HD Heads-Up: February 16 – 22

➢➢ TVNZ 2 will lock in one of its strongest new-season schedules in years with the premiere of quirky Kiwi drama Fresh Eggs on February 19. If the skilfully cut promos are an indication, this could be a breakthrough for the moribund genre. Billed as “a black comedy series with a deliciously twisted sense of humour”, it concerns two city slickers whose dream of living “the good life” in the country sours when they accidentally kill someone and encounter some very bad eggs. It stars Penny Chitham (Shortland Street), Wade Holloway (Hunt for the Wilderpeople) and Danielle Cormack, and was created by Nick Ward (Stickmen) and Kim Harrop (Shortland Street, The Coffin Club) …

➢➢ Fresh Eggs will air 8.30 Tuesdays, after Changing Rooms Australia (7.30 Mondays and Tuesdays from February 18), and ahead of the latest season of Heartbreak Island (9.30 Tuesday-Thursday). When the first season of the latter aired at 7.30, it was a hit with 18-39 year-olds, a key demographic that’s increasingly deserting FTA TV for Netflix. By rescheduling season two, TVNZ 2 stands to bolster its 9.30 mid-week ratings while enabling racier content and expanding the type of programming that’s unique to the network and a social media mainstay …

➢➢ The same week, TVNZ 2 will bring back another reality hit, First Dates Australia (8.30 Thursdays), and cap the week with the belated 30th season premiere of The Simpsons, which has just been renewed for two more seasons (7.30 Fridays). The latter will follow the return of Shortland Street to Friday nights, even though TVNZ 2 said last year it would strip the soap from Sunday-Thursday, and will precede a season of Harry Potter movies. Fridays have been the network’s most vulnerable night and programmers may have had second thoughts about losing SS as its anchor. By starting the HP movies at 8.00, they’ll try to dent the appeal of Three’s perennial crowdpleasers, The Graham Norton Show and 7 Days …

➢➢ TVNZ 1 will strengthen its line-up in the week starting February 16 with season three of Victoria (8.10 Sundays), a new 9.30 Monday slot for Q+A after last year’s disastrous 9.30 Sunday experiment, the return of Eat Well for Less (7.30 Tuesdays) and Location, Location, Location (7.30 Wednesdays), and the premiere of Bad Mothers (8.30 Wednesdays). Bad Mothers is an Australian drama about “five very modern women juggling the big issues of love, family, careers, infidelity … and murder. When their lives collide following a series of shocking events, the Bad Mothers will learn that life can get a whole lot more complicated, more outrageous — and a whole lot more fun — than they ever imagined” …

➢➢ The same week Prime will launch two local documentaries: Finding Jeremy: A Story of Escape (8.35 Tuesday), in which two survivors of the 2011 Christchurch earthquake set out seven years later to find an American with whom they were trapped at the top of a high-rise hotel; and Demolition NZ (8.30 Wednesdays), a series spun off the documentary The Demolition Teams that goes behind the security fences and into the hidden world of demolition …

➢➢ Also new to Prime will be: season two of The Great Escapers (6.00 Sundays from February 17); Killer in the Classroom: Never Again  (9.35, February 19), which explores the global, youth-led movement campaigning for stricter gun laws in America that the Parkland Florida high school shooting triggered; and the six-part Call the Cleaners (9.00 Wednesdays from February 20), which, with its “scenes of vomit-inducing rot and squalor”, won’t be for the fainthearted …

➢➢ Appearing on the February 22 broadcast of The Graham Norton Show (Three, 8.00) will be Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Jennifer Connelly, Paul Whitehouse and Chaka Khan while ending their runs that week will be Dynasties and The Red Stag Timber Hunters Club …

➢➢ TVNZ 2 will use the FTA movie premieres of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (7.15 Sunday) and How to be Single (9.45 Sunday) to try to squeeze out Three’s premiere of Ghost in the Shell (8.30 Sunday). TVNZ 1 also has an FTA premiere that weekend, Race (11.25 Saturday). Other HD coming attractions for the week starting February 16 will include:

• 50 First Dates (TVNZ 2, 7.00 Saturday)
• Need for Speed (TVNZ 2, 8.45 Saturday)
• Catch Me If You Can (Three, 8.55 Saturday)
• Bram Stoker’s Dracula (Duke, 9.25 Saturday)
• Mortal Kombat (TVNZ 2, 11.25 Saturday)
• Cruel Intentions (Three, 11.40 Saturday)
• This Is The End (TVNZ 2, 1.20am Sunday)
• The Last King of Scotland (Maori TV, 8.30 Sunday)
• The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (TVNZ 2, 12.05am Monday)
• Hostage (Prime, 9.30 Monday)
• Rambo 3 (Duke, 8.30 Tuesday)
• Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (Three, 8.30 Thursday)
• Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (TVNZ 2, 8.00 Friday)
• Go (Duke, 8.30 Friday).