The fall TV lineup looks lighter this year, but there are still plenty of options

Good morning, and welcome to the Essential California newsletter. It’s Saturday, Sept. 16. Here’s what you need to know to start your weekend:

• Fall TV is returning, with fewer options due to strikes
• Striking workers could get unemployment benefits
• Nothing could stop these kissing (step) siblings from dating
• And here’s today’s e-newspaper

The shows we’re most excited about this fall

Cooler temperatures may start rolling in soon, but nothing is more exciting about fall than the TV lineup.

TV has progressed past the days of me rushing home from school to get my homework done before “Reba” and “What I Like About You” aired. Instead, access to a wide range of shows and replays on streaming services, where I can binge watch full seasons.

How we watch TV has changed. But this year, what we watch looks a lot different, too.

The writers’ and actors’ strikes have halted productions, stalling new seasons of popular shows like “Abbott Elementary” (I was so ready to root for Janine and Gregory as a couple!) and “Young Sheldon.”

Still, there’s a lot of TV to get excited about. UBA’s daily broadcast is starting up again in the third season of “The Morning Show” on Apple TV+. (I worked in TV news, so that mess and chaos? I get it.)

It looks like the sex-crazed teens in Moordale are also back at it in the fourth and final season of “Sex Education,” which returns next week on Netflix.

Over on network television, unscripted reality programming is back with a force (much like during the last writers’ strike). “The Golden Bachelor,” a new twist on ABC’s “The Bachelor” franchise, premieres Sept. 28. Instead of contestants in their 20s and 30s finding love and sex, the spinoff features retirees in their 60s and 70s looking for a second (or third) chance at love.

The networks are also padding their lineups with shows from overseas, including the original British version of “Ghosts” and series borrowed from within their parent companies (this explains why “Yellowstone” reruns will air on CBS starting Sunday).

The great thing about streaming is we don’t always need new shows to fill our time anyway. (“Suits” became an unlikely sensation on Netflix earlier this summer.)

As Times television critics Lorraine Ali and Robert Lloyd write, “there will still be more television than you can watch.”

The week’s biggest stories

(Andrea D’Agosto / For The Times)

• Gov. Gavin Newsom is in the hot seat after California passed a bill to give striking workers unemployment benefits.
• Will California health workers get a $25 minimum wage? Legislature sends a bill to Newsom after a long fight.
• The Times’ Jenn Harris went to an exclusive L.A. dinner party. Everyone was naked.
• $750,000 in overtime: How a group of LAUSD employees abused extra-pay practices.
• Tom Girardi curses at a prosecutor as a judge weighs the ex-attorney’s competency to stand trial.
• The Dodgers remove Julio Urías’ locker and murals featuring the pitcher around Dodger Stadium.
• A climate scientist wanted to start a debate in academia. He set off a bigger firestorm.
• When should I get vaccinated for COVID-19? Flu? RSV?
• A newly discovered green comet: When’s the best time to see it in Southern California?
• A dispute over Dianne Feinstein’s family fortune was aired further as attorneys spar in court.
• Nobu Malibu faces a lawsuit alleging sexual harassment and discrimination against hostesses.

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Column One

Column One is The Times’ home for narrative and longform journalism. Here’s a great piece from this week:

(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)

There’s a hidden crisis among California’s rural kids. Would this teen make it? Even the most ambitious students in California’s impoverished rural north often deal with extreme challenges, including poverty and neglect, at higher rates than anywhere else in the state. For Linda Plumlee, academics were a ticket out of Alturas, a cattle-ranching town of 2,700.

More great reads

• ‘Whatever it takes to reduce crime’: Why Lancaster is creating a police department.
• Food and love brought them together. Now they’re all about selling plants in L.A.
• UC regents rejected a reportedly $12-million home for a Black university president after the racist attack on his current house.

How can we make this newsletter more useful? Send comments to [email protected].

For your weekend

(Miki Kim/For The Times)

Going out

• 📸 10 ways to feed your K-pop obsession in L.A., from K-pop spa treatments to dance parties.
• 📽️ Films from the greatest Mexican filmmaker you’ve never heard of are being screened in L.A. through Sept. 23.
• 🥗 Three new places to eat and drink in Palm Springs.
• 🍸51 rooftop restaurants and bars in L.A. to soak in the best city views.
• 🍕We tried the best grilled cheese in the universe, 21 of the best pizza slices and some of the best soft-serve in L.A. and loved them all.

Staying in

• 🎥 With “A Haunting in Venice,” Kenneth Branagh’s Agatha Christie series hits its stride.
• 🧑🏽‍🚀 The story of a real-life migrant worker’s goal to become an astronaut seems “A Million Miles Away” in new biopic.
• 🧑‍🍳 Here’s a recipe for Charles Namba’s gyoza two ways.
• ✏️ Get our free daily crossword puzzle, sudoku, word search and arcade games.

L.A. Affairs

Get wrapped up in tantalizing stories about dating, relationships and marriage.

(Inma Hortas / For The Times)

My dad and her mom had an affair. Should that stop us from dating? As Paul and Gabby’s love blossomed, their parents were concerned that they might have some sort of ugly breakup, making family gatherings uncomfortable. But exactly the opposite happened.

Have a great weekend, from the Essential California team

Kevinisha Walker, multiplatform editor
Karim Doumar, head of newsletters

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