Watching This Week #80

Welcome to the September 19, 2022, edition of Watching This Week, the weekly newsletter from Where Can I Watch – covering the latest news on where TV shows and movies will be available in Canada.

This week, we have news about another indie-studio movie output deal, a bunch of Canadian sales from StudioCanal, an additional way to watch HBO Max's Our Flag Means Death, and more. But first, we look ahead to the coming week in TV and streaming.

What's new this week – September 19–25

Compiled from our monthly listings and/or any subsequent updates we've come across. We strive for accuracy but schedules may change without notice. Some series/seasons may have weekly rollouts; we won't list new episodes every week (though we may note significant episodes such as series finales). The most notable premiere for each service (in our rough estimation) is bolded.

• Most major Canadian networks and international news channels, and some streaming services: State funeral of Queen Elizabeth Ⅱ (Monday with coverage starting on most services at 5:00 a.m. ET – which we know will be before this is sent out, but repeats should be widely available)
• Netflix: Patton Oswalt: We All Scream (stand-up special – Tuesday); The Blacklist (season 9 – Wednesday); Designing Miami (reality series – Wednesday); The Real Bling Ring: Hollywood Heist (docuseries – Wednesday); Snabba Cash (season 2 of the Swedish series – Thursday); Thai Cave Rescue (limited series – Thursday); The Dreamlife of Georgie Stone (doc short – Thursday); Athena (French film – Friday); A Jazzman's Blues (period drama – Friday); Lou (thriller – Friday); Dynasty (season 5 – Saturday); Fullmetal Alchemist The Final Alchemy (live-action film – Saturday); Roald Dahl's The Witches (2020 film – Saturday)
• Disney+: Dancing with the Stars (season 31 – Mondays at 8:00 p.m. ET); Reboot (mockumentary series – Tuesdays); Andor (Star Wars series – Wednesdays); Criminal Minds (season 13 – Wednesday); El repatriado (Mexican series – Wednesday); May It Please the Court (Korean series – Wednesdays); Rookie Cops (Korean series – Wednesday); Super/Natural (Nat Geo docuseries – Wednesday); The Kardashians (season 2 – Thursdays)
• Crave: The Voice (season 22 – Tuesdays and Wednesdays; also Mondays and Tuesdays at 8:00 p.m. ET on CTV2); Escape from Kabul (HBO doc film – Wednesday at 9:00 p.m. ET); Jockey (equestrian drama – Friday); The Circus (season 7, part 2 – Sundays at 8:00 p.m. ET)
• Prime Video: Dog (2022 film – Friday)
• CBC Gem: 2022 Polaris Music Prize Gala (Monday at 8:00 p.m. ET); Lido TV (variety series – Friday); Rhod Gilbert: Stand Up to Shyness (British doc – Friday); Boys vs. Girls (2020 film – Saturday); The Legacy Awards (inaugural presentation of awards honouring Black Canadian entertainers – Sunday at 8:00 p.m. ET, also on CBC TV at 8:00 local / 9:00 AT / 9:30 NT)
• Apple TV+: Sidney (Poitier documentary – Friday)
• Paramount+ (also available as a channel on Prime Video and Apple TV): Spin City (complete series – Tuesday); On the Come Up (YA film – Friday)
• BritBox (also available as a channel on Prime Video and Apple TV): Murder, Mystery and My Family (season 5 – Sept. 23); Murder, Mystery and My Family: Case Closed (seasons 3–4 – Sept. 23)
• CTV: numerous new and returning series including: The Cleaning Lady (season 2 – Mondays at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT); The Amazing Race 34 (Wednesdays at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT); Transplant (season 3 – Fridays at 9:00 p.m. ET/PT); Celebrity Jeopardy! (primetime spin-off – Sundays at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT); The Rookie (season 5 – Sundays at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT)
• Global (also on StackTV): numerous new and returning series including: 9-1-1 (season 6 – Mondays at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT); Survivor 43 (Wednesdays at 8:00 p.m. ET/PT, two-hour premiere); Abbott Elementary (season 2 – premiere Wednesday at special time of 10:00 p.m. ET/PT, regularly at 9:00 p.m.)
• Citytv (also on Citytv+): numerous new and returning series including: Quantum Leap (Mondays at 10:00 p.m. ET/PT); Chicago series (Wednesdays from 8–11 p.m. ET/PT); Law & Order series (Thursdays from 8–11 p.m. ET/PT)

This week in deals

As a reminder, we may get an affiliate commission for services you sign up for through links in this newsletter, which helps support our site maintenance, at no additional cost to you. Prices are in Canadian dollars before applicable sales taxes, and may change in the future.

• The Disney+ Day deal mentioned last week – one month of Disney+ for $1.99 (plus applicable taxes), $10 off the usual monthly price, available to new and "eligible returning" subscribers – ends at midnight PT tonight (Monday, September 19). If you haven't tried Disney+ lately (or ever), this may be your best opportunity to try it out for a low price for some time; Disney+ no longer offers free trials and didn't offer a Black Friday deal last year.

Programming news

• The Crave linear pay channel schedule for Saturday, October 1 indicates two recent theatrical films not previously announced as coming to the Bell Media pay TV / streaming service: animated feature DC League of Super-Pets (released theatrically in Canada by Warner Bros.) and crime thriller Alice (Photon Films).
   
• Another American independent film distributor has announced a significant Canadian distribution deal: Bleecker Street has signed an exclusive output agreement with LevelFilm, covering films beginning in 2023 with Mafia Mamma. As with Sphere Films (noted last week as having signed a multi-picture deal with A24), movies distributed by LevelFilm currently go to Crave in the pay-1 window.
   
• French distributor StudioCanal recently announced a number of program rights sales, including in the Canadian market. It looks like sci-fi series Infiniti will go to Telus Presents in Canada, while niche streaming service MHz Choice has already added period drama Paris Police 1900 and comedy series UFOs [OVNI(s)] in both the U.S. and Canada.
   
  Meanwhile, similarly niche streaming service Topic has picked up the U.S. and Canadian rights to the well-received late 2021 Icelandic drama limited series Blackport [Verbúðin]. No word yet on when it will premiere there.
   
• Something we had meant to note a few weeks ago: the upcoming London-filmed limited series A Gentleman in Moscow, starring Ewan McGregor and based on the novel by Amor Towles, will air on Showtime in the U.S. but will stream on Paramount+ in all other markets where the service is available, including Canada according to the service's Canadian representatives. We're surmising that because it's being filmed in the UK (where Showtime doesn't operate but Paramount+ does), the commissioning broadcaster is technically Paramount+, placing the series outside of Showtime's output deal with Bell / Crave, even if the U.S. rights happen to have been shifted over to Showtime.
   
• A slight correction to one of our Mailbag answers from a few weeks ago: the CTV network will in fact be airing this year's season of Love Island USA, just on a significant delay. The season in fact premiered on CTV late last night (early Monday morning) at 1:05 a.m. local, with two episodes airing weekly. Episodes also remain available online, at least for applicable subscribers, on the CTV and Crave websites and apps.
   
  In a similar vein, the recently-aired first season of Taika Waititi-produced HBO Max comedy series Our Flag Means Death will air on Much, with two episodes weekly on Tuesday nights starting at 10:00 p.m. ET, beginning tomorrow (September 20), and may be available thereafter on the CTV app. Like most of the Max Original series Bell Media has rights to, the series premiered in Canada on Crave, and also remains available there.
   
• If you've been watching season 2 of Rutherford Falls on Showcase, you may have noticed something out of place with this past week's episode: episode 7, "Firefighters Pancake Breakfast", aired out of order, with episode 6, "Halloween", having not aired yet. Showcase has acknowledged the error and will air both episodes 6 and 7 in the intended order this Tuesday, September 20 starting at 9:30 p.m. ET; the "Halloween" episode is also shown as being available on the Global TV website/app.

Other notes

• Bell Media has announced a co-development pact with Lionsgate to produce Canadian "comedy and drama television series for the global market"; Bell Media will retain distribution rights to these series within Canada while Lionsgate will distribute them elsewhere. That means Lionsgate gets to build on distribution of Canadian series like CBC's Son of a Critch, while Bell is perhaps moving away from international distribution, which has never seemed to be their strong suit.
   
  That doesn't necessarily mean that future CTV / Crave originals will go to Lionsgate's services like Starz internationally. In fact, Lionsgate has sold off rights to some in-house series originally intended for Starz that the company no longer believes will be thematic fits, like upcoming John Wick spinoff series The Continental, while the aforementioned Son of a Critch landed in the UK at Paramount+, not its own StarzPlay service.
   
  The deal is described as building on an existing partnership that includes Bell's Canadian rights to the Starz brand, and to Lionsgate-produced HBO Max Original series like Minx, plus Canadian pay-1 rights to Lionsgate films. Of course, that hasn't stopped some other Lionsgate-distributed programming from going elsewhere in Canada, including Global and Paramount+ (Home Economics), and Super Channel (House of Ho).

Recent updates on WCIW

The only really significant update this week was adding a new post about NFL Thursday Night Football games, to explain why these broadcasts are no longer available through Prime Video in Canada even as they've become (essentially) exclusive to the Amazon streaming service in the United States.

Thanks for reading – we greatly appreciate your support. If you like this newsletter, please consider forwarding to a friend who might be interested, or if you're in a position to do so, support our hosting costs with a paid subscription, which includes access to our movie streaming rights database, or on a one-time basis via our Buy Me a Coffee page.

A reminder that we do welcome Mailbag questions by email at hello@wherecaniwatch.ca; those of general interest may be included in future newsletters unless specifically requested.

If you're new to Watching This Week, you can catch up on past editions here, and sign up to receive future editions on our website at https://www.wherecaniwatch.ca/newsletter/. Or, if you're reading this on the web, you can use the form directly below.

We'll see you again next week.