What to Watch in August 2024

With the Olympics dominating this summer, August 2024 is a slow month for releases in totality, but we do get some of the biggest shows returning for our viewing pleasure. New this month, KAOS sees Jeff Goldblum take on the mantle of the gods, when ancient Greek deity Zeus has a mid-life crisis in LA. Vince Vaughan is yet another movie star headed for the small screen, investigating the underbelly of corporate America. Bad Monkey is written by Bill Lawrence (of Scrubs and Ted Lasso), so there's high hopes it'll rise above usual detective fare.

The rest of the new shows for August come in the form of animation, with big name properties to pique your interest. The latest Batman: Caped Crusader harks back to the early 90s series (which still has one of the best intros and music ever), but shows the Dark Knight early on in his crime fighting career. Terminator Zero is an anime based on the Terminator franchise, but updated and largely its own take on events; most will love that it doesn't just rehash one of the previous films, but I'm worried Terminator purists won't appreciate the changes. Fun Fact: the show starts on August 29th which is the date of Judgement Day in the second film. Like clockwork every 10 years or so, we get another Teenage Mutant Turtles cartoon. It is a follow up to 2023s Mutant Mayhem, and depicts the group from the goop as youngers tweens. Raph is still my favourite...

Returning shows start with the final, and unfortunately shorter, season of The Umbrella Academy. It's been 2 years since we saw the gang lose their powers, and go their separate ways in a reset universe. Will and how will they get their powers back? Do they even want them back? And why do the new villains (played by real life husband and wife Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally) seem to still know about the multiverse?

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power is another show that has been off our screens for 2 years. Season 1 had a mixed reception, not exactly telling a story most wanted to see, but hopefully that just set up the second season of the story of the second age of Middle Earth. The show runners have promised that the story will go further into the "lore and the stories people have been waiting to hear"; and show runners have never lied before, right?

Only Murders in the Building finds a way to get around its own title in season 4, with a shift to another building in a another city. The trio are on their way to LA! A TV show about making a movie of a podcast sounds like something younger me would recoil in horror from, but gosh darn, I love this show. With a (mostly) brand new cast due to the venue change, and the loss of New York backdrop, I just hope that it hasn't lost its spirit.

Check out the best New and Returning shows below:

Premiering TV Shows in August 2024

KAOS

Season 1 Starts 29th August // Netflix // Fantasy

Official Synopsis: "An all-powerful god, yet insecure, Zeus started to fear his end of reign once he noticed a wrinkle on his forehead, possibly indicating the end of the world. He became paranoid and vengeful towards his lieges, and later, three humans connected with the ancient prophecy possibly related to his end of reign and the possible apocalypse of the Earth. Meanwhile, the three humans starts to discover their connections with each other and grand conspiracies involving the Greek gods."

Bad Monkey

Season 1 Starts 14th August // Apple TV+ // Crime

Official Synopsis: "When a severed arm is found by a tourist out fishing, Andrew Yancy - a one-time detective demoted to restaurant inspector in Southern Florida - is pulled into a world of greed and corruption that decimates the land and environment in both Florida and the Bahamas."

Batman: Caped Crusader

Season 1 Starts 1st August // Amazon Prime Video // Animation

Official Synopsis: "A hard-boiled animated series following the fearsome vigilante in his first year. Forged in the fire of tragedy, billionaire Bruce Wayne becomes something both more and less than human - the BATMAN. Night after night, against overwhelming odds, he wages his relentless one-man war on crime."

Terminator Zero

Season 1 Starts 29th August // Netflix // Animation

Official Synopsis: "A future war has raged for decades between the few human survivors and an endless army of machines. 1997: the AI known as Skynet gained self-awareness and began its war against humanity. Caught between the future and this past is a soldier sent back in time to change the fate of humanity."

Tales of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

Season 1 Starts 9th August // Paramount+ // Animation

Official Synopsis: "The Turtles - Leo, Raph, Donnie and Mikey - each will go it alone for the first time. Faced with new threats and teaming up with old allies, the Turtles will discover who they really are when they don't have their brothers at their sides."

Returning TV Shows in August 2024

The Umbrella Academy

Season 4 Returns 8th August // Network: Netflix // Superhero

Official Synopsis: "A super-dysfunctional family of superheroes - The Monocle, Spaceboy, The Kraken, The Rumor, The Séance, Number Five, The Horror, and The White Violin - have eight days to buckle up and save the world. They must work together to solve their father's mysterious death while coming apart at the seams due to their divergent personalities and abilities."

The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power

Season 2 Returns 29th August // Network: Amazon Prime Video // Fantasy

Official Synopsis: "Beginning in a time of relative peace, we follow an ensemble cast of characters as they confront the re-emergence of evil to Middle-earth. From the darkest depths of the Misty Mountains, to the majestic forests of Lindon, to the breath-taking island kingdom of Númenor, to the furthest reaches of the map, these kingdoms and characters will carve out legacies that live on long after they are gone. "

Only Murders in the Building

Season 4 Returns 27th August // Network: Hulu // Crime

Official Synopsis: "Three strangers who share an obsession with true crime and suddenly find themselves wrapped up in one. When a grisly death occurs inside their exclusive Upper West Side apartment building, the trio suspects murder and employs their precise knowledge of true crime to investigate the truth. As they record a podcast of their own to document the case, the three unravel the complex secrets of the building which stretch back years. Perhaps even more explosive are the lies they tell one another. Soon, the endangered trio comes to realize a killer might be living amongst them as they race to decipher the mounting clues before it's too late. "

Plan B

Season 2 Returns 11th August // Network: CBC // Legal

Official Synopsis: "An ambitious young lawyer discovers a way to travel through time to fix his relationships, and create his perfect life, but even when he knows what's going to happen next, he can't control everything."

Emily in Paris

Season 4 Returns 15th August // Network: Netflix // Comedy

Official Synopsis: "Emily, a driven twenty-something American woman from the Midwest, who moves to Paris for an unexpected job opportunity, tasked with bringing an American point of view to a venerable French marketing firm. Cultures clash as she adjusts to the challenges of life in a foreign city, while juggling her career, new friendships and love life."

SEAL Team

Season 7 Returns 11th August // Network: Paramount+ // Action

Official Synopsis: "Failure is not an option for the Navy SEALs - the world's most elite, special ops forces. These stealthy and fearless warriors conduct high-risk clandestine missions against impossible odds. And when they return to the home front they face stress of a different nature. Keeping secrets, deploying at a moment's notice, and the knowledge that each assignment could be their last takes a toll on them and their families. But their unbreakable oath and patriotism compel them to persevere."

Pachinko

Season 2 Returns 23rd August // Network: Apple TV+ // Drama

Official Synopsis: "Epic in scope and intimate in tone, the story begins with a forbidden love and crescendos into a sweeping saga that journeys between Korea, Japan and America to tell an unforgettable story of war and peace, love and loss, triumph and reckoning."

Unstable

Season 2 Returns 1st August // Network: Netflix // Comedy

Official Synopsis: "A biotech genius tries to bounce back from the depths of grief with help from his son, who works to escape his dad's shadow and save the family business."

Bel-Air

Season 3 Returns 15th August // Network: Peacock // Drama

Official Synopsis: "Based on Morgan Cooper's popular fan film, this series, set in modern-day America, is a serialized one-hour dramatic analogue of the popular '90s sitcom 'The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air' that leans into the original premise: Will's complicated journey from the streets of West Philadelphia to the gated mansions of Bel-Air. With a reimagined vision, the series will dive deeper into the inherent conflicts, emotions and biases, while still delivering swagger and nods to the original show."