Television

For major broadcast networks, Monday is the official start of the 2014-15 TV season. Fresh Air's critic has a not-very-long list of new shows you should make an effort to sample.

On Friday night, Shonda Rhimes spoke about her hugely successful television career, her love of the National Spelling Bee, and the New York Times article that called her an "angry black woman."

On the anniversary of the iconic series, NPR's Eric Deggans talks with the author of a new Bill Cosby biography about how the show and the comedian have shaped perceptions of black families.

Do you want to be a lab rat? That's what teenagers are doing when they smoke marijuana, the state of Colorado says. But since hard evidence of marijuana's harms is scanty, it may be a tough sell.

The CBS dramas about women juggling family lives and high-intensity jobs showcase excellent acting. But while The Good Wife is one of the best shows on TV, Madam Secretary's writing is disappointing.

Metástasis, the Spanish-language remake of the AMC series, ends this week on UniMás. The show is set in Colombia instead of New Mexico, but the story of a teacher-turned-drug dealer stays the same.

Josh Thomas, 27, stars in the show geared toward 20-somethings on the new cable channel Pivot. He talks about coming out to his dad via text message and dealing with his mom's suicide attempts.

The Daily Show correspondent will become the first black co-anchor of Saturday Night Live's "Weekend Update." NPR TV Critic Eric Deggans says his hire could help diversify comedy well beyond NBC.

The HBO show began its final season Sunday. Terence Winter says he wrote the Prohibition-era drama in part to work with Martin Scorsese. It was "something I couldn't possibly ... pass up," he says.

A 14-hour biography of Theodore, Eleanor and Franklin Delano starts Sunday. Actors including Paul Giamatti and Meryl Streep put on Emmy-worthy vocal performances reading from an Emmy-worthy script.

In a new PBS documentary series, Burns turns his lens to Theodore, Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, and how each triumphed over adversity.

Aaron McGruder's Black Jesus premieres Thursday night on Adult Swim, and it features a Christ who drops f-bombs and drinks 40s. So is it sacrilege or subversive? Some biblical scholars weigh in.