MacGyver Reboot Update #124

Great news: Filming has finally started – and we have a premiere date for Season 5!

MacGyverCBS Twitter and Facebook Header (via CBS)

(Spoiler Alert: You will get spoilered about Season 5 storylines by reading this post and its comments or by clicking on the links provided. For daily news and to join the discussion, you can find me on Twitter and head over to the MacGyverOnline Forums.)

 

Season 5 Premiere News and Promo
On November 9, we finally got news about the premiere date for Season 5: The first episode will air on Friday, December 4! The official MacGyverCBS Twitter Account changed their profile photo and header with new key art. The header is a photoshopped version of a photo taken while filming Episode 4×08; inserting a paperclip into MacGyver’s mouth.

Just minutes later, they also revealed the Synopsis and the First Still for Episode 5×01 (Resort + Desi + Riley + Window Cleaner + Witness) via SpoilerTV. Interestingly, this is the episode that was initially filmed with production number 415 (Resort + Desi + Riley + Witness). As predicted, they changed the title; adding one ingredient to match it for Season 5. We got 16 Official Stills in total via KsiteTV, which were later reposted by SpoilerTV and What2Vue.

Episode 5×01: Resort + Desi + Riley + Window Cleaner + Witness (Mark Hill/CBS via KsiteTV)

It’s interesting to note that the episode with production number 414 has been written by ex-Showrunner Peter Lenkov. Actually, the Magnum PI Season 3 premiere episode was co-written by Lenkov, too. Maybe they felt that two episodes written by Lenkov was too much for one night…

Gearing up for Production
After waiting for months, we finally got proof of pre-production being in progress. On November 6, Heather Kritzer posted a photo of several crew members (e.g. Steven Serna) doing some location scouting. The next day, Sarah Downer uploaded a photo of her officially being back in the office for Season 5. Two days later, she showed us her new work attire: Corona Chic. (And if you look really closely, you can see a photo of our favorite villain Murdoc aka David Dastmalchian in the background.)

Back in the office at Mailing Avenue Stageworks (via Sarah Downer)

Like on other productions, the crew members are wearing masks and face-shields – plus being dressed in “suits” and gloves in some departments. I guess we won’t see too many smiles on BtS photos with the crew this season. Sarah also posted another photo that day, revealing that Lucas Till was back for his costume fitting.

On November 10, Justin Hires uploaded a photo of Lucas, Henry Ian Cusick and himself; masked up and presumably waiting to get a haircut. Many fans commented on the matching mullets of Lucas and Ian, hoping that they get to keep their longer quarantine locks. As Ian later revealed via an Instagram Story, they cut and dyed his Hawaiian sun-bleached hair a bit; matching the style with the one he had in Season 4.

Waiting for a new haircut (via Justin Hires)

Working on Episode 501
(Note: Since we don’t know the order of the episodes yet, I will continue to refer to the episodes by their production number. It might be a bit confusing, but this seems to be the best option for now.)

On November 11, Justin uploaded the first photo while being on set for the episode with production number 501. He didn’t look as excited as he said to be, but maybe simply because he was overwhelmed standing in front of yet another Porsche. According to a photo by Christopher Duddy, Tristin was on the set too that day. The slate revealed that the episode is directed by David Straiton, who has directed several episodes before.

Season 5 Premiere Announcement (via CBS)

In the Instagram Story by Hussein Agamiri, it looked like they re-created parts of the Phoenix Lab on a bigger, open soundstage so that the crew is able to film from a bigger distance. While Justin and Tristin kept a bigger distance as well, it’s not clear yet if they will put them closer together in post-production. Sarah Downer revealed in her Insta Story that instead of living and breathing Fit Models, they are using mannequins.

On November 12, production moved to an airport. We didn’t get to see much material, though. Later, Henry Ian Cusick posted two photos in his Insta Story. We didn’t get a good look at MacGyver’s new haircut, but it seems that despite being kidnapped, Russ Taylor will get out mostly unscathed (besides a small butterfly bandage on his forehead).

BtS photo of Episode 501 (via Christopher Duddy)

Season 5 Overview
As mentioned above, filming for about 10 more episodes started on November 11. For now, I’m assuming that CBS has planned for Season 5 to have 16 episodes (if they manage to continue filming without a bigger hiatus).

Since filming per episode takes about 8-10 days during the pandemic, they might finish about 4 episodes before Christmas break if all goes well – but with covid cases rising in all states, it’s possible that filming protocols will be tightened or that filming has to shut down again.

Episode 5×01: Resort + Desi + Riley + Window Cleaner + Witness (Mark Hill/CBS via KsiteTV)

Here’s an overview of all the information about the upcoming episodes so far. The infos were either provided by CBS, by the website for the Writers Guild of America West (episode titles), by social media accounts or IMDb (cast and crew info), from SpoilerTV (press releases) and The Futon Critic (airdates).

• 5×01 (filmed with production number 415):
  Resort + Desi + Riley + Window Cleaner + Witness (December 4)
  Written by Stephanie Hicks, directed by Avi Youabian
• 5×02 (414): Thief + Painting + Viro-486 + Justice (tba)
  Written by Peter M. Lenkov and Andrew Klein
• 5×03 (416): Jack + Kinematics + MgKNO3 + GTO (tba)
  Written by Jim Adler, directed by Ericson Core
• 5×04 (417): Golden Lancehead + Venom + Blood + Baggage
  Written by Joshua Brown and Andrew Karlsruher, directed by David Straiton
• 5×05 (418): SOS + Hazmat + Frequency + Malihini
  Written by Cindy Appel, directed by Yangzom Brauen
• 5×06 (419): Banh Bao + Drill + Burner + Mason
  Written by Justin Lisson and Sophia Lopez, directed by Peter Weller
• 5x?? (420): Rails + Pitons + Pipe + Salt (unfinished production)
  Written by Rob Pearlstein, directed by Christine Moore
• 5x?? (501): Telescope + S-218 + Amplifier + Frenemies + Fog
  Written by Jim Adler and Stephanie Hicks, directed by David Straiton

Remember that the episode titles and their order is not definite until an official Press Release by CBS.

Back in the office at Mailing Avenue Stageworks (via Sarah Downer)

Considering that the hairstyles of the main cast seems to match with Season 4, they could mix up the order; sliding newly-filmed stand-alone episodes in between of older ones to draw out the Codex story-arc. With only 10 more episodes to film, they probably won’t bother with setting up a second, bigger story arc with another main villain.

Other Cast, Crew and Character News
This week, Central Casting Georgia has been looking for Science Types (for today), for Homeless Types (for Monday) and for Background Actors with Cars. The amount of Casting Calls has been toned down for most productions; especially for background actors. Covid tests two days in advance are mandatory, so there won’t be any Rush Calls anymore.

BtS photo of Episode 501 (via Henry Ian Cusick)

Since the IMDb entries for the leftover episodes had been wiped, we don’t have much information for upcoming cast and crew yet. Due to the new protocols, crossovers are very unlikely this season, but we already know from BtS photos in Winter and Spring that we will have Jorge Garcia (Lost, Hawaii Five-0) and Peter Weller in guest-appearances. For more information about the producers and directors assistants, we might have to wait a bit longer. Posts on social media confirmed that some former crew members won’t work on Season 5 (e.g. Haley Porch or Levy’s stand-in Amanda Mazonkey).

On Sunday, Henry Ian Cusick will attend virtual panels at the Dream It Convention. During hiatus, Tristin Mays filmed a movie called “The Christmas Sitters” that will air on the ion TV channel on December 13, 20 and 25. For the exact dates and more promo photos, you can check here.

Tristin Mays in The Christmas Sitters (via ionTV)

Season 4 Rerun and Season 5 Schedule
Tonight, there’s a rerun of Episode 4×12 (Loyalty + Family + Rogue + Hellfire (4×12). Next Friday, we get a rerun of the Season 4 Finale (Save + The + Dam + World). The rerun on November 27 was dropped due to “Frosty the Snowman”, but it’s possible that they will add more reruns during Christmas break. In fact, it seems some networks are planning on bigger Christmas breaks than usual, so it’s not clear yet when the Friday shows will be back next year.

For now, we can safely assume that we will get to watch at least three new episodes in December. Ratings-wise, the other CBS Fall shows haven’t been doing well so far (especially SWAT), but I think the Friday Line-Up will be safe from any big schedule shake-ups.

Cover Preview for MacGyver: Meltdown (via Prince of Cats Literary Productions)

Other MacGyver News
Yesterday, we got a first look at the cover of the upcoming first MacGyver Novel (MacGyver: Meltdown), written by Eric Kelly and MacGyver-Creator Lee David Zlotoff. The book was to come out in October, but has been postponed to end of November. You can find more information here.

MacGyver Reboot Update #86

Filming for Season 4 will start in 4 days. Let’s hope we get some good BtS material to tie us over until we finally get to see the episodes.

Season 4 Logo (via MacGyver Writers)

(Minor Spoiler Alert: You might get spoilered about characters and storylines in Season 4 by reading this post and its comments or by clicking on the links provided! For daily news and to join the discussion and/or speculate away, you can head over to the MacGyverOnline Forums.)

 

What are Cast and Crew up to?
The main cast was pretty busy in recent weeks; finishing up old projects and preparing for another 5 months of filming:

• Lucas Till enjoyed a well-deserved holiday with friends and celebrated July 4 with family
• Justin Hires finished his Stand-Up comedy show tour. A photo of him during one of his shows even made it into an article by The Hollywood Reporter.
• Tristin Mays attended several fundraising events and did some talk show appearances for the RuJohn Foundation in Jamaica
• Besides working out, Levy Tran has been taking shooting lessons to prepare for Season 4. She just finished her road trip across the States.
• Like last year, David Dastmalchian auctioned off a visit to the MacGyver set for a good cause. It was sold for 17’000 USD. The set-visit last year was auctioned off for 12’000 USD, so that’s pretty cool.
• George Eads’ Korean War movie “The Battle of Jangsari” has been picked up for international distribution and is supposed to be released in Korea this month.
• Amazon Studios has picked up “The Wilds”, the series that Reign Edwards filmed the pilot for in New Zealand last year. There’s no filming dates yet.

Costume Designer Sarah Downer had revealed on June 18 that she had started on costume prepping. After that, it stayed quiet on social media for a while, despite the production office already being open since June 3rd.

Justin Hires at The Comedy Store (via The Hollywood Reporter)

Of course, there’s still been a lot of preparation going on behind the scenes. As Steven Serna stated, the grips are already in full preparation mode. On Tuesday, both Justin and Levy had been on the studio lot for fittings.

On June 25, Peter Lenkov revealed part of the production logo for Season 4. He also uploaded a few throwback photos (e.g. of him and Lucas at the Monte Carlo Television Festival back in 2017). Every now and then, a new/old BtS photo (e.g. of Episode 3×08) or BtS video (e.g. of Episode 3×19) pops up. Meredith Eaton shared a photo of her with Lucas.

Technical Consultant Rhett Allain continued writing science notes about the MacHacks; adding a blog post for Episode 2×12 (Mac + Jack) and for Episode 2×13 (CO2 sensor + Tree Branch).

Meeting up with friends (via Meredith Eaton)

Ratings prediction for Season 4 (encore)
TV show ratings tend to drop each year. On average, every non-rookie CBS Fall show lost about 17.61% in demo ratings and 12.94% in audience numbers in the 2018/19 TV season. When looking at the renewed action and crime shows only, the loss was even higher (about 18.77% in demo ratings and 15.29% in audience numbers).

The ratings loss for MacGyver was actually a bit lower than the average (with a loss of 15.79% in demo and 11.01% in audience numbers compared to Season 2). If the Reboot would have been allowed to air in the same timeslot this Fall, Season 4 could have ended up with an average demo-rating of 0.59 and a live-audience of 5.43 million viewers. That’s… not really great. But how will the ratings for the other CBS shows look like; especially the Friday shows?

Lucas Till enjoying a vacation in Alaska (via Jason Trost)

In case you’re interested in some CBS Friday predictions:

• If Hawaii Five-0 has the same ratings drop as it did this season, it will end up with an average demo of 0.62 (-18.9%) and 6.27 million live-viewers (-13.05%) per episode.
• If Blue Bloods has the same ratings drop as it did this season, it will end up with an average demo of 0.69 (-13.09%) and 7.83 million live-viewers (-7.15%) per episode.

Both shows still have good DVR ratings and do very well internationally, so they will probably get renewed for another season. They could still go on for more seasons if one the lead actors quits.

Tristin Mays doing interviews (via RuJohn Foujndation)

There’s no losses for Magnum PI yet. Because of the timeslot move, it’s a bit difficult to predict how the ratings will do. Let’s say it will drop the same amount as all the other renewed action- and crime-shows did this year. It would end up with an average demo of 0.72 (-18.77%) and 5.08 million live-viewers (-15.29%) per episode. Let’s be generous and say the timeslot actually helps the show and the loss will only be 10%. That way, it would end up with an average demo of 0.80 and 5.40 million live-viewers per episode.

While a demo of 0.8 for Magnum would be acceptable, the audience numbers aren’t good enough for a show in its 2nd season. It’s even lower than what MacGyver could have gotten this season if it stayed a Fall show. It will be interesting to see how much the time slot switch will influence the Friday ratings. It’s very likely that while the move will help to keep the ratings-loss marginal for Magnum PI, it’s going to accelerate the ratings drop for both H50 and BB.

BtS photo of Episode 3×08: Revenge + Catacombs + Le Fantome (via Justin Hires)

As mentioned before, midseason shows aren’t very famous for their ratings in general. This is how the CBS rookie Spring and Summer shows have been doing this year:

• The Red Line ended its run of 8 episodes with 3.85 million live-viewers and a demo of 0.36 per episode and was cancelled.
• After 9 episodes, The Code (Mondays 9pm) is at 4.98 million live-viewers with a demo of 0.55 on average. The show has been pulled off schedule temporarily; replacing it with reruns of Magnum PI. The break didn’t do it any good; dropping half a million live-viewers when it came back this week. There’s 3 more episodes to go, but since the show has already been cancelled, the ratings might drop even lower.

Summer Show Blood & Treasure (Tuesdays 10pm) aired 8 episodes so far. The average at the moment is 4.24 million live-viewers with a demo of 0.48 per episode. Interestingly, it’s been renewed for a 2nd season. That gives us hope for MacGyver since it should be able to beat these ratings and is already a well-known franchise internationally.

Season 4 Logo (via Peter Lenkov)

All you need to know about Season 4
There’s still no midseason premiere date yet, but here’s an overview of what we know so far:

• Terry Matalas (12 Monkeys) replaced Craig O’Neill as Co-Showrunner
• Season 4 will have 13 episodes for now
• filming starts July 8 in Georgia and is expected to wrap in November (unless they add more episodes to film)
• as expected, Levy Tran has been promoted to Series Regular
• According to TV Line, there was a new regular role to be cast; specifically the character “of a former Army guy, trained in psy-ops, who has parlayed his particular set of skills into a successful career as the owner of an elite military contractor”. As Deadline revealed on June 28, the role has been appointed to LOST alum Henry Ian Cusick.

Henry Ian Cusick will play Russ, a lead opposite Lucas Till’s MacGyver. Russ is handsome and quick-witted Oxford-educated ex-military who is a master manipulator and salesman — skilled in propaganda and lie detection with an extremely high emotional intelligence. A very wealthy man, he’s used to getting his way and not beyond enjoying the spoils of war: expensive suits, fast cars, private jets, house in Monte Carlo.

Henry Ian Cusick (via IMDb)

There’s no further information if he’s friend or foe. The news flooded social media very fast; even ending up as one of the top posts on SpoilerTV last week. Judging by the info of all the news sites, he sounds like a mixture of the characters of Jack Dalton and Samantha Cage. Some fans are worried that him being another regular might push both Riley and Desi a bit into the background.

The first Casting Calls came out on Tuesday. Central Casting Georgia has been looking for Bar and Coffee Patrons and for a Featured Bartender.

Costume Fitting Break (via Sarah Downer)

Timeslot prediction for Season 4 (encore)
Although they start filming in just 4 days, it could take another half a year until we get official news about the premiere date and the timeslot. Many have speculated about a start in January 2020. But the only potential one-hour-timeslots for MacGyver to start in January are Mondays 9pm (in place of All Rise), Thursdays 10pm (Evil) or Sundays 10pm (Madam Secretary). Additionally, there are also 3 other crime shows needing a one-hour-slot during midseason: Tommy, FBI: Most Wanted and the last season of Criminal Minds. So it’s going to be a tight schedule if they still insist on all the mini-breaks and reruns during the season.

CBS might have already planned on where and when to fit which show into the ongoing schedule, but it all hinges on how well the rookie shows will do. As you can guess, a 10pm slot for the show would be pretty bad. And if both All Rise and Evil get a back-up order for a full season, there’s only Sundays 10pm left in January; meaning the show might have to wait until Spring for a free 8pm or 9pm slot.

Lucas and Nick Till celebrating July 4th with Family (via Erin Quinn)

MacGyver in Germany
German-speaking fans finally got a premiere date for Season 3 on German channel Sat.1 (July 23rd). As expected, they will air two episodes every Tuesday. Pity that the Season 2 DVD isn’t out before mid-August *sigh*.

The upcoming German Episode Titles:

• 3×01: 50 Millionen Diamanten (50 Million Diamonds, Improvise)
• 3×02: Daltons Helden (Dalton’s Heroes, Bravo Lead + Loyalty + Friendship)
• 3×03: Zurück aufs College (Back to School, Bozer + Booze + Back To School)
• 3×04: Atemnot (Respiratory Distress, Guts + Fuel + Hope)

Additionally, Germany had another MacGyver-related event last week: Original MacGyver Richard Dean Anderson visited Comic Con Germany in Stuttgart; attending two panels, posing for photos and writing countless of autographs.

Other MacGyver Promo
ICYMI: Both the Reboot and Lucas Till have been nominated in the 1st wave of nominees for the Teen Choice Awards. Voting for the 1st wave was open until June 25; voting for the 2nd wave of nominees starts on July 8. The Awards will take place on August 11.

Also, Greenlight Hollywood has just released a second MacGyver collectible: Jack Dalton’s 67 Pontiac GTO convertible. Check out the photos and description here.

MacGyver Collectible (via Greenlight Hollywood)

It’s still months until we get to see new episodes, so here’s what we know so far about other upcoming MacGyver-related promo stuff:

• The French DVD for Season 2 will be released on July 24
• The German DVD for Season 2 will be released on August 15
• The “Official MacGyver Survival Manual: 155 Ways to Save the Day” will be released on September 17

According to an article from June 3, CBS has announced new licensees for its TV properties. MacGyver is one of them, doing collaborations with “Just Funky” and “Skybrand”. I’m assuming it will be similar items that CBS usually has in their shop for other shows (e.g. mugs, mousepads or beanies), so most likely nothing too exciting unless they add standees like for H50. It’s worth noting that almost all crime shows shops for CBS are down at the moment. They’re probably already in the process of updating the shop pages, so new articles might be available soon.

MacGyver Reboot Update #85

It might take a while until we get to see the episodes on TV, but we don’t have to wait too long for new BtS material: Filming for Season 4 will start on July 8.

BtS photo of Episode 3×22: Mason + Cable + Choices (via CBS)

(Minor Spoiler Alert: You might get spoilered about characters and storylines in Season 4 by reading this post and its comments or by clicking on the links provided!)

 

What are Cast and Crew up to?
The main cast was pretty busy in recent weeks:

• Lucas Till wrapped his movie “Son of the South” and promoted the upcoming Season of MacGyver at the Corus Upfronts in Toronto. It looks like he’s enjoying a well-deserved holiday at the moment.
• Justin Hires dropped the first music video “Fire Flame” for his upcoming album. He did more comedy shows and visited several radio and TV stations (e.g. WJZ in Baltimore) for interviews.
• Tristin Mays’ short movie “Breathe” is temporarily available on Amazon Prime in the US/UK. She also attended some red carpet premieres and travelled to Jamaica this week to attend some fundraising events for the RuJohn Foundation.
• Besides working out, Levy Tran has been taking shooting lessons to prepare for Season 4. She recently did a short interview with the Chi Creative Agency.
• Like last year, David Dastmalchian auctioned off a visit to the MacGyver set for a good cause. It was sold for 17’000 USD. The set-visit last year was auctioned off for 12’000 USD, so that’s pretty cool.
• George Eads’ Korean War movie “The Battle of Jangsari” has been picked up for international distribution
• Amazon Studios has picked up “The Wilds”, the series that Reign Edwards filmed the pilot for in New Zealand last year

Reboot-related, it was still pretty quiet on social media. Costume Designer Sarah Downer revealed on Tuesday via Instagram stories that she has started on costume prepping.

BtS photo of Episode 3×21: Treason + Heartbreak + Gum (via Robert Maxfield)

Every now and then, a new/old BtS photo (e.g. of Tristin Mays in costume fitting for Episode 3×11) pops up. Boom Operator Robert Maxfield uploaded several photos recently as well; e.g. of Lucas, Levy and Justin on set of Episode 3×21. CBS shared a new photo of Lucas and Tate Donovan on set of Episode 3×22 for father’s day.

Technical Consultant Rhett Allain continued writing science notes about the MacHacks; adding a blog post each for Episode 2×09 (CD-Rom + Hoagie Foil), for Episode 2×10 (War Room + Ship) and for Episode 2×11 (Bullet + Pen).

Ratings prediction for Season 4 (encore)
Season 3 had an average of 6.107 millions live-viewers per episode with a demo-rating of 0.70. Usually, a new season of an ongoing Fall show continues in ratings the way it ended its last season; rising up a bit towards midseason before dropping again.

BtS photo of Episode 3×11: Mac + Fallout + Jack (via Sarah Downer)

On average, every non-rookie CBS Fall show lost about 17.61% in demo ratings and 12.94% in audience numbers this year. MacGyver was in the same range (with a loss of 15.79% in demo and 11.01% in audience numbers compared to Season 2). So if MacGyver would have continued in the same timeslot this Fall, Season 4 could have ended up with an average demo-rating of 0.59 and a live-audience of 5.43 million viewers. That’s… not great. The Reboot is the lowest-rated show that had premiered last Fall and got renewed. So the expected demo-rating is probably one of the main reasons why the show lost its Fall slot.

Predicting the Season 4 ratings is pretty much impossible at this moment, though – since we don’t know yet when and in what timeslot the show will come back. I will try to make another prediction once the Fall shows have already aired the first few episodes.

In case you’re interested: If Hawaii Five-0 has the same ratings drop as it did this season, it will end up with an average demo of 0.62 (-18.9%) and 6.27 million viewers (-13.05%) per episode. It will be interesting to see how much the move to MacGyver‘s old time slot will influence the ratings loss. It is very likely that CBS trying to help Magnum PI doesn’t just hurt the ratings for MacGyver, but for H50 as well.

Episode 3×22: Mason + Cable + Choices (Official Still via TV Insider)

CBS has several mediocre-rated shows on TV this Fall, but it’s difficult to say what they expect for MacGyver and what they will be willing to tolerate before cancelling it. In general, midseason shows aren’t very famous for their ratings; so CBS probably doesn’t expect too much anyway. As mentioned in my last Reboot Update blog post, both CBS rookie Spring shows this year failed ratings-wise:

• The Red Line ended its run of 8 episodes with 3.85 million live-viewers and a demo of 0.36 per episode and won’t come back for another season.
• After 8 episodes, The Code (Mondays 9pm) is at 5.10 million live-viewers with a demo of 0.57 on average. Apparently, that isn’t good enough for CBS since they even pulled it off schedule temporarily; replacing it with reruns of Magnum PI. The show has 4 more episodes to go, but is already cancelled.

Summer Show Blood & Treasure (Tuesdays 10pm) aired 6 episodes so far. The average at the moment is 4.55 million live-viewers with a demo of 0.50 per episode.

All you need to know about Season 4
As we all know by now, the show has been shoved to midseason. Its Friday Fall timeslot at 8pm will be taken over by Hawaii Five-0, followed by Magnum PI at 9pm. They just announced the premiere Fall dates for CBS, but there’s no information yet about any of the premiere dates for midseason shows.

BtS photo of Episode 3×22: Mason + Cable + Choices (via CBS)

Here’s what we know so far:

• Terry Matalas (12 Monkeys) replaced Craig O’Neill as Co-Showrunner
• Season 4 will have 13 episodes for now
• Filming starts July 8 in Georgia and is expected to wrap in November
• Levy Tran has been promoted to Series Regular

There’s no Casting Calls out yet, but it shouldn’t be long for the first postings.

(For daily news about Season 4 and to join the discussion and/or speculate away, you can head over to the MacGyverOnline Forums.)

Timeslot prediction for Season 4 (encore)
Although they start filming on July 8, it could take another half a year until we get official news about the premiere date and the timeslot. And while many have speculated about a start in January 2020, remember this: With probably only getting 13 episodes, Season 4 wouldn’t need to start airing before June to be done in time for the new Fall shows to start in September.

Cover Art for debut single “Fire Flame” (via Justin Hires)

There’s several possibilities:

• The Reboot could take over the 1-hour-timeslot of a rookie show or any other show that didn’t get a full season order, so probably premiering in January 2020. This is the most likely option.
• The Reboot could take over the timeslot of a show with a full season order of 22 episodes that doesn’t get reruns after the season finale, so probably premiering in April or May 2020.
• The Reboot could take over the 1-hour-timeslot of a crime show that got pulled early. This seems rather unlikely, but could happen anytime.

Lets revisit the CBS Fall schedule again. Potential one-hour-timeslots for MacGyver to start in January could be Mondays 9pm (in place of All Rise), Thursdays 10pm (Evil) or Sundays 10pm (Madam Secretary). But besides Amazing Race (that has a history of airing on whatever day being available), there are also 3 other crime shows needing a one-hour-slot during midseason: Tommy (most likely Mondays or Sundays), FBI: Most Wanted (most likely Tuesdays or Sundays) and Criminal Minds (most likely Wednesdays).

CBS Fall 2019 Schedule (via World Screen)

So… what’s the speculation? Well, mine goes like this:

• If All Rise doesn’t get a back-order, Monday 9pm in January seems the most likely option. That would make MacGyver the lead-in for Bull; taking over Magnum PI‘s old timeslot. This is an option that other prediction sites already had in mind for last year when Magnum was announced being one of the new Fall shows for 2018.
• But what if All Rise DOES get a back-order? Then, it seems more likely they’ll wait for another timeslot in April or May since Sunday 10pm is better fitted for Tommy or the FBI Spinoff. Also, Evil created the most buzz so far; probably getting a full season.

Yes, that would be quite a long wait. But all the other crime shows got a full-season order, so there’s no chance for another early timeslot unless they either pull or pause a show due to bad ratings. (They paused SEAL Team for almost 3 months in the middle of the season for another show, and that didn’t turn out too well) And MacGyver probably can’t hold the ratings in a 10pm timeslot anyway, so we should be happy if it doesn’t land there. (The bigger the ratings drop, the smaller the chances for a 5th season.)

Lucas Till at the Corus Upfronts 2019 (via Candids Toronto)

Note that rookie shows usually DO get reruns if they get a full season order. Which leaves… Friday as another likely option; depending on what day they’ve planned for Undercover Boss to air (Celebrity Undercover Boss aired Fridays 8pm in Summer 2018). So the MacGyver Reboot could actually end up in its old timeslot again, followed by reruns of either Magnum or H50 and reruns of Blue Bloods. Which isn’t great, but isn’t the worst that could happen. Not to forget that on TV, anything can happen… I will try to make another prediction once the Fall shows have already aired a few episodes.

The Corus Upfronts and other MacGyver Promo
Lucas Till promoted the upcoming season at the Corus Upfronts in Toronto. It was a pleasant surprise to see BtS photos of interviews and of him posing with fans pop up on social media on Monday. So far, there haven’t been any interviews released yet since they probably hold onto the promo material for the upcoming season.

Nominations for the Teen Choice Awards (via CBS)

Both the Reboot and Lucas Till have been nominated in the 1st wave of nominees for the Teen Choice Awards. You can cast your vote (up to 10 votes per category per day per entry method) on the official website or via Twitter. Lucas had already been nominated last year, but lost out to Flash‘s lead hero. Voting for the 1st wave is open until June 25, so you still have time to get Lucas to win one of those TCA surfboards! And retweets count as well, so you don’t even have to write your own tweets to support the show!

It’s still a long way until we get new episodes to enjoy and there’s no news about the Season 3 DVD yet. But here’s what we know so far about other upcoming promo stuff:

• The French DVD for Season 2 will be released on July 24 (instead of July 17)
• The German DVD for Season 2 will be released on August 15 (instead of July 11)
• “The Official MacGyver Survival Manual: 155 Ways to Save the Day” will be released on September 17 as planned

MacGyver Reboot Update #59

No new episodes and no re-runs of MacGyver at the moment. The Production Office re-opened on June 4, and filming for Season 3 starts in less than 10 days. Also, Season 2 scored some nominations and awards!

Script Title Page for Episode 3×01: Improvise (via Justin Hires)

(Minor Spoiler Alert: You might get spoilered about Season 3 by reading this post and its comments or by clicking on the links provided!)

 

What are Cast and Crew up to?
Several cast members took opportunity of the hiatus and enjoyed some downtime, attended charity events or started on new projects in between.

Lucas Till enjoyed a short holiday on Hawaii with family and friends. On June 26, he went to the shooting range with friend Mike Milligan. George Eads spent several days on the Bahamas with his family. He also attended the LA Golf Classic, an annual fundraiser organized by the SAG-AFTRA Foundation. Last week, Tristin Mays travelled to Jamaica with her brother and a group of friends; including on-screen-boyfriend Lance Gross (Billy Colton). The group took part of workshops and charity events for the RuJohn Foundation.

Presentation of sports equipment to Kingston College (via RuJohn Foundation)

Justin did some more Stand-Up comedy shows, but still found time to pose with fans for photos. In his Instagram Live Story on June 26, he sported a new hairstyle. At the moment, there’s no news about the movie project he is attached to, so it’s not clear if this is a new do for the movie, the Reboot or just for fun before they start filming again. (The status of said movie project could be relevant since it would probably interfere with his screentime on Season 3.)

Executive Producer Peter Lenkov still spends a lot of time on the Paramount Studio lot, presumably working on finalizing the scripts, doing table reads and other pre-production-work for his many TV shows. David Dastmalchian is promoting his new movie “Ant-Man and the Wasp”, hitting red carpets and prepping for interviews.

George Eads and CSI-buddy Carmine Giovinazzo at the LA Golf Classic (via Chris Jacobs)

Meanwhile, the crew is slowly trickling into the studio; setting up shop and prepping the gear, or sending ordered gear (e.g. T-Marks) to the studio. The prop people started work on Monday while most of the grip crew will start next week. Set dog Einstein has already been back at Stage 6 yesterday.

Season 1 News
Due to Celebrity Undercover Boss, there are no Reboot re-runs at the moment – contrary to pretty much all the other action and drama shows in the CBS line-up. More episodes for Celebrity Undercover Boss (CUB) – some of them reruns even – are scheduled for Fridays 8pm until August 31. At the moment, it looks like there are no plans for MacGyver reruns at all which still makes no sense to me – considering the Season 1 reruns had higher ratings than the CUB premieres; not to mention that the CUB rerun airing today just premiered on May 11.

Original MacGyver Remaster Preview (via Jediferret)

Season 2 News
The Reboot got nominated for an International TV Audience Award within the category “Action & Science-Fiction TV Series”. Sadly, it lost against Scorpion, another CBS Show (which ultimately wasn’t really a surprise, considering Executive Producer Nicholas Wootton had been listed as a VIP guest on the Festival Website for weeks before the event.)

Composer Keith Power, who’s involved in all three of Peter Lenkov’s Reboot Shows, just won the “Screen Composer of the Year” Award.

Stunt Coordinator Jeff Wolfe had handed in a Season 2 Stunt Reel for the Emmy Awards. Nominations will be announced mid-July.

Lucas Till was nominated for the Teen Choice Awards in the category “Choice Action TV Actor”. The first voting period ended on June 19. Voting for the 2nd wave started on June 22, but it doesn’t look like any of the cast made the cut for other categories in the 2nd wave of nominations. The Awards Show will air on August 12.

Lucas Till at the Shooting Range (via Mike Milligan)

Season 3 News
On June 22, Costume Designer Sarah Downer tweeted about her excitement of doing the first fitting soon. According to Justin Hires, filming for Season 3 should start around July 10 (which is the same day that Hawaii Five-0 will start filming). Like every year, he also revealed the Season Premiere Episode Title: Improvise. Written by Peter Lenkov and Craig O’Neill, the episode will be directed by Stephen Herek.

Interestingly, David Slack – husband of Kate Bond (who portrays Phoenix Tech Jill in the Reboot) – is not listed as Executive Producer anymore. Instead, there’s Rob Pearlstein listed as Co-Executive Producer. Pearlstein had previously worked as a producer on all episodes of Scorpion and had also written about 11 episodes for the now-cancelled CBS show.

MacGyver Pop! Vinyl Figure (via Funko Blog)

Fans have been discussing if some of the Scorpion cast (or even Scorpion characters) might show up on the Reboot, especially since it seemed very likely last year that both shows would have a cross-over soon. Maybe it’s more likely now that writers or producers who had multi-year-contracts with CBS might end up on the Reboot instead.

The Fall Premiere Date and the amount of episodes for Season 3 are still not known to us *sigh*. There’s also no news yet about a Season 2 DVD release, although most other CBS shows have their DVD release dates set for August or September.

Original MacGyver News
While there was a serious lack of Reboot News over the last weeks, there’s interesting news for the Original Show. For one, CBS just announced that they’re in the process of remastering the Original Show into HD. All 7 Seasons should be available until the end of the year, although it’s not clear yet how it will be distributed. The Before-and-After preview looks pretty good to me.

Second, after years of waiting, MacGyver finally gets his own Funko Figure. After “coming soon” promises on Reddit and leaked release schedules on Instagram, Funko officially announced that a MacGyver Pop! Vinyl Figure is coming in August. Of course, he’s decked in his favorite jacket, carrying his SAK and a glorious mullet.

Greenlight Collectible (via Jim Scavenger)

On the other hand, Original MacGyver isn’t the only one anymore with having collectible cars made by Greenlight. I’ve seen pictures of the car model on social media last year, but it was only yesterday that I came across a picture of the packaging.

It’s a police car – the same model (Ford Crown Victoria) that Greenlight uses for most of their police cars. (Of course, it’s much cheaper to obtain a license for one model and use the prototype case for several TV shows.)

It’s great that Reboot fans finally can get their hands on some collectibles, but I’m still confused why they chose a police car for the first MacGyver Reboot vehicle.

MacGyver in Germany and Switzerland
Starting July 9, German FreeTV channel Sat.1 will premiere two episodes of Season 2 on Mondays 8pm. On June 26, they released a German promo trailer on YouTube, using snippents from the first few episodes.

Swiss FreeTV channel 3+ will start July 4, airing the two first episodes on Wednesday 9pm before moving to Fridays 9pm, skirting around the Soccer World Cup games on TV.

Original MacGyver Remaster Preview (via Jediferret)

The German Episode Titles so far:
2×01: Von den Toten auferstanden (Literal translation: Risen from the dead; Original Title DIY Or DIE)
2×02: Solomission für Artemis (Solo Mission for Artemis; Muscle Car + Paper Clips)
2×03: Die rote Faust (The red fist; Roulette Wheel + Wire)
2×04: Väter und Söhne (Fathers and Sons; X-Ray + Penny)
2×05: Geisterinsel (Ghost Island; Skull + Electromagnet)
2×06: Höllenfeuer (Hellfire; Jet Engine + Pickup Truck)
2×07: Herz und Helden (Heart and Heroes, Duct Tape + Jack)
2×08: Der Turm der blauen Pferde (The Tower of Blue Horses, Packing Peanuts + Fire)
2×09: Die Regeln des Spiels (The Rules of the Game, CD-Rom + Hoagie Foil)
2×10: Verloren im Eis (Lost in Ice, War Room + Ship)

T-Marks ready to be delivered (via Jimmy’s T-Marks)

FunFact: The translation of the German title for 2×06 (Jet Engine + Pickup Truck) is the same title as for Original MacGyver Episode 1×08 – the episode on which the storyline for Episode 2×06 is loosely based on. In 1×08: Hellfire (1985), an accident starts a fire in an oil-well owned by MacGyver’s friends. MacGyver and his buddy go to fetch dynamite so the fire can be put out. The transport of the leaking dynamite with their failing Pickup Truck is stupidly dangerous since there’s a time limit – they have to move fast, but cautious. Even more interesting: This episode was probably the inspiration for a recent episode of Hawaii Five-0 (7×18: E malama pono; Handle with Care), where McGarrett and Danno have to transport an Uranium bomb – set to blow and strapped down on their Pickup Truck. During transport, they have to cross a riverbed the same way Original MacGyver did.

MacGyver Reboot Update #32

Lucas Till travelled to Toronto, Amsterdam, Monte Carlo and Madrid this month for MacGyver Promo. Also, we have a title for the first episode of Season 2!

Photocall at the Monte Carlo Television Festival (via Ansa)

(Minor Spoiler Alert: You will get spoilered about Season 2 by reading this post and its comments or by clicking on the links provided!)

 

Season 2 News
On the first of June, CBS had announced the premiere date of Season 2 as September 29. On June 17, Justin Hires revealed the title for the first episode: DIY or DIE. Well, that doesn’t help us much in guessing what the plot for the episode might be, but we know this is a statement rebooted MacGyver said in the Pilot Episode (1×01: The Rising) while MacGyvering the parachute.

Script Title Page for Episode 2×01 (via Justin Hires)

In other news, it seems that Season 2 got a direct Full Season Order of 22 Episodes. This means enough episodes to introduce a new series regular; a CIA operative named Carmen. So far, we don’t know yet who will play this part, but I’m quite sure that her character will change the dynamics of “Team Phoenix”. It’s possible that she will be the one in the field with “Mac and Jack” now while Bozer and Riley stay on base more often.

MacGyver Promo in Europe – Amsterdam
On June 13, Lucas Till posted a panoramic picture that revealed him being in Amsterdam. He soon met up with Executive Producer Peter Lenkov. They did some sightseeing of the Canals and the Anne Frank House. On June 15, there was a CBS Press Junket with Robert Patrick (Scorpion) and Michael Weatherly (Bull) also attending. It was the perfect event for Lucas to show off his new socks and to attend a classical concert.

(Fun Fact: In 2005, Robert Patrick had played Lucas’ father in Walk the Line.)

Then and Now – Robert Patrick and Lucas Till in “Walk The Line” (2005) vs. Press Junket in Madrid (2017)

In an interview with the German newspaper Stuttgarter Zeitung, Lucas revealed that he hadn’t dared to read the negative feedback concerning the reboot until the show had started airing and getting some positive feedback as well. He also talked about how back when he was little, it wasn’t very “cool” to do TV instead of movies and that he’s happy that this has changed in recent years.

MacGyver Promo in Europe – Monte Carlo
On June 16, the CBS Squad travelled to Monaco to attend the Monte Carlo Television Festival. They met up with Malin Akerman (Billions) and Wilmer Valderrama (NCIS) for more promo. Attending the Opening Ceremony where Peter Lenkov was introduced as a jury member, they posed for a photocall, signed autographs for fans and gave interviews on the red carpet before signing more autographs. Lucas sported another pair of new socks he had purchased in Amsterdam and spent some time uploading new pictures onto his Instagram account.

New Socks at the Opening Ceremony (via Robert Patrick)

In a video interview with ET Canada at the Corus Upfront Press Event in Toronto on June 8, Lucas had revealed that there will be a “Casino Episode” in the upcoming season. Following the Opening Ceremony of the Monte Carlo Television Festival, there was a Casino Event. It almost looked like they were already shooting for another episode of MacGyver.

On June 17, there was another press junket including a photocall for Lucas to attend while Peter Lenkov did his duties as a jury member. He posted many pictures of the surrounding landscape and of the correct Monaco pool attire. Lucas took his time posing for selfies with fans before he answered more questions.

Casino Event at the Monte Carlo Television Festival (via Allociné)

In an interview with Monaco Matin, Lucas talked a bit about the auditioning process and revealed that initially, he didn’t think he was going to get the role since he didn’t hear anything for 3 weeks after the meetings and screentests. In the interview for Les Infos Vidéos, Lucas joked he still doesn’t know if his character is the son of Original MacGyver or not. He also revealed that they will establish more bad guys in Season 2.

Asked about any other projects, Lucas told Premiere that he won’t be in the upcoming X-Men movie – partially because of his characters’ fate in the last installement (X-Men: Apocalypse, 2016 – which shouldn’t be a problem in a superhero movie, though), but also because it would be too complicated with him being so busy with filming for MacGyver.

On June 19, a smaller version of the CBS-Squad made a little trip to Italy. They all enjoyed the nice weather with food and drinks. Lucas also showed off one of his balance tricks he likes to talk about.

June Photocalls: Toronto and Monte Carlo

On June 20, the boys suited up (or tuxed up?) for the closing ceremony. Both Lucas and Wilmer Valderrama made Instagram videos during the limo ride towards the red carpet. Besides Peter Lenkov and the CBS Squad, Lucas was joined by his long-time manager Tom.

MacGyver Promo in Europe – Madrid
On June 22, Lucas did another press junket in Madrid. The CBS-Squad was joined by Kyle MacLachlan (Twin Peaks). Meanwhile, Peter Lenkov had already left to return back to the US. Lucas revealed how he likes to spend time while waiting for the last journalist to show up: Playing Mario Kart. Babs Patrick posted a picture of Lucas enjoying some down time while MacGyvering another one of his balance tricks during dinner.

Enjoying the evening in Madrid (via Babs Patrick)

Reruns
Yesterday, there was a rerun of Episode 7 (Can Opener). There is the rerun of Episode 16 (Hook) tonight that should have already aired last Friday. There will be a rerun of Episode 19 (Compass) on June 30. The other scheduled reruns so far are the Pilot Episode on July 7 and Episode 2 (Metal Saw) on July 14.

As before, the reruns continue to garner good ratings. Two weeks ago, Episode 15 (Magnifying Glass) had 4.21 million live viewers with a rating of 0.5 in the 18-49 Demo group.

What are cast and crew up to?
Besides reading MacGyver scripts, Justin Hires is doing stand-up comedy shows and editing videos before he has to return back to Atlanta to resume filming. He uploaded the first (with Lucas, Tristin Mays and Henry Winkler) and the second part (with Peter Lenkov and David Dastmalchian) of the LA Wrap Party videos he had made back in March.

George Eads attended a Classic Fundraiser Golf Event in LA on June 12 for the SAG-AFTRA Foundation. As suspected, his “faux-hawk” has been shaved off at some point, but is growing already back at the moment.

BtS picture of Episode 1×11: Scissors

David Dastmalchian was busy enjoying his new-born daughter Penelope while Tristin Mays took the opportunity to spend as much of her free time as possible with family and friends.

On June 22, Lucas Till posted a new BtS picture of the “Christmas Episode” (1×11: Scissors) with George Eads and Justin Hires.

MacGyver around the world – Germany Premiere
The Reboot premiered in Germany on Monday, June 19 at the prime time of 8.15 pm. The German TV Station Sat.1 had also been the first German station to air the original show back in 1987. It was still a bit surprising for me to see them undertake such an effort for doing promo for an US show on social media. They posted several teaser videos on their Facebook-Page and their YouTube channel, using a theme of MacGyver seeing and using tools differently than we do.

Sat.1 Teaser Promo on Facebook (Screenshot)

They also did some shared video promo with Justin’s other series because Rush Hour premiered on the same day, right after the first two episodes of the MacGyver Reboot.

The ratings were quite good; especially since it’s not only Summer season, but there’s also a heat wave in Europe at the moment. The first two episodes garnered 2.10 and 1.99 million live viewers with a market share of 12.9% and 10.9% within the demo group (14-49 years). The show trended on Twitter as well, but got quite a few negative tweets (mainly about the missing opening theme and about the use of guns and violence). Of course, that has also happened during other premieres since people who enjoy a show are busy watching, not tweeting. We’ll see how the ratings will progress.

MacGyver Reboot Update #31

We have an official date: Season 2 of the MacGyver Reboot will premiere on Friday, September 29.

via Lucas Till

(Minor Spoiler Alert: You might get spoilered about Season 2 by reading this post and its comments or by clicking on the links provided!)

 

Season 2 Premiere
On the first of June, CBS announced the premiere dates of the Fall Season. As expected, the MacGyver Reboot will have its premiere for Season 2 on Friday, September 29 – along with Hawaii Five-0 and Blue Bloods.

Corus Upfronts
On June 8, Lucas Till attended the Corus Upfront Press Event in Toronto to promote the upcoming Season 2. He gave interviews and also attended the Sales Dinner where he posed for selfies, sporting his new haircut.

In a video interview with ET Canada, Lucas revealed he has just approved the Gag Reel for MacGyver (presumably for the Season 1 DVD). He joked about getting punished for doing a good job and talked about having no free weekends for 9 months. He revealed that there will be a “Casino Episode” next season and brought up the MacGyverisms of Episode 1×05: The Heist (the casino episode of the original show).

Corus Upfront Press Event (via Corus Entertainment)

Many Reboot fans have mentioned on social media that they miss the voice-overs. Lucas confirmed my suspicions about this to ET Canada: They cut down on the voice-overs for the same reasons as the original show. I always liked the voice-overs, but I can understand that they just take up too much time in the already tight schedule. Original MacGyver Richard Dean Anderson stated in several interviews being very happy about finally dropping the voice-overs, and it sounds like it was Lucas who suggested dropping them as well.

Lucas stated that he had signed up for an action-comedy and that viewers don’t want to see too much drama on a Friday night. This might explain the serious lack of “Mac-whump!” and why there always seems to be this need to bring in more jokes (which are not necessary in my opinion).

Corus Upfront Sales Dinner (via Corus Entertainment)

In the interview on stage, Lucas stated that he really enjoyed physics as a kid and that the tries to understand what he’s actually talking about in the show. He also revealed that the scariest stunt they did was for the Opening Gambit of Episode 1×03 (Awl).

Reruns
There is a rerun of Episode 15 (Magnifying Glass) tonight. The other scheduled reruns so far are Episode 16 (Hook) on June 16, Episode 7 (Can Opener) on Thursday, June 22 and the Crossover Episode 18 (Flashlight) on June 23. (I’m not sure why there’s no rerun of Episode 17…)

The reruns continue to garner good ratings while winning the 8pm time slot. Episode 13 (Large Blade) made 4.47 million live viewers with a rating of 0.5 in the 18-49 Demo group. The rerun of Episode 14 (Fish Scaler) had 4.20 million live viewers (along with 0.5 in Demo). These numbers are a bit lower than for previous reruns, but are still strong considering the season.

Episode 1×13: Large Blade (screenshot)

What are cast and crew up to?
Executive Producer Peter Lenkov spent Memorial Day with Family and Friends, e.g. Meredith Eaton. Next week, he will attend the Monte Carlo Television Festival with Lucas Till who can’t wait to get his boss into trouble.

On May 26, Lucas posted a picture of a Season 2 SAK on Instagram. It’s a much smaller version of the one for Season 1 that cast and crew got for Christmas. On May 27, Lucas was seen at Hollywood Burbank Airport where he posed for a selfie with a fan. As mentioned above, Lucas attended the Corus Upfront Press Event in Toronto on June 8.

As you remember, Lucas and George Eads got to travel to Hawaii for the crossover episode with Hawaii Five-0 while Justin Hires and Tristin Mays stayed back in Atlanta to film their scenes. While Tristin Mays recently travelled to Hawaii for a holiday, it was Justin’s turn last week. He’s already back at work doing stand-up comedy and editing videos; promising to upload a new BtS video of the LA Wrap Party this weekend.

LA Wrap Party (via Justin Hires)

David Dastmalchian was busy welcoming daughter Penelope into this world. Looks like “Murdoc” won’t get much sleep for the next few weeks. (Meaning months. Think years.)

Script Writer Brian Durkin is also busy. On June 6, he was doing research at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory for his next MacGyver script. Writer Nancy Kiu cited Andrew Klein being the “Shakespeare of the Robot Revolution”. Looks like we’re getting more robot scenes, yay. (Uhm. No yay from me, though.)

MacGyver around the world
The Reboot is or has been airing in several countries by now. The premiere for Italy (Rai2) took place on June 6. On the same day, there was a premium preview in Japan with several of the voice dubbing actors attending.

As mentioned in my last update, other countries mostly don’t translate the episode titles literally. In Germany, the episode titles are “Die Wiedergeburt” (Rebirth) for 1×01 (The Rising), “Alias” for 1×02 (Metal Saw), “Golden Boy” for 1×03 (Awl), „Kalter Krieg“ (Cold War) for 1×04 (Wire Cutter), “Der Todeszug” (Death Train) for 1×05 (Tootphick) and “Der Geist” (The Ghost) for 1×06 (Wrench).

Japan Premium Preview on June 6 (via Twitter)

It’s a well known annoyance that translated titles for TV shows usually reveal too much of the plot. Italy follows France in this tradition with “Vecchie fiamme” (Old Flames) for 1×02 and “Morte apparente” (Apparent Death) for 1×03.

My favorite is still the French Episode Title for 1×03, though: “Tête à claques”. This is the French equivalent of the name that Jack Dalton uses for Ralph at the beginning of the episode: “Punch Face”.

The Vault: Phoenix Foundation Wall Panel
Since I laid eyes on one of the Phoenix Foundation Wall Panels for the first time, I’ve been intrigued by the design. I found it very interesting, but also kind of odd because it seemed too intricate compared to the rest of the set designs. I didn’t realize the Wall Tiles are an Easter Egg until recently, when I randomly came across an article about set design in movies. I’ve never seen the movie (shame on me), but the Wall Tiles are the same as the ones used in the original Blade Runner (1982) with Harrison Ford.

Episode 1×17: Ruler (screenshot)

Apparently, the style of the tiles is based on Ennis House in LA which was designed by Frank Lloyd Wright and constructed primarily of interlocking pre-cast concrete blocks. Besides for “Blade Runner”, the very unique Ennis House was used for productions such as Twin Peaks, Karate Kid III or Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Well. Who says you only learn about science while watching MacGyver.

MacGyver Reboot Update #30

As predicted, Season 2 of the MacGyver Reboot will continue to air on Fridays this Fall. The competition for the Friday ratings has changed, though.

LA Wrap Party (via Justin Hires)

CBS Upfronts
On May 17, CBS presented their 2017-2018 TV schedule. As predicted, their Fridays Line-Up hasn’t changed and the “Holy Trinity” (MacGyver, Hawaii Five-0 and Blue Bloods) stays intact. The competition has changed, though; e.g. because Tim Allen’s Last Man Standing has been cancelled. MacGyver will share its airtime with Once Upon A Time (ABC), Blindspot (NBC), Hell’s Kitchen (FOX) and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (CW).

Blindspot used to air on Wednesdays. The show earned on average 4.89 million live viewers (with a 18-49 Demo of 1.03) per episode which is less than MacGyver (7.73 live viewers, Demo 1.08). But like the Reboot, Blindspot also serves a lot of action scenes.

Once Upon A Time used to air on Sundays. In its 6th Season, the show managed on average 3.15 million live viewers (with a 18-49 Demo of 0.93) per episode. The show will undergo a complete overhaul for next season with the consequence of losing six series regulars; looking for a “younger” and “fresher” audience. The show was renewed due to its fierce and loyal fanbase, but we’ll see if the fans will stay without their main heroes that made the audience fall in love with the show in the first place. Also, considering they’re targeting a younger audience by using younger actors, moving the show to Friday might not help to get bigger ratings.

Friday Schedule 2017-2018 (via TV-Recaps-Reviews)

Reruns
There is a rerun of Episode 13 (Large Blade) today. The other scheduled reruns so far are Episode 14 (Fish Scaler) on June 2, Episode 15 (Magnifying Glass) on June 9 and Episode 16 (Hook) on June 16.

What are cast and crew up to?
This Monday, Executive Producer Peter Lenkov has been back on the Paramount Studios lot. With roughly a month left until production moves to Atlanta to get ready for filming, it’s save to say that there are scripts to finish, locations to scout, sets to design and build and casting calls to send out soon.

Lucas Till was also seen at the Paramount Studios lot on May 24, possibly for the LA Screenings that had prepared a pool and palm trees for a screening of the new Baywatch movie.

Lucas Till posing for a selfie (via Felipe Duque)

Justin Hires is already excited for next season. He posted several pictures of MacGyver Episodes and also a new picture with Lucas Till at the LA Wrap Party. George Eads was seen at a restaurant and posed for a picture. Interestingly, we can’t clearly see what’s going on with his hair, but it looks like he has shaved off Jack Dalton’s “Fauxhawk” for hiatus.

MacGyver around the world
The Reboot is or has been airing in several countries by now. The premiere for Italy is set for June 13 (Rai2). For the premiere in Japan, there will be a premiere event on June 6 which the dubbing actors for MacGyver (Mamoru Miyano) and Jack (Hiroshi Tsuchida) will attend.

While the English episode titles are named after tools on an SAK, other countries don’t even try to literally translate them. In Germany, the pilot episode (The Rising) is titled “Die Wiedergeburt” (Rebirth), episode 1×02 (Metal Saw) is called “Alias” (which doesn’t make much sense to me).

In France, the episode titles are either funny or outrageous. Episode 1×02 (Metal Saw) is called “Sauvez la femme” (literally translated: “Rescue the woman”). Episode 1×11 (Scissors) is titled “Joyeux Noël” (Merry Christmas) while Episode 1×14 (Fish Scaler) reveales the plot since it’s titled “Agent double” (Double Agent).

Episode 1×13: Large Blade (via SpoilerTV)

The Vault: New/Old interview with George Eads
There were times when the promo load was so intense that I couldn’t catch all of it. I recently stumbled over an old interview with George Eads that was published in September 2016, a day before the premiere of the pilot episode.

Again, I’m amazed how often he gets away with revealing stuff in interviews; e.g. the entire plot for Episode 1×05 (Toothpick), that “pretty hefty bottles of wine” are consumed while rehearsing with Lucas Till and that they both get “a vitamin bag IV, amino shots and B12 shots” on the weekends. He also talked about the differences between filming scenes for MacGyver and CSI, about the bond with Lucas and about some of the issues with the Unaired Pilot.

Here’s an interesting excerpt regarding the original actors:

When they see the pilot and see we’ve hit the mark, we’ll have a lot more of them come around. I think that’s when we can ask Richard Dean Anderson. We’ll have to wait and see how the kid does before he does anything. It will be cool to have MacGyver play MacGyver. It would be almost like ‘Back to the Future.” We brush by the real Jack Dalton and MacGyver in a case. That might be interesting.

(George Eads, via RadioTVTalk, September 2016)

(via Lauren Leigh)

He revealed that they reshot some scenes for Episode 1×03 (Awl). Comparing Jack Dalton with his CSI-character Nick Stokes, Eads said:

It’s completely different. There is still that bravery issue, that no fear issue that Nick had. But this character has severe PTSD. He’s a death dealer. He’s ex Special Forces, been in all kinds of secret ops. He kills without a conscience. He’s kind of the epitome of courage but when you have those screws loose, he’s the type of guy Mac has to turn around and say, ‘Stop! Calm down! We’re not just running in there like that!’  […]  So [Mac’s] teaching Jack how to get his temper and emotions in check because there’s nothing Jack likes better than to fight and kill someone who deserves it. He’s just a loose cannon, a damn wild man.

(George Eads, via RadioTVTalk, September 2016)

It’s funny how I absolutely can’t see rebooted Jack Dalton in this, considering they were already filming Episode 5 when this interview took place. It feels like he’s talking about his Unaired-Pilot-character Lincoln. Also, I always felt that Jack does all the emotional work for MacGyver, not the other way around.

MacGyver Reboot Update #29

Disclaimer: My original guest-post was first published on The MacGyver Project on May 12, 2017. I made some minor changes (e.g. grammar or source corrections, link corrections, additional pictures) before re-posting it on my own blog for safe-keeping.

With only two months left until filming for Season 2 starts, the writers are working on new scripts.

BtS of Season 1 (via Pius Pietrzyk)

Crisis averted
Thankfully, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) managed to secure better working conditions for script writers during weeks of tense negotiations, therefore avoiding a strike that would have resulted in TV show productions coming to a grinding halt and being stopped for weeks, maybe even months.

Production should go on as planned. As David Slack tweeted on May 2nd, he’s already writing on a new episode for Season 2.

working on new scripts (via David Slack)

Reruns
There will be a rerun of Episode 13 (Large Blade) on May 26 and a rerun of Episode 14 (Fish Scaler) on June 2.

Season 2 News
As Executive Producer Peter Lenkov confirmed on May 10, Season 2 will start in September.

What are cast and crew up to?
Peter Lenkov is gearing up for the premiere of his CBS Summer Show “Salvation” in July. Justin Hires is busy polishing his career as a stand-up comedian. Tristin Mays and Meredith Eaton recently visited one of his shows.

Comedy Club (via Justin Hires)

Because of the DVD-Release of Monster Trucks, Lucas Till had been doing promo for this movie back in April. In a video interview with TVs Talking Pictures, Lucas also talked about filming MacGyver. He revealed that George Eads is one of his best friends, that he fell asleep several times while trying to memorize his lines and that he was stressed out 8 of 9 months while shooting because he put too much pressure on himself, trying to fill RDA’s big shoes by taking on such an iconic role.

What’s going to happen now?
Next Wednesday, CBS will present their 2017-2018 TV Schedule at the Upfronts in New York. Since both Hawaii Five-0 and Blue Bloods have been renewed as well for another season, the reboot airtime schedule probably won’t change.

Both Peter Lenkov and Lucas Till will be at the Monte Carlo Television Festival in June. Lenkov is listed as a member of the festival’s jury while it is not clear yet in what capacity Lucas will be there.

Monster Trucks Promo (via Instagram)

There has been no word yet if there will be another promo event at Comic Con San Diego (July 20 to 23) this year.

MacGyver around the world
The Reboot is or has been airing in several countries by now; e.g. Australia, Turkey, the UK, the French speaking region of Switzerland, New Zealand or the Netherlands. The show is airing soon in Japan and in France. The premiere for Germany (on Sat.1) is set for June 19.

The German dubbing of rebooted MacGyver is done by Ozan Ünal who funnily also voiced Nicholas Hoult’s character of “Beast” in the X-Men movies with Lucas Till and David Dastmalchian in “CSI Cyber“. Ünal otherwise regularly dubbs Emile Hirsch, Logan Lerman (in the Percy Jackson Series) or Ian Somerhalder. On German TV, he’s probably best known for voicing Johnny Galecki in all episodes of “The Big Bang Theory“, so this is going to be weird and interesting for me.

The Vault: Unaired Pilot
A year ago, Meg London-Boche – Assistant of Director David Von Ancken – tweeted about the MacGyver Pilot being done. Little did we know back then that the pilot would be scrapped and reshot, earning the title of being an Unaired Reboot Pilot that got rebooted.

BtS of the Unaired Pilot (via Adam Michna)

The Unaired Pilot has more or less disappeared. The IMDb page was deleted rather quickly, along with every official material that had been posted by CBS on social media. It’s difficult to predict if we’ll ever get to see this Unaired Pilot that shall not be named. It’s probably futile to hope for it being released on the Season 1 DVD.

 

Original Author’s Note (May 12): This is my last Update for the MacGyver Reboot – for now. I will probably continue posting somewhere else, but I have to set it up first and I don’t know yet when it’s going to be ready. (I have been writing in German on my own blog for 11 years, but I don’t want to mix up blog posts in different languages.)

A big THANK YOU to Nicholas Sweedo for letting me write on his blog. I wouldn’t have dared to do it on my own. I never thought I would be able to write so many blog-posts in another language and I learnt A LOT while doing this.

A big THANK YOU for you readers as well. I never thought these blog-posts would get so many hits. Hopefully read you soon! If you need a quick fix of MacGyver Reboot News until my next Update, you can find me on Twitter.

Original Editor’s Note (May 12): A big thanks to Andrea (Dashboard) for all her great posts and for being really nice to work with! I decided that I wanted to distance this blog from the reboot since I don’t like it and am not watching it any more. But for fans of the reboot, Andrea really is the best person out there to follow for the latest news and information, and I’m sure that her new blog will be an awesome place to go for that!