The NCIS franchise has never exactly struggled to find a new corner of the map. After more than two decades, CBS has sent its investigators from Washington, D.C., to Los Angeles, Hawaii, and beyond, building one of television’s most durable procedural universes in the process. But NCIS: New York has something its predecessors can’t quite manufacture: a city that can do some of the storytelling for it.

That starts with CBS making the unusually important decision to actually film the new series in New York City. NCIS: New York isn’t simply going to slap a few recognizable skyline shots between scenes filmed somewhere else and call it a day. Production has been underway across the city, with LL Cool J, Scott Caan, Jacqueline Byers, and Shane Harper photographed filming in places including Brooklyn and Central Park.

‘NCIS: New York’ Is Actually Filming Where It’s Set

Image via Sonja Flemming / ©CBS / courtesy Everett Collection

That distinction matters more than it might sound. Television has a long history of asking viewers to accept one city as another, and the NCIS franchise is hardly an exception. NCIS: Los Angeles, for instance, was built largely around production in Los Angeles and the Paramount lot, while NCIS: Origins has likewise used Paramount’s Los Angeles facilities and Southern California locations.

NCIS: New York is taking a different route. The series is being produced in the city it calls home, and recent set photos have already shown the cast working in real New York locations, which gives the spinoff an immediate visual identity before viewers even know whether its new characters will become as beloved as the franchise’s veterans.

New York is not exactly a city that needs help making an impression, and a case unfolding in Brooklyn can feel different from one unfolding in Manhattan, and a chase through Central Park doesn’t need a line of dialogue explaining why the location matters. The danger with any spinoff is that familiarity can become sameness, but NCIS: New York has the opportunity to make it feel different because its surroundings are different.

CBS Is Spending More to Give Its New ‘NCIS’ Spinoff a Real Identity

Image via CBS

Filming in New York also represents a meaningful commitment from CBS. Location production is not the easy, interchangeable option for a network procedural, particularly when a series could theoretically recreate plenty of streets, offices, and city exteriors somewhere cheaper or more production-friendly.

CBS is nevertheless putting NCIS: New York on the ground. The series began filming in the city in July, with production moving through locations such as Brooklyn and Central Park. New York’s production infrastructure and tax incentives can help offset some of the expense — the state offers a production tax credit for eligible television projects — but choosing to build a series around the city still requires a commitment to location work that a studio-based production doesn’t.

CBS has placed this show directly in the middle of an all-NCIS Tuesday, with the original NCIS at 8 p.m., New York at 9 p.m., and NCIS: Origins at 10 p.m. The strategy makes obvious business sense because viewers who already know the franchise are being given an entirely new hour without leaving the universe. But that also puts pressure on the spinoff to justify its existence. If NCIS: New York were simply another version of the same show with a different sign on the office door, viewers could reasonably wonder why they needed it. The New York production gives CBS a much better answer.

LL Cool J’s Return Makes the New Setting Even More Important

Image via CBS

The other major piece is Sam Hanna. LL Cool J isn’t playing a brand-new character who needs to establish himself from scratch. He spent 14 seasons as one of the defining faces of NCIS: Los Angeles, and Hanna has also appeared elsewhere in the franchise. Now he’s returning to his hometown to lead a new team alongside Caan’s Nick Schaeffer.

Hanna already has history with viewers, but putting him back in New York gives that history somewhere meaningful to go. This isn’t just another assignment in another city. He’s returning home, and the series is following him there. Jennifer Beals, Byers, Harper, and Devin Druid round out the new field team, giving the show plenty of fresh personalities around its returning lead.

The result could be exactly what the franchise needs from its newest branch. NCIS doesn’t need another city in name only as each new series needs a reason to exist, and New York provides one. The city gives the series a visual language that can’t be copied simply by changing the establishing shot. CBS’s willingness to film there gives that choice some weight, while Hanna’s return provides the franchise connection longtime viewers need. When NCIS: New York premieres on October 6, 2026, there may be a question of whether New York can make this one feel like its own thing.

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NCIS: New York

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Release Date

October 6, 2026

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Eagle Egilsson, Adam Davidson

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While Prime Video’s original series often draw from novels to tell their stories, they rarely do as much justice to the book as 2026’s The House of the Spirits, with some exceptions like Barry Jenkins’ take on Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad. Drawing from Chilean author Isabel Allende’s 1982 debut novel of the same name, the show does a beautiful job transposing the book’s blend of multigenerational family saga, magical realism, and poetic tale of the ravages of time and the longstanding effects of violence to a new medium. The series is not afraid to be melodramatic, colorful, and rich, studying the Trueba family from their humble beginnings in an unnamed Latin American country that slowly descends into a horrific political situation. Narrating the saga is Alba (Rochi Hernandez), who thrusts us into the world of the family with as much speed as The Royal Tenenbaums.

Every episode of The House of the Spirits feels like a short film in itself, with the show as a whole mimicking the book’s decades-spanning structure. Much like the first season of House of the Dragon, years can pass between episodes, but familial relationships stay the same, lingering on old wounds and traumas hidden behind. Allende’s novel was unafraid to deal with heavy subject matter, like animal violence, a country’s descent into fascism, and sexual violence, and the show’s faithfulness to those aspects of the book is its greatest feature. Part of the passage of time is conveyed by a color palette. Like in Greta Gerwig’s 2019 take on Little Women, the nostalgic early years are often offset by a steely grey-blue take on the present day, as Alba pores over her family history, digging into a journal left behind by her clairvoyant grandmother Clara (Dolores Fonzi as an older woman; Nicole Wallace in younger years). Clara’s journal is a Rosetta Stone for the family history, a document of 50 years from the mid-1920s onward.

‘House of the Spirits’ Has A Compelling Villain in Esteban Trueba

While The House of the Spirits moves quickly through its eras, running with a montage-like pace through Esteban Trueba’s (Alfonso Herrera) courtship of Clara’s older sister Rosa (Chiara Parravicini), it’s hard to imagine it in a more condensed timeframe. But the book was first adapted as a Hollywood drama in 1993, with a number of subplots shelved and a cast full of English-speaking actors like Jeremy Irons, whose cold villainy was appropriate enough for Esteban, but not quite on the level of Herrera’s three-dimensional performance. After Rosa’s tragic early passing, the show version of Esteban grows into a darkly tyrannical patriarch whose class resentment and casual cruelty becomes a stand-in for the terrors the country will soon face. Herrera’s performance as Esteban shows his descent and development into the wicked master of Las Tres Marías, the Trueba family estate, and the eventual husband of Clara.

Esteban is a tricky character, in large part because he lasts so long. The series is brutal and rewarding because it deals so much with the subjugation, abuse, and resilience of women. Esteban is an immediate foil. In his younger years, his cruel treatment of women and campaign of sexual misconduct have aftereffects you can only see by the series’ end, with the full picture in mind. Rising from the back-breaking toils of mine work to being a property owner, he has nothing but contempt for the political shift heralded by the arrival of the Communist party to the country. Because of the show’s structure, with Alba looking backwards at events, viewers get a sense of dramatic irony not quite present in Allende’s novel, with a sense of where all these lives go. That framing device casts a unique glow on the show’s rich melodrama. Births and deaths collide as Clara, whose clairvoyant gifts become more prominent as the show progresses, gives birth to Esteban’s daughter Blanca (Fernanda Urrejola, who co-wrote the series, in middle age; Sara Becker in younger years).

‘House of the Spirits’ Is A Magical Realist Latin Melodrama

By emphasizing the actual Latin American qualities of the original decades-spanning book, the show gets the chance to breathe, with its operatic elements playing directly against its larger saga of political change. It’s neither a dry retelling of history nor total soap opera, but a mix that is true to the spirit of Isabel Allende’s novel. Its acknowledgment of the passage of time means one episode might have a character being born and the next might cast them as a young adult. Alba grows from childhood to participating in revolutionary politics and discovering horrific truths about her family. The novel emphasized heartache, trauma, and magical realism, and the show works in the same big, melodramatic beats, slowly replacing the charming nostalgia of its early episodes with the devastation of a country falling into ruin. If the first half of the show is Jean-Pierre Jeunet, the second is more Steven Soderbergh.

Ghosts are real in the story of House of the Spirits. They are almost incidental, complex characters in their own right that can guide or complicate the journeys of the living. Uncle Marcos (Juan Pablo Raba) serves as a ghostly confidant to young Clara, and in the 1970s, Alba is often visited by her grandmother Clara in times of great despair. But more pertinently, the ghosts reflect Esteban’s actions and the privilege the family was able to experience by ignoring who had to pay most, particularly in the form of Esteban Garcia, Jr. (Pedro De Tavira). The show is a richly compelling meditation throughout, and a novel adaptation that allows the characters the tragic complexity they deserve.

By the time Let’s Marry Harry landed in Las Vegas, the trip had already peaked once.

In Episode 6 of Netflix’s summer breakout, Harry Jowsey and his five remaining fiancées swapped the Los Angeles house for a weekend in Sin City. But the flight there wasn’t a hard cut between scenes. It was the scene — champagne open, charcuterie out, music up, and five women dancing in the aisle somewhere over the Mojave.

The jet in question: a Bombardier Challenger 850 operated by Cirrus Aviation Services, the aviation group behind Theos, a new members-only club curating by-the-seat routes and exclusive experiences for travelers who’d rather skip the terminal entirely.

A 15-Seat Cabin, and Nobody Sat Still

The Challenger 850 is a specific kind of flex. It carries up to 15 passengers in one of the widest cabins in private aviation — a genuine stand-up, walk-around interior rather than the crouch-and-shuffle tube most people picture when they hear “private jet.” Which is precisely why it works on camera, and precisely why nobody stayed in their seat.

“As viewers will see in Episode 6, the fun started long before Harry and the women arrived in Las Vegas,” says Travis Turner, VP of Guest Experience at Cirrus Aviation Services. “With champagne flowing, fresh fruit and charcuterie being enjoyed, music playing, and the girls dancing throughout the flight, the journey became part of the experience — not just the transportation.”

So What Would It Cost You?

Here’s the number everyone actually wants: roughly $37,000.

That’s the ballpark for recreating the Let’s Marry Harry Vegas run end to end — round-trip Challenger 850 service between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, premium onboard catering, champagne service, and stretch limousine transportation on the ground.

Split fifteen ways, that’s a little under $2,500 a head for a weekend that starts the second the door closes. Split six ways, it’s a very different conversation. Either way, it’s a considerably shorter list of logistics than most bachelorette weekends require.

“Watching Harry and the women laugh, dance, and enjoy every moment from takeoff to touchdown proved that some of the best moments happen long before you reach Las Vegas,” Turner says. “It was the perfect way to kick off one of the most memorable trips on Let’s Marry Harry.”

The Part the Cameras Didn’t Catch

Reality TV runs on edit-room alchemy, so the more interesting question is always what the crew saw when the cameras weren’t rolling. On this one, the answer is a little wholesome.

“Harry and the women were all incredibly respectful, engaging, and genuinely fun to host,” says Alexandria Hurley, Head of PR at Cirrus Aviation Services. “From the moment they landed in Las Vegas, you could tell everyone was excited to make the most of the experience.”

And Harry himself? For a guy whose dating résumé has been picked over online for the better part of a decade, the behind-the-scenes review is a notably good one.

“Behind the scenes, Harry was very attentive and made a genuine effort to spend quality time with each of the women,” Hurley says. “He wasn’t focused on just one person in the group. He was constantly checking in, making conversation, and ensuring everyone felt included. There was a really natural chemistry among the group, and you could tell the women were genuinely invested in getting to know him.”

Why Production Picked Up the Phone

Flying a principal cast, a camera crew, and a functioning party from Los Angeles to Las Vegas is a genuinely hard production ask. It requires an aircraft big enough to shoot inside of, a cabin that photographs well, catering that holds up at altitude, ground transportation waiting on the tarmac, and a schedule that bends to a call sheet instead of the other way around.

Cirrus Aviation Services is Las Vegas–based, which makes it something close to a home-field operator for a show built around a Vegas weekend. The Theos model — members-only access, curated by-the-seat routes, experiences designed as the destination rather than the commute — is aimed at exactly the kind of traveler who watched Episode 6 and immediately started doing math with their group chat.

That’s the pitch, and Episode 6 is the proof of concept: eight minutes of television in which the most fun anyone has is at 35,000 feet.

Watch It Back

All eight episodes of Let’s Marry Harry are streaming now on Netflix, with the reunion special — hosted by Haley Baylee — arriving Wednesday, August 26.

Episode 6 is the Vegas one. 

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Season 1 of Apple TV’s sleeper hit Murderbot is a tiny show with a giant heart — no matter how much the misanthropic titular character (Alexander Skarsgård) tries to deny its growing affection for the annoying humans it’s contracted to protect. For all intents and purposes, the events of Season 1 closely follow the first installment in Martha Wells‘ The Murderbot Diaries book series, which begins with a contained setting and a cast to match: one soap opera-obsessed Security Unit, one primary planet, a team of six humans, and a handful of enemies. Artificial Condition, Wells’ sequel novella, introduces a different location and multiple new characters.

In that light, it’s not necessarily surprising that Murderbot has significantly expanded the size of Season 2’s ensemble cast. The scale and the celebrity star power behind the adjusted ensemble is the somewhat mind-boggling part. Earlier this week, Apple TV confirmed the return of Season 1’s 11 primary actors and welcomed a slew of fresh faces to the Murderbot universe. The video listed 25 additional cast members in undisclosed roles, including the (frankly, genius) likes of Steve Buscemi, Patton Oswalt, Michael Sheen, Tramell Tillman, Wanda Sykes, Katy O’Brian, Kali Reis, and Martha Plimpton. But what might shifting Murderbot‘s initial formula mean for everyone’s favorite introverted android?

Who Could ‘Murderbot’s New Cast Members Be Playing in Season 2?

Without going into deep spoiler territory, Artificial Condition resumes where Murderbot Season 1 leaves off. Rather than stay with the kindly humans who essentially adopted it, Murderbot ventures into the wider galaxy on a journey of independence and self-discovery. Specifically, it returns to RaviHyral, the mining site where it had lived up to its self-given name by unintentionally killing its clients. Murderbot seeks answers about its inexplicable violence and the erased memories accompanying that haunting incident. After becoming frenemies with a cargo ship’s hilariously abrasive AI, Murderbot once again finds itself dragged into defending another batch of scientists from a deadly conspiracy.

Aside from those three new humans and the snarky pilot bot, Artificial Condition features the augmented human leader of the Tlacey Excavations company, other SecUnits (most of them obedient to their clients’ whims), and multiple ComfortUnits (one, in particular, undergoes a prominent arc). By that metric, Murderbot Season 2 contains more actors than the novella has existing roles. There are several potential areas where showrunners Chris and Paul Weitz could organically incorporate an increased cast: more SecUnits, executives, and employees tied to Tlacey, longer flashbacks with the 57 individuals Murderbot killed, and snippets from Murderbot’s favorite television show, The Rise and Fall of Sanctuary Moon.

Although we can only speculate as to whom the 25 performers are playing, it’s worth noting that Season 2‘s announcement video groups Reis, Underwood, and Griffin Newman in roughly the same area as Season 1’s Sanctuary Moon players (John Cho, DeWanda Wise, Clark Gregg, and Jack McBrayer). Since Murderbot‘s delightfully campy show-within-a-show is already filled with prominent film and TV names, it’s easy to imagine their industry peers feeling just as game to wear extravagant costumes and recite melodramatic dialogue.

‘Murderbot’ Season 2 Has Legitimate Reasons to Increase Its Cast

As for Skarsgård’s fellow main cast members, Artificial Condition‘s first-person point of view leaves Murderbot’s newfound pals off-page for the book’s entirety (fear not: they return to the series sooner than later). It would be a waste for the upcoming second season not to utilize Mensah (Noma Dumezweni), Gurathin (David Dastmalchian), Pin-Lee (Sabrina Wu), Arada (Tattiawna Jones), Bharadwaj (Tamara Podemski), and Ratthi (Akshay Khanna). After all, the only humans who deserve Murderbot’s affection are quite the endearing, quirky, sincere, wise, and broken bunch. Dumezweni and Dastmalchian, in particular, each contribute gut-wrenching emotional arcs.

Inventing original content for a television adaptation is a tricky needle to thread. That said, not only would it be abrupt to temporarily abandon the Preservation Alliance crew, it’s worthwhile — even necessary – to explore their next steps from a story standpoint. The aftermath of their SecUnit friend slinking away in the night offers a range of potential responses: acceptance, compassion, grief, confusion, hurt, indifference, etc.

Juggling a wider ensemble might easily become too unruly on the heels of a more reserved focus. Likewise, pacing and focus problems can compromise the strengths a simpler story offers. Since Murderbot Season 1 is a home run, however, the likely case is that more than doubling the cast’s size is a thoughtful move. Suffice to say, Murderbot‘s sophomore season, now officially in production, is doing something its protagonist despises — stepping out of its comfort zone. Unfortunately for said protagonist (and all the neurodivergent audience members who understand its distress), that’s a potential risk worth taking.

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Murderbot

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May 15, 2025

Network

Apple TV+

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Directors

Aurora Guerrero, Roseanne Liang

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The sequel to Michael Jackson‘s biographical drama may finally confront his controversial past. 

The first installment, which arrived in theaters in April, became a global box-office sensation but also drew criticism for sidestepping the controversies that shadowed the pop icon.

Now, Jaafar Jackson, who portrays his late uncle in “Michael,” has hinted that the follow-up could revisit some of the most contentious chapters of the singer’s life, this time from his perspective.

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Amid the development of the second installment, Jaafar acknowledged that he has little control over the script’s direction. However, he said he hopes the project would highlight his uncle’s truth. 

“I think the second film will give even more insight from his point of view, because at the end of the day, [the allegations] are always from someone else’s,” Jaafar explained. 

According to the 30-year-old, the story has long been told by people “driven by an agenda,” rather than the late singer’s, something he believes should not be so. 

 “And that’s really the issue we’ve been having as a family – not having Michael’s voice being heard. I think that’s very, very important, especially in the late years,” he told GQ Magazine. 

The first installment of “Michael” focused largely on the legend’s early career and concluded in 1988, leaving out much of the period when he became the subject of serious child-abuse claims.

Jaafar added that dividing the film into two pieces allows for a detailed portrayal of the singer, helping viewers understand he was a “human being first” before an icon.

He went on to describe the “Smooth Criminal” hitmaker as someone who remained kind-hearted despite facing intense scrutiny throughout his life. According to the young actor, audiences should see more of that side of Michael in the continuation of his story.

Producers Reportedly Removed Controversial Scenes From The Original Script

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Jaafar’s comments come months after reports surfaced that the movie parts dealing with the singer’s troubled past were originally included in the screenplay but later removed.

As The Blast previously reported, the scenes about the child abuse claims were cut out due to a legal clause tied to a prior settlement between Jackson and Jordan Chandler’s family.

The changes reportedly also resulted in substantial additional payments for the production’s key figures. Director Antoine Fuqua was initially expected to receive $10 million, while producer Graham King was set to earn $6 million.

Those amounts allegedly increased after the required revisions and reshoots, with Fuqua receiving $15 million more and King another $10 million.

How One Of Michael Jackson’s Accusers Reacted To The Film

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When the movie hit cinemas, it stirred a strong reaction from one of his accusers, James Safechuck, who insisted that it should never have been released.

 As The Blast reported, Safechuck declared he would never watch it because he does not support people he considers child abusers.

Safechuck and Wade Robson previously alleged in the now-removed HBO documentary “Leaving Neverland” that Jackson sexually abused them as children.

Although Safechuck and Robson sought $400 million in damages from his estate, Jackson was never convicted of a crime, and his estate continues to deny the allegations.

Dan Reed Compared Michael Jackson To Epstein As He Questions Biopic 

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As Jackson’s accuser reacted, Dan Reed, who directed Safechuck and Robson’s documentary, slammed the authenticity of “Michael.” 

Per The Blast, Reed argued that it cannot present a truthful account of the “Thriller” singer’s life while omitting the child abuse allegations that have followed him for decades. 

Reed doubled down on his claims, adding that he thinks the deceased vocalist “hurt a lot of children” and was “worse than Jeffrey Epstein.”

“And he may have been a great entertainer, but those two things don’t cancel each other out,” Reed added. “The fact is that pedophiles exist, and he was one of them.”

Jaafar Jackson Scores A Major Box-Office Milestone

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Despite the criticism that has followed the portrayal of the late Grammy Winner, the project has performed exceptionally well commercially.

According to The Blast, the production has crossed the $1 billion mark worldwide, reaching approximately $1.001 billion in global ticket sales. 

The milestone reportedly makes Jaafar the first lead actor to star in a debut feature that surpasses $1 billion at the worldwide box office. The achievement also places the project among the highest-grossing music-centered biographical productions, surpassing “Bohemian Rhapsody” at the global box office.

The legendary ’90s R&B group Boyz II Men once crooned, “It’s so hard to say goodbye to yesterday,” and that’s how Watch With Us feels about Outer Banks.

The wildly popular Netflix series, starring Chase Stokes, Caroline Arapoglou and others, just released its final season, and it’s at the top of our best new shows to watch this weekend list.

It’s not the only new Netflix show worth watching right now, as the streamer also debuted the compelling murder mystery series, Blood Sacrifice.

For something a little lighter, we recommend you travel the world with Conan O’Brien in HBO Max’s Conan O’Brien Must Go, which returns for a third season full of exotic destinations and crazy stunts.

Finish your weekend by flipping to AMC and attending The Vampire Lestat: One Night Only LIVE concert, where actor Sam Reid rocks out as his blood-sucking vampire musician character, Lestat.

‘Outer Banks’ Season 5 — Netflix

Stick a fork in it, because Outer Banks is officially done. The much-loved Netflix series just dropped its fifth and final season, wrapping up the Pogues’ epic story in a pretty satisfying fashion.

After JJ Maybanks’ (Rudy Pankow) shocking death in season 4, the surviving Pogues grapple with their tragic loss while trying to find a way back home to North Carolina. Will John B (Chase Stokes) set things right with Sarah (Madelyn Cline)? Will Sarah and Rafe (Drew Starkey) repair their damaged relationship after he tried to kill her? And will Pope (Jonathan Daviss) ever forgive himself for murdering a mercenary last season? The answers all lie in Outer Banks season 5’s 10 action-packed episodes, which are now streaming on Netflix.

‘Blood Sacrifice’ Season 1 — Netflix

When two police officers are found murdered and decapitated in an isolated house in the Stockholm archipelago, homicide detective Thomas Berg (Jakob Oftebro) realizes it’s the work of a serial killer who is targeting Sweden’s police force. To help find the culprit, Berg turns to the only man who can help him — his estranged alcoholic father, Alfred (Peter Andersson), who used to be the best detective in the country. Together, they can find the person behind the crimes, but once they do, will it be too late to save others — or themselves?

Blood Sacrifice is a hypnotic Nordic thriller that doesn’t shy away from violence. Creator George Kay, the man behind the hit shows Lupin and Hijack, knows how to draw viewers in by interweaving an intriguing plot populated with damaged characters and a series of murders that are more gruesome than the next. The heart of the five-episode series, however, is the fractured relationship between father and son. Thomas hates that he needs his father’s help, while Alfred still resents being pushed out of work by a past scandal.

‘Conan O’Brien Must Go’ Season 3 — HBO Max

Since the ‘90s, Conan O’Brien has kept going, from writing some of The Simpsons best episodes to hosting several hit talk shows. Lately, he’s been traveling around the world in pursuit of more knowledge, some experience with other cultures and, of course, plenty of laughs.

The comedian’s hit HBO travel series Conan O’Brien Must Go is back for season 3, and the show is taking its ginger-haired host to four new countries: India, the Netherlands, Morocco and the Philippines. Watch Conan bury his assistant in the Sahara Desert and trick some kids into believing he’s actually 90 years old. (For the record, Conan is a young-looking 63.) Conan O’Brien Must Go remains silly, sweet and irreverent, kinda like Conan himself. New episodes debut each Friday on HBO Max.

‘The Vampire Lestat: One Night Only LIVE’ — AMC+

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When was the last time one of your favorite shows held a special concert with its lead character singing a handful of rock tunes? That’s what is happening this weekend with The Vampire Lestat, the third season of AMC’s hit horror romance series, Interview with the Vampire. The actor playing Lestat de Lioncourt, Sam Reid, and composer Daniel Hart joined forces last June for a standing-room-only concert, The Vampire Lestat: One Night Only LIVE, at New York City’s legendary Beacon Theatre to celebrate the premiere of the new season.

The set list includes six original tracks by Hart: “Long Face,” “Big Bad Wolf,” “Your Biggest Fan,” “The Loneliness,” “Brutal Love” and “Butterscotch Bitch.” Come for the good tunes and killer vibes and stay for a debauched good time that only Reid’s seductive vamp can deliver.

The Vampire Lestat: One Night Only LIVE streams on AMC+ on Sunday, August 23.

Trying to get someone interested in something that’ll take up countless hours of their lives isn’t easy. It happens with TV shows that ran for multiple seasons (good luck getting anyone interested in Lost, nowadays, even if most of it’s great and the ending is kind of over-hated), and it also happens for books in general, but especially books that make up longer series.

The following are all counted as series because they’re longer than three books. You could argue a trilogy is a series as well, but if there’s a trilogy that’s not here, counted among the very best book series ever published, it’s because that was treated as a cutoff. So, with these examples, you get four or more books, and all of those books stand as worthy of one’s time. That’s what you get here, and there’s a mix of genres represented, as well as an attempt to cover different series published at different points in time.

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The ‘L.A. Quartet’ (1987–1992)

Image via The Mysterious Press

Two books in the L.A. Quartet have been made into movies, and one of them (L.A. Confidential) was pretty great, if a little different – and not as intense – as its source material. When it comes to The Black Dahlia, you’re better off sticking to the book, and then with The Big Nowhere and White Jazz, you can only experience them as books, at least at the time of writing.

The Big Nowhere would make for a particularly despairing movie or miniseries, if ever made, and then White Jazz… it would be a miracle, actually, for that to be adapted somehow. White Jazz is experimental and maybe the only miss of the bunch, yet it’s still got its fans, and it is interesting, for what that’s worth. The other three books are all excellent, well and truly ranking among the best James Ellroy has written to date.

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The ‘Cosmere’ (2005–present)

Image via Tor Books

The Cosmere universe is huge, being counted as a series of sorts here, encompassing not quite everything Brandon Sanderson has written, but a lot of it. And Sanderson has written a lot, and doesn’t show any signs of slowing down any time soon, so it’s anyone’s guess how big the Cosmere will really end up being. It’s also got series within it, like the Mistborn trilogy, or the Mistborn series, since that run of books includes more than just the “original” trilogy.

And then you’ve got The Stormlight Archive, which is made up of five main (and massive) books at the time of writing, and is intended to itself be a 10-part series by the time it’s concluded. So, call it cheating a bit, if the whole Cosmere universe is being treated as one big thing right now, but the other option was to pick either Mistborn or The Stormlight Archive, and there’d probably be people annoyed that one wasn’t picked, so… what can you do?

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The ‘Leatherstocking Tales’ (1823–1841)

Image via Bantam Books

The Leatherstocking Tales is a confusingly published series, because the five books span about 66 years (1740 to 1806), but the last one published (The Deerslayer, in 1841), covers the earliest period of time, from 1740 to about 1755. Reading them in publication order will mean jumping around, but however you tackle them, they are centered on Natty Bumppo, a man who has different aliases in each of the five novels.

It’s like the Dollars trilogy, in that regard, with the Man with No Name having a few different nicknames, and also, with that trilogy, the final one seems to take place chronologically before the other two. Anyway, the Leatherstocking Tales are very historically significant works of American literature, and also significant for being such an early series just generally speaking, laying out how an author could feasibly tell one large story across multiple books and have it work.

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‘A Song of Ice and Fire’ (1996–present… hopefully)

Image via Bantam Spectra

The other series that’s going here, despite not being finished (like the Cosmere), is A Song of Ice and Fire. Now, there are other books George R.R. Martin has written within his whole fictional world (known as The Known World), but A Song of Ice and Fire is the main one. If you’re not much of a book person, for whatever reason, it’s the series that Game of Thrones was based on.

It’s also the series Game of Thrones eventually overtook, with A Song of Ice and Fire remaining, at the time of writing, unfinished. What has been published so far (five out of a planned seven books) has been great, and it would be an obvious shame if things weren’t resolved eventually. But the pressure on Martin is unprecedented at this point, so whether The Winds of Winter and A Dream of Spring do come out and conclude the (again, great so far) series… time will tell and all that.

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The ‘Hyperion Cantos’ (1989–1997)

Image via Doubleday

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Four books make up the Hyperion Cantos, with the first two books being closely linked, and then the final two books also being linked. You get an idea of that with the titles, since the first two are Hyperion and The Fall of Hyperion, while the last two are called Endymion and The Rise of Endymion, so go figure and all that (there’s also a big time-jump between The Fall of Hyperion and Endymion).

The first book, which is just called Hyperion, is probably the best and most interesting, but it’s the sort of thing where if you like what that one’s putting down, it’s worth reading on. Also, not everything is resolved in Hyperion (1989), with The Fall of Hyperion functioning as a conclusion, in many ways, and then books #3 and #4 end up feeling more like a continuation.

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‘Monster’ (1994–2001)

Image via Shogakukan

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You sometimes get people saying that animated movies shouldn’t be ranked and considered among live-action ones, and maybe those same people would also argue that books and graphic novels should be separated. To those people, sorry, but the Monster series is going here, and honestly, it’s great and approachable enough that you don’t have to be particularly into graphic novels or manga to appreciate it as a great mystery/thriller series.

Monster is about the uncovering of a conspiracy that involves a pair of twins (and some other children), with one of them being a fearsome serial killer, and the protagonist is a doctor wracked with guilt for having saved the life of this eventual serial killer when the killer was still a child. It does a lot more – and introduces various other characters – across its 18 volumes, with the thousands of pages here proving very compelling and maybe even kind of addictive, once it really gets going.

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‘The Ripliad’ (1955–1991)

Image via Coward-McCann

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The Talented Mr. Ripley does tend to get the most attention out of all the books about Tom Ripley, but it’s one of five parts, ultimately, that make up The Ripliad, which might be the best name any of the series mentioned here has. They were all written by Patricia Highsmith over a surprisingly long period of time, with the final Tom Ripley book being published 36 years after the first.

Tom Ripley makes for a more than worthy central figure for a whole series, though, with each book involving him engaging in some kind of different scheme or crime (or, when things don’t go well, maybe even a series of crimes). The Talented Mr. Ripley is especially intense, and deserving of its classic status, but the follow-ups are all good, too, with book #3, Ripley’s Game, definitely being worthy of an honorable mention.

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Frank Herbert’s ‘Dune’ (1965–1985)

Image via Chilton Books

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To specify, the six Dune books that Frank Herbert wrote during his lifetime are being counted here as the Dune series. There is more to Dune, as a whole franchise, with Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson having written far more in the series than Frank Herbert ever did, but for a movie example, it’s a bit like considering the Star Wars series under George Lucas (so, the six movies released between 1977 and 2005) as separate from the whole Disney era of Star Wars.

With Dune, you have the original book, which lives up to its reputation and then some, with Dune Messiah being a sequel, and then things do get a bit weird after that. But if Frank Herbert’s the author, and the word “Dune” is on the cover, then it’s probably worth it. At worst, you’ll be in for something interesting, you know?

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‘The Dark Tower’ (1982–2004)

Stephen King has a big old multiverse of interconnecting books, with some only vaguely referencing others, and certain stories existing as stories within other stories (usually, in a more grounded Stephen King book, someone will refer to having seen a movie based on a more outlandish/supernatural King book). As far as his series go, though, The Dark Tower is the easiest to single out.

There are seven main books in this series, and they’re all about a mysterious gunslinger trying to reach the titular Dark Tower, because he feels he’s destined to. He has some companions, there are “side quests,” so to speak, and then there are also a fair few flashbacks. But The Dark Tower does eventually end, and it ends very boldly, all in a way that makes the journey worth it. Well, some people feel it made the journey worth it. The only way to find out if you’re one of them is to read the whole thing (2012’s The Wind Through the Keyhole is more optional, though, as it takes place between books #4 and #5 and doesn’t really add anything narratively).

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J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘Legendarium’ (1937–2021)

Image via HarperCollins

Yes, The Lord of the Rings is the big one, and the most essential read of anything J.R.R. Tolkien wrote for hopefully obvious reasons. It might well be the best book ever written, and if you want to count it as a trilogy, since it was divided into three for publication initially, then it’s probably the best book trilogy of all time. But there is a lot more to dig into, obviously, including The Hobbit and The Silmarillion, if you’re looking for other Tolkien-penned heavy-hitters.

It’s also a bit complicated to try to define this series, because unlike with Frank Herbert and the Dune novels written during his lifetime, there are posthumous works within Tolkien’s legendarium that are very important, including the previously-mentioned The Silmarillion. Dig in as deep as you want, basically (and there’s been previously unpublished material that’s seen the light of day only very recently, as 2021’s The Nature of Middle-earth shows).

Big Brother spoilers reveal the week 7 head of household winner along with who they’re planning to nominate, who are the have-nots and how exactly Angela Murray won the BB Blockbuster. Plus, Kamu Kirk is asked some hard questions in an exit interview.

Big Brother: Kamu Kirk Falls Flat

It’s kind of a bummer Kamu was evicted – mostly because Rick Devens was making big threats to blow up the house if Kamu stayed. With Kamu gone, we don’t get that nuclear house explosion like Devens promised.

Post-eviction, Melody Morris told Haley Thogmartin she didn’t get a chance to warn LaTrice Lala Verrett, who’s upset she didn’t know about Kamu going. Melody only had time to warn Taylor Brown.

Melody also told Mallory Aurichio she wishes they had time to give Yash Patel a heads up so he wouldn’t have been blindsided as HOH. Taylor and Lala are done with Drew Campbell and Barrett Pfeiffer.

They blame them for Kamu ‘s eviction because Mallory said the guys wouldn’t let them vote to keep Kamu. Realistically, they could’ve voted how they wanted. Taylor and Lala want to nominate Drew, Barrett and Devens if they won.

Big Brother 28: Alum Secret Strategy

Also, Angela told Haley the strategy to win it if they got that ball blowing Blockbuster. And Haley shared it with Kamu, but neither took the winning advice.

Haley didn’t want to get on the floor because she thought the vents would scrape her leg tattoos. And Kamu just ignored the tip. And guess what? It was Tucker Des Lauriers from BB26 who taught Angela that move to sit and grab.

Tucker posted a TikTok of him watching her win the Blockbuster live and cheering for her. And Tucker said Angela did him proud. Then, Tucker also smiled big when Kamu was evicted.

So, there was a lot of people gunning for the Big Brother HOH because the house is ripped in two again. Taylor and Lala were playing hard. Mallory and Melody told Drew if they win, they’ll put the icons on the block.

But it turns out not everyone was playing that hard because two houseguests might have just stepped back and let the new HOH win it. Dee Valladares and Rick Devens were also really amped up about it.

BB28: Haley’s Not Making Moves

Haley hoped the HOH was the balance beam race and guess what? It was. But she didn’t win it. Dee won the comp and is the week 7 Head of Household in BB28.

And Mallory and Barrett finished 2nd and 3rd but sounds like neither of them wanted to win this and threw it to Dee. So after all her big talk, Mallory didn’t fight for it, it seems.

Dee Valladares and Rick Devens did some pro-Survivor propaganda for the cameras after she won. Then they briefly talked noms last night. Dee won’t have one-on-ones until today because she was too tired.

But she told Rick Devens she wants Taylor, Lala and Yash on the block. What Dee really wants is to renom Yash Patel so he’s only got the BB Blockbuster to get himself off the block. Problem is, nomination options are slim.

They don’t want to nominate anyone from Mosh Pit and Dee wants to try and pull Haley in closer to them. So that leaves them with asking one of their own to be a pawn or for Dee to just throw Haley up one more week in a row with a plan to backdoor Yash Patel.

Haley probably won’t care since at this point, she won’t make it to the end and really wants to avoid the Big Brother jury house. But later in the day, when Dee started having meetings, targets shifted.

Big Brother: The House is Cooked

Taylor coached Lala on how to handle her one-on-one with Dee and to convince her to go after the FAP4 since they’re a block that needs broken up. Taylor’s right about that.

Have-Nots for the week are Taylor, Lala, Mallory. They raised their hands to volunteer. What’s funny is they’re the three who do all the good cooking. And Taylor and Lala already said they’re not cooking anything this week. Taylor said she’s seen if they don’t cook, the Big Brother house doesn’t eat.

Mallory’s joining them in solidarity with the ban on cooking. Speaking of cooking, Taylor was so worked up last night, she was pacing a hole in the living room floor, back and forth, kitchen to living room and all around. But she stopped at the stairs and said nope, I’m not trying to exercise.

Lala and Taylor laid in bed together and cried, saying they want to go home, this is a waste of time. And Lala cornered Barrett in the storage room and chewed him out for evicting Kamu. Lala said we had the majority and were driving the truck and with Kamuela Kamu, the other side has the power.

Barrett scrambled, said Kamu didn’t talk game with him, Barrett didn’t think Kamu was on his side. He told Lala sorry and they swapped I love yous and she left. Then Barrett deadpanned to Mallory “that went well” and she told Barrett, “I don’t think that went well”. Then, they laughed.

Big Brother 28: Live Feeds Fun

Fun feeds stuff, Mallory freestyled a rap song about cereal including the lyrics “if you don’t like Fruity Pebbles, then you are the devil”. The hook which Dee, Drew and Haley sang too, was “Cereal, cereal, what you know about cereal?” Production liked it and told Mallory thank you.

Also, Kamu was hit by a tough question in a Big Brother exit interview. The interviewer said his comments about Jason and Drew in girls’ clothing came off as anti-drag and homophobic.

Kamu said he thinks it’s fine for Jason to wear what he wants and for Drew to wear the girls clothes if he wants, but that’s not for him. Kamu said he respects how they want to dress and asks for the same respect for how he wants to dress.

He said he loves Jason as a person. The interviewer asked if he’d go see the Salina Estitties drag show and Kamu said “I don’t know about that, but I look forward to seeing Jason after this”.

Speaking of Angela’s Big Brother Blockbuster win. Jason was with Frankie Grande watching the episode. Jason was done up in Kamu drag and started bawling in excitement for Angela’s win while Frankie teased him about crying in that outfit.

He was in a blonde wig, a full beard pasted onto his face, a mesh top that looked like tattoos on his arms and chest and a hot pink satin dress. Jason’s also been dressing up like Haley in flannel to do cameo messages.

Big Brother: The Powers in Play

Also there was a big push on social media today asking for votes to get Taylor the last BB Time Capsule. Drew had been in the lead in the popularity polls with Taylor second I think. Haley was literally dead last.

There’s 4 Big Brother time capsule powers still available. So, there’s the Never Not pass which no one cares about. There’s HOH replay where the outgoing HOH can play in the comp. This one can be gifted so it’s okay but conditional.

There’s the Mystery Competitor where an alum comes in and plays veto on your behalf to double your chances. And the last, the one really good one, is coin of destiny where you have a 50/50 shot at a HOH takeover.

And Rome Seymour is in Hawaii right now with Lyric Medeiros. He’d been face timing with her parents while she was still in the house. And now Rome Seymour’s there with her.

Remember Cody Nickson – the Marine from BB19? He met his wife Jessica in Big Brother. Turns out Cody’s rooting for Rome Seymour and messaged him saying meeting the love of his life was much more important than winning Big Brother. Cody and Jessica have five daughters on top of the one he already had. Six years, five babies. Just wow.

“The Blind Side” star Quinton Aaron has finally shed light on finding out that his “wife,” Margarita, was still married to her ex-husband.

In a new interview, he revealed that he would have never spoken to her if he knew she was a “married woman,” claiming that he’s happy their own union was “voided.”

Quinton Aaron also spoke about his healing journey, stressing that he knows he will walk again after his stroke incident left him paralyzed.

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During a chat with Us Weekly, Aaron candidly talked about his split from Margarita, noting how he was in a bad place during his health ordeal, which was worsened when he found out his wife was legally married to her supposed ex-husband.

According to the actor, Margarita assured him she was completely divorced from her ex, hence why he agreed to date her.

“We would’ve never spoken if I knew she was married,” he stated. “I’m not the type of person that messes with married women. She kept telling me she was divorced for 10-plus years.”

The actor then noted that their marriage was “supposed to be a legal” one; however, it was “voided,” adding, “I didn’t need to annul it because we weren’t legally married. I dodged a bullet there.”

‘The Blind Side’ Star Has Not Spoken To His Ex Since He Last Saw Her In The Hospital

Aaron confirmed that he has not seen Margarita since he was hospitalized and that they are no longer in contact, after the exposure of her true marital status, which was done by his family members during his stroke ordeal.

“There were times I remember seeing her in the room, but I was in and out of consciousness, and I didn’t speak to her because I was intubated. I don’t need to speak to her ever again,” he added.

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Now, Aaron says he is going to leave God “in charge of the love department” in his life, noting that he is done seeking out partners on Bumble, Tinder, Facebook and TikTok, where he met Margarita.

“God has blessed me with a second chance to do it the right way,” he said.

Quinton Aaron Claims He Had Already Checked Out Of Their ‘Marriage’ Before He Suffered A Stroke

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Speaking more about his sham marriage with Margarita, the actor admitted that their relationship had been toxic for a long time due to endless fighting, mutual accusations, and dishonesty.

He said he felt completely trapped in the situation and had actually been praying for a spiritual intervention to remove Margarita from his life, having emotionally checked out of the romance long before the scandal broke.

For him, discovering her secret past was simply the absolute final breaking point that forced them apart, and he was entirely at peace with that outcome.

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“I’d been praying for God to remove her from my life because I felt like I was stuck,” Aaron stated. “I was done a long time ago. So I feel like if this was the final nail in the coffin, so to speak, the thing that had to happen in order to finally separate us, I was OK with it.”

Despite currently being confined to a seat and restricted in his movement, he expressed deep gratitude just to be alive, maintaining optimism that he will fully regain his ability to walk again.

‘The Blind Side’ Actor Has Forgiven His Ex And Hopes She Gets The ‘Help She Needs’

Speaking more about healing, Aaron discussed how his Christian faith helped him get through the marriage discovery, saying, “It’s definitely been a challenge dealing with that and the recovery.”

He noted, “[Earlier on], a lot of things aggravated me easily, which spiked my blood pressure. When I was intubated, I was dealing with depression and anger and all these different emotions. So I got to this point where I had to completely shut all of that out.”

“In order for me to move forward, I needed to completely remove [Margarita] from my life,” Aaron continued. “So that’s what I did. As a Christian, I forgave her a long time ago because I didn’t want to hold on to the anger and have it slow down my process of healing.”

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“I really do wish her well. I hope she gets the help she needs,” the actor added.

Quinton Aaron‘s Ex Slammed His Claim That She Tried To Kill Him

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Prior to his recent confession, Aaron claimed in a statement to TMZ that Margarita is “satanic” and wanted to kill him.

However, she has since pushed back against his allegations, insisting she is not “satanic” and never attempted to harm the actor because she deeply loves him.

To defend her name, she highlighted her past efforts to help him adopt healthier habits, pointing to his extensive history of medical issues, which includes diabetes, congestive heart failure, and past episodes of coughing up blood.

Noting that their very first meeting took place while he was hospitalized, she argued that his current physical struggles are entirely unrelated to her.

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Margarita further maintained that she is a deeply religious woman, declaring, “If anything came from ‘spirits’ or ‘satanic’ it’s from Quinton’s side of the family.”