HBO is ready for Bill Simmons, are we? The personality has been a part of the HBO stable, as reported, for a while now and his first contribution to the network is about to make its debut. It is ANY GIVEN WEDNESDAY debuting June 22. In his first promotional clip for the show he makes it clear what he believes in, at least for the moment, and gives us a sense of what topics he will explore for a half hour on Wednesday nights.
Love him or hate him, agree or disagree with him the fact is he is on HBO now and not ESPN. You can be certain that he is going to be full of his own opinion and whether or not you can roll with that is up to the viewer. But the same can be said for the two other personalities and their “talk shows”; that being Bill Maher and John Oliver. But we have to ask do we need another guy doing the shtick?
That is for the viewer to decide also, but consider this: REAL TIME WITH BILL MAHER gets into the nitty-gritty of the political scene and LAST WEEK TONIGHT WITH JOHN OLIVER taps into that also but includes social and international issues as well. That leaves ANY GIVEN WEDNESDAY WITH BILL SIMMOMS to root around the topics of pop culture and sports, which is exactly what the above promotional clip features. We don’t need another take on the political scene, but all the filler in between all that top news satire could be entertaining.
I just hope that what is shown above is not the set of his show. I’m sure it is not, but perhaps it is indicative that he will feature a lot of green-screen work in his bit. We can also be sure that he will be behind other programming, likely for HBO Sports as we move on, but REAL SPORTS WITH BRYANT GUMBEL is the one to beat there. He and his team have the serious sports coverage down.
The bigger news than this talk forum show is the fact that it will air Wednesday nights on HBO. Is the network going to try to build up another night of the week? It needs to step up its game to compete in the busy market and adding another night is long overdue. It is not expected to happen in 2016 but if Simmon’s show catches on then in 2017 perhaps he show can be coupled with one of the limited series or comedies in the works. But we are jumping the gun; let’s get ANY GIVEN WEDNESDAY on the air first, right?
So there is a lot to believe in. Bill Simmons ranted a few in the promo and we are sure he will have quite a bit more opinion to share, after all it is a twenty episode season. So what do you believe in? Do you believe in Bill Simmons on HBO? Check him out beginning on Wednesday, June 22 and let us know.
2 comments
Really curious to see if HBO blows up Wednesdays more thoroughly. They have “Real Sports” on Tuesdays, Docs on Mondays, this on Wed, Real Time and Vice on Fridays, Movies on Saturdays and Mega Series on Sundays. Looks like Thursday is the only one with no love!
In this streaming world it doesn’t make a lot of sense to have the weekly schedule constrain too much of what HBO is doing. I think they’re transitioning slowly.
To be honest.. they need more content to fill it. They have arguably more shows than ever but it won’t be enough. There need to be HITS ALL YEAR ROUND for HBO to reach it’s full potential.
Now.. where’s Westworld at?
from what I heave been reading, Westworld filming is just about completed …….my prediction it will air Sun Sept 11 2016( sun after Labour day)