English Entertainment
It is time to bid adieu to some of your favorite shows on Star World Premiere HD
MUMBAI: Die-hard TV show lovers are sure to be struck by a bout of summer time sadness as Star World Premiere HD, India’s English entertainment channel that is home to day and date viewing will conclude seasons of some of the audiences’ favorite TV shows this May! These were the shows that made everyone cry, laugh and even jump out of their beds to cheer a character on. Through their stellar storylines and scintillating performances, these shows became an intimate part of viewers’ lives.
Never fear though! There is a firecracker lineup that will soon help you drop kick those summer blues into oblivion. For now, here is a list of some of your beloved shows that are all set to sail into the gentle night this summer so you can be sure to catch the shows’ finales before they end.
First in line is the popular comical memoir of real life character Eddie Huang ‘Fresh Off The Boat’ that follows his immigrant Taiwanese family as they attempt to adjust to the socio cultural and socio-economic reality of the US. The finale episode of the series’ season 2 picks up after Eddie’s girlfriend pulls out all the stops to impress his mother Jessica and Emery asks Louis for help with his graduation speech. Meanwhile Grandma tried to make Eddie a new suit and with everything coming together, the finale episode is sure to ensue into a sequence of hilarious antics! What will happen next? Catch the Season 2 finale of the show as it airs on Wednesday, May 25th at 9 PM.
Following suit is the crazy, dysfunctional and hilarious ‘Modern Family’ with its season finale this Thursday, May 19th at 9PM.The much loved comedy family drama, now in its seventh season, traverses across the lives of three wildly different families while bringing out the humour from situations in their everyday lives. Catch the Dunphy family struggle as Clair tries to find the right time to fire an employee, Phil thinks he caught Luke with a girl and Alex moves back in, seemingly undetected. Lily fears that the increasing arguments between her parents could result into something bigger. All the while, Jay struggles to deal with entering the workforce again.
Next in line is the popular action-spy drama show Quantico starring Priyanka Chopra. After all the thrill and suspense all season, the time has come for the final showdown in Quantico’s Season 1 finale episode ‘Yes’ that will air this Saturday, May 21st at 9PM. Watch Alex Parrish (Priyanka Chopra) race against time to tackle a terrorist while also trying to stop a bomb from going off in the season finale. Will she finally be recruited by the CIA?
Then there is the iconic and beloved yellow faced family drama ‘The Simpsons’ that culminates its glorious Season 27 on Monday, May 23rd at 9:30 PM. The satire, the comedy and the bang on depiction of the working class entwined with humour is what makes this show truly a household favourite among kids and adults alike, around the world!
Another popular comedy family drama that will meet its end this summer is the coming of age series Black-ish. The show that has an all-African-American family at its centre is co-produced by none other than the very famous Lawrence Fishburne who also stars in the show. Catch the season finale of Black-ish this Tuesday, May 24th at 9PM and watch the all-black family as they struggle to live in a pre-dominantly white world.
And lastly, it’s time to say goodbye to the comedy family drama set in the good ol’ days of the 80s, ‘The Goldbergs’. The show that never once failed to make us smile and sometimes even burst into laughter at the rib-tickling antics of the characters will showcase its Season 3 finale episode on Thursday, May 19th at 9 PM.
But with so many shows nearing their end after their mighty successful seasonal runs, Star World Premiere HD is all set to introduce an all-new line up of popular shows soon! So, don’t go anywhere, stay tuned-in to Star World Premiere HD and enjoy viewing all the latest seasons of shows at their day-and-date best!
UK: The aerial is losing its grip. As broadband becomes the default way Britons watch television, the UK is edging towards a decisive, and divisive, question: should Freeview be switched off by 2034? The issue, highlighted in reporting by The Guardian, has exposed deep fault lines over access, affordability and the future of public service broadcasting.
For nearly 25 years, Freeview has delivered free-to-air television from the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5 to almost every corner of the country. Even now, it remains the UK’s largest TV platform, used in more than 16m homes and on around 10m main household sets. Yet the same broadcasters that built it are now pressing for its closure within eight years.
Their case rests on a structural shift in viewing. Smart TVs, superfast broadband and the Netflix-led streaming boom have pulled audiences online. Advertising economics have followed. By 2034, the number of homes using Freeview as their main TV set is forecast to fall from a peak of almost 12m in 2012 to fewer than 2m, making digital terrestrial television, or DTT, increasingly costly to sustain.
But critics say the rush to switch off risks abandoning those least able, or least willing, to move online.
“I don’t want to be choosing apps and making new accounts,” says Lynette, 80, from Kent. “It is time-consuming and irritating trying to work out where I want to be, to remember the sequence of clicks, with hieroglyphics instead of words. If I make a mistake I have to start again.”
Lynette is among nearly 100,000 people who have signed a “save Freeview” petition launched by campaign group Silver Voices. She fears the government is about to “take [Freeview] away from me and others who either don’t like, can’t afford, or can’t use online versions”.
Official figures underline the fault lines. A report commissioned by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport estimates that by 2035, 1.8m homes will still depend on Freeview. Ofcom’s analysis shows those households are more likely to be disabled, older, living alone, female, and based in the north of England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
Freeview is owned by the public service broadcasters through Everyone TV, which also operates Freesat and the newer streaming platform Freely. After two years of review, DCMS is expected to set out its position soon, drawing on three options proposed by Ofcom: a costly upgrade of Freeview’s ageing technology; maintaining a bare-bones service with only core PSB channels; or a full switch-off during the 2030s.
The broadcasters have rallied behind the third option. They argue that 2034 is the logical cut-off, when transmission contracts with network operator Arqiva expire. By then, they say, the cost of broadcasting to a dwindling audience will far outweigh the returns from TV advertising.
Ofcom agrees a crunch point is approaching. In July, the regulator warned of a “tipping point” within the next few years, after which it will no longer be commercially viable for broadcasters to carry the costs of DTT.
Others see risks beyond economics. Questions remain over whether internet TV can reliably deliver emergency broadcasts, such as the daily Covid updates, in the way that universally available DTT can. The UK radio industry has also warned that an internet-only future for TV could push up distribution costs and force some radio stations off air if PSBs no longer share Arqiva’s mast network.
“It is a political hot potato,” says Dennis Reed, founder of Silver Voices, who says he has “dissociated” his organisation from the government’s stakeholder forum, which he believes is “heavily biased” towards streaming.
The Future TV Taskforce, representing the PSBs, counters that moving online could “close the digital divide once and for all”. “We want to be able to plan to ensure that no one is left behind,” a spokesperson says, adding that rising DTT costs could otherwise mean cuts to programme budgets.
The numbers show the scale of the challenge. Of the 1.8m Freeview-dependent homes projected for 2035, around 1.1m are expected to have broadband but not use it for TV. The remaining 700,000 are forecast to lack a broadband connection altogether.
Veterans of the analogue switch-off, completed in 2012 after 76 years, recall similar fears of “TV blackout chaos”. Around 6 per cent of households were labelled “digital refuseniks”, yet a targeted help scheme and a national campaign, fronted by a robot called Digit Al voiced by Matt Lucas, delivered a largely smooth transition.
This time, the BBC is less keen to foot the bill. Tim Davie, the outgoing director general, has said the corporation should not fund a comparable support programme for a Freeview switch-off.
Research for Sky by Oliver & Ohlbaum suggests that with early awareness campaigns and digital inclusion measures, only about 330,000 households would ultimately need hands-on help ahead of a 2034 shutdown.
Meanwhile, viewing habits continue to fragment. Audience body Barb says 7 per cent of UK households no longer own a TV set, choosing to watch on other devices. In December, YouTube overtook the BBC’s combined channels in total UK viewing across TVs, smartphones and tablets, albeit measured at a minimum of three minutes.
That shift may accelerate. YouTube has recently blocked Barb and its partner Kantar from accessing viewing session data, limiting transparency just as online platforms consolidate power.
“When the government chose British Satellite Broadcasting as the ‘winner’ in satellite TV it was Rupert Murdoch’s Sky instead that came out on top,” says a senior TV executive quoted by The Guardian. “There already is such an outsider ready to be the winner in the transition to internet TV; it is YouTube.”
Freeview’s future now hangs on a familiar British dilemma: modernise fast and risk exclusion, or protect universality and pay the price. Either way, the aerial’s days as king of the living room look numbered.
