Cintra.

In the second season of the hit fantasy show, “Convinced Yennefer’s (Anya Chalotra) life was lost at the Battle of Sodden, Geralt of Rivia (Henry Cavill) brings Princess Cirilla (Freya Allan) to the safest place he knows, his childhood home of Kaer Morhen. While the Continent’s kings, elves, humans and demons strive for supremacy outside its walls, he must protect the girl from something far more dangerous: the mysterious power she possesses inside.” There’s also a spin-off series in the works – the prequel The Witcher: Blood Origin.

Snowfall, the FX series co-created by the late John Singleton, is getting another season. FX just renewed the show for season 5, with FX Entertainment president Eric Schrier saying: “Snowfall has come into its own as one of the best dramas on TV, its quality and audience growth is a remarkable achievement for a show in its fourth season. Damson Idris and our entire cast continue to deliver outstanding performances every episode.” The series is set in Los Angeles in the 1980s and follows a group of interconnected characters.

When he’s not trying to blow the lid off of government conspiracies about aliens, David Duchovny also dabbles in writing. He recently published a novel called Truly Like Lightning, and now that novel is being turned into a TV series. And wouldn’t ya know it, that series is going to star David Duchovny. Deadline reports the show is in development at Showtime, with Duchovny also set to write the script with Tyler Nilson and Michael Schwartz, the team behind The Peanut Butter Falcon. Nilson and Schwartz would also direct the show if it gets picked up. In Truly Like Lightning, “the unplugged, off-the-grid, almost biblical desert lives of former Hollywood stuntman, Bronson Powers (Duchovny) and his 3 wives and 10 children is upended when a ruthless real estate developer stumbles upon his thousands of acres in Joshua Tree and tries to force him off his land and return his family to the temptations and modernity of 21st century America.” This would be Duchovny’s second series with Showtime – his show Californication was also set up over there.

Earlier this month I reported on a story about a new A24 TV series that would star Steven Yeun and Ali Wong. It was one of my least favorite type of stories because there was almost no information – no title, no synopsis, nothing. Now, thankfully, we have actual news. Deadline reports that the series is called Beef, and that it’s found a home on Netflix. The series “follows two people who let a road rage incident burrow into their minds and slowly consume their every thought and action.” Lee Sung Jin, a writer and producer on the FX series Dave, is the creator-writer-showrunner. “Ali Wong, Steven Yeun, A24 and Netflix — it’s a dream team, and I’m honored to be collaborating with them,” said Lee. “I’m also grateful to the guy who yelled at me in traffic three years ago. I did not let it go, and now we have a show.”

Filmmaker and snazzy dresser Paul Feig has yet another new project in the works. Per Variety, he’s adapting the BBC Two series Motherland into a U.S. show. The original series is “about navigating the trials and traumas of middle-class motherhood, looking at the competitive side and unromantic take on parenting, and not the cute and acceptable public face of motherhood.” Julieanne Smolinski, a writer on Grace and Frankie, is tackling the script.

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