THIS ARTICLE CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR A FEW TV SERIES – CONSIDER YOURSELF WARNED

This is a fantastic time in television history to be a geek. Sure in the past we’ve had lots of wonderful and dare I say, legendary shows, but it’s always been one or two shows worth watching at a time. No longer. Our community of fandoms now has a plethora of shows that fit many genres yet somehow all cater to the same “type” of people, which is wonderful. Starting next week, the fall season of television drops like a sledgehammer on our collective psyches and millions of people will be begging for larger storage on their DVRs. Let’s take a look at some of the great new shows and upcoming new seasons of successful mainstays:

Walking Dead Season 4 premiere – Sunday, October 13th, 2013 at 9/8c on AMC
The Governor’s still on the loose! The Woodbury people survivors are now in the prison! Rick is still crazy! Darryl is….oh who am I kidding, last season was a disappointment. At least to me.
Walking Dead was a show I wanted to love from start to finish. The comic STILL throws out hooks and draws you in with every issue. Why couldn’t the show just follow it? Then it wouldn’t have had to deal with the litany of lineup changes in producers, writers, directors, show runners, etc that all seemed to have only the vaguest idea of where they wanted to take the show. Less an idea, it seems, of what to do with themselves on the journey from Point A to Point B. However, from everything going around the rumor mills, this season seems to have finally found a new pair of legs for the show to stand on. Regardless, it’s retained my interest and still has some “shocking” moments, and all I can really say is that I am invested. I will be watching. I will be hoping.

Supernatural Season 9 Premiere – Tuesday, October 8th, 2013 at 9/8c on CW
Ah Supernatural… I recently attended a Supernatural convention in NJ and this fandom is a beast of a different shade. I love the show. Once I’d had enough pestering to watch it (C’mon man! You loved X-Files!! This is just like that if you replaced aliens with demons!!), I finally sat down, opened up Netflix, and proceeded to lose about 2 or 3 weeks getting caught up on 7 seasons. Now I’m hooked, I’m a fan, I know and love all the characters. I won over my girlfriend by dressing up like Castiel. I’ve got a lot out of this show. During Season 7, though, it seemed like it had started to finally lose steam. The story arc was dragging, the format was so heavy-handed in its content that I almost stopped watching, but come Season 8, they finally started getting back to the reason I fell in love with the show. They brought back the fun, well written, episodic content but made it fresh with new locations (They’ve got a “bat-cave”!), characters and weekly antagonists. It closed with an exciting shocker. The King of Hell is now mortal-ish, the Angels have all fallen from heaven, and the boys have their hands full once more.  With word that Bobby’s coming back and Castiel is going to be a season regular, I couldn’t be more excited!

Revolution Season 2 Premiere – Wednesday, September 25th, 2013 at 8/7c on NBC
If you haven’t, for some odd reason, been watching Revolution, you really need to get on that. Tell you what, as soon as you’re finished reading this, go watch it. It’s exciting. Stripping it down, Revolution is a post-apocalyptic swashbuckling adventure. Better yet, if felt like one of the older BBC science fiction dramas. Sure it’s a little heavy on the cheesy acting at times, but ultimately it’s a lot of fun. Better yet, it grows. The show doesn’t let go of it’s forward momentum. You aren’t allowed to get bored. The characters mature, the scenes keep changing, the stakes keep getting higher and just when you’re wondering how the hell the show would get picked up for another season because the power is back on and the world didn’t burn?
Well…the world burned. At least the world that we saw in the first season. It’s all gone and now when we revisit those landscapes, it’s going to be a different game. Next season promises more character growth and worse problems with bigger, badder enemies. Gone is the civil war analogy, it’s time to move into a world war analogy.

Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D Series Premiere Tuesday, September 24th, 2013 at 8/7c on NBC
If you haven’t heard of Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. yet, well, you’re:

• Very likely not a comic book fan.
• Haven’t been that into the past, almost 10 years of sci-fi/fantasy cinema including last year’s blockbuster Avengers movie.
• Living under a rock.
• On this website by accident.

This is perhaps the most exciting television event for comic-book/geek culture since Star Trek was brought back with The Next Generation. Fan favorite side/ancillary character Agent Phil Coulson is back and in charge of a new roster of Agents in charge of keeping order in a new world of super powers and super science. Allusions, nods, and cameos by the Marvel Comics Universe will be doled out without alienating a unknowing audience so the hardcore fans will be able to enjoy it just as much as those who only know the movies or just happen to be channel surfing.

Arrow Season 2 Premiere Wednesday, October 9th, 2013 at 9/8c on CW
Oh how I thought I’d dislike this series. One of the few DC comics I like, that’s not even a “heavy hitter” in its universe, getting his own show in the wake of the once good, but quickly cheezy Smallville, I figured, “Eh, I’ll give it a shot, but I’ll make other plans for the rest of the season’s time slot.” Boy was I wrong. Arrow is easily the most exciting show on TV. It is the action show I wait for every week. It’s cool, stylish, and dark. OH MAN is this show dark…and violent. I was NOT expecting that going in. I mean, first you give me the illustrious John Barrowman as Malcolm Merlin, but then you throw in Manu Bennett who I loved as Crixus in Spartacus: Blood and Sand as Slade Wilson/Deathstroke? Could there have been better casting? How about all those smartly done nods to the DCU? I’m sure there are TONS of purists out there who have cried foul with every episode, but at the same time, I also bet they wouldn’t miss a single one. This show is that fun. The first season’s finale did not disappoint and left me anxious for more. With the exception of one other show (which I’ll get to below), this is probably the one I’m most excited for this season.
Oh, and by the way….this trailer….BLACK f’n CANARY!!!!!

Once Upon A Time Season 3 Premieres Sunday, September 29th at 8/7c on ABC

I have not caught more than a few episodes of this series yet. Still, I’ve highly enjoyed what I’ve seen and c’mon, Robert Carlyle? He’s just awesome in anything. Yes, even 28 Weeks Later.

Almost Human Series Premiere Monday November 4th at 8/7c on FOX
Okay, sure, this looks like someone watched Alex Proyas’ I, Robot and said, “Hey, ya know what would make an awesome tv series? THAT!”. But in my opinion, especially after watching this trailer and coupled with the fact that I’m a Karl Urban fan, I whole-heartedly agree. Let’s just hope it’s given enough slack to last. It looks too good in the “hard sci-fi” realm to really stand a chance on a station like FOX, but I’ll keep my fingers crossed.
Karl Urban is a “future cop” who works along with the new “synthetic police” officers. Robotic cops made to be the greatest tool in the law enforcement belt. After an accident that leaves him in a coma, he wakes up to a force that looks on him as a loose cannon with issues against the robots. However the catch here is, to return to active duty, it is mandatory for him to take on a mechanized partner. He manages to dispatch a few, hoping they’ll just give up and leave him alone, when they uncover an older model with “issues” of its own. Sort of like a futuristic “robo-buddy-cop” drama. Eh, I was sold at Karl Urban and Robots.

Dracula  Series Premiere Friday, October 25th at 10/9c on NBC
Wait…sooo…ANOTHER vampire-centric TV series? Yep, and this time they’re forgoing all the “namby-pamby” vampires everyone complains about and going straight for the throat (see what I did there?). Yes, Dracula. The most romantic of them all. His very legacy a love story. However, there’s also plenty of potential for action as well with Van Helsing and Harker. Alas, from the trailer with it’s obvious nods to the goth & steampunk crowd, along with name-dropping the popular Downton Abbey, and with Dracula and Harker being played by what looks like early-20’s stand-ins for Keanu Reeves and Robert Downy Jr respectively…. Let’s just say I’m not dying to see it (eh?) however, it’s the first Vampire drama on TV that I’m willing to give a chance. Even if we do all know how it’s going to end.

Master Chef Junior Series Premiere Friday, September 27th, 2013 at 8/7c on FOX
“WHIP LIKE A MAN!!!” comes bellowing out of a 9-year-old girl in the trailer for this new spin-off series. If for nothing else, this would sell me. However, being a foodie and a fan Gordon Ramsey’s television legacy, I can not wait to see how this show plays out. It’s possible that more than any other series starting this season, I’m most excited for this. A reason to stay in on a Friday night? You bet. Also, finally something I can watch with my son that will inspire us both to get creative.

Sleepy Hollow Series Premiered on Monday September 16th at 9/8c on FOX
Hmmm…now, when I first heard of this series, I was thinking, “Wonderful, yet ANOTHER waste of funds for yet ANOTHER unimaginative rehashing of an old fairy tale trying to ride the coat tails of Once.“, and maybe I was right. Regardless, even if it didn’t have the names of Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, and Len Wiseman attached, after the first episode aired last week, the internet was abuzz with praise for this semi-modernized take on the Legend of Sleepy Hollow. I say “semi” because the tale’s “Ichabod Crane” is in it and in modern times, however, he is sort of “time-displaced”. In this version, instead of a teacher, he was a soldier serving under General George Washington. He was charged with killing a beast of a man in the opposing militia, which he succeeded in doing by first shooting, then as you might imagine, beheading. Then, mysteriously waking up 250 in the future, along with the Headless Horsemen, Crane is thrown to the wolves and must now sort out what happened to him, why, and how to stop this mysterious foe who, by the way, is now being considered to be Death of the Four Horsemen. Sounds a bit heady and heavy, I don’t know how this could drag out for more than a season, I suppose we’ll just have to see how it all pans out and whether or not the first episode is the highlight of the series.

Tomorrow People Series Premiere Wednesday, October 9th, 2013 at 9/8c on CW
Oh if this wasn’t so darned controversial, I’d be “allowed” to like it openly, hahaha. Well, I’m going to anyway.
The Tomorrow People is based on an old BBC series of the same name. As we, the “geek community”, well know, anything the US touches that started out as British fare is looked upon with disgust and ridicule. For many parts, I agree. There’s a sort of feeling to British television that can’t be recaptured. Like watching a foreign film in its native language vs being dubbed. The subtle nuances in the actor’s speech can lend a levity to a scene that might go otherwise unnoticed. When “Spaced” got picked up to be “transferred over” it was met with such vitriol that it never made it past its honestly sad, sorry pilot. Thankfully. The American produced 1996 Doctor Who movie, though now accepted as canon and kind of beloved for Paul McGann’s sadly cut short run as the Doctor, was an overly flashy, cheesy, weird affair and believe me, to consider a pre-Russell T. Davies DW cheesy by comparison to the shows roots is really saying something. But I digress.
This new Tomorrow People looks great in my eyes. I was a fan of the original and can honestly say, the story was too ahead of its time. Like if they tried to make Lord of the Rings or The Hobbit back in the 70s-80s, the story just wouldn’t have worked because it’s so dependent on special effects, make-up, and props that have now come far enough to bring an almost believability to it. Not to mention I’m completely hooked on Arrow, a series I thought I’d dislike rather highly. So again, let’s wait and see. I’d like to say I’m reserving judgement, however every time I see previews or trailers, I get excited.