Spring 2020 TV: ‘Dispatches’ from Philly, A ‘Modern Family’ finale, HBO Max, Peacock, and more

Here's what you should fill your DVR with this month and beyond.

Jason Segel as Peter in AMC's "Dispatches from Elsewhere," a series premiering March 1 that was filmed in Philadelphia, in locations that included the atrium of the Curtis Center.Read moreJESSICA KOURKOUNIS / AMC

Published Feb. 8, 2020, 4:12 a.m. ET

You can’t watch it all.

Television, though, keeps coming. Over the next few months, with the addition of two more major streaming services, the fear of missing out could be replaced by the fear of never sleeping (or having quite as much money) again.

On April 15, Comcast customers will get free access to Peacock, the cable giant’s new streaming service, and its 15,000 hours of content. (Everyone else waits until July 15. Price plans vary.)

May brings the launch of HBO Max, which for $14.99 a month will carry all HBO’s programming as well as content from WarnerMedia’s other libraries, and original shows, including at some point an adaptation of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s best-selling novel Americanah, starring Lupita Nyong’o. And, oh, yes, HBO Max will be the new home of Friends.

The spring also brings some goodbyes.

ABC will air the series finale of Modern Family on April 8, capping an 11-season run that included five consecutive Emmy wins for outstanding comedy. Fox’s Empire, the music-fueled drama cocreated by West Philadelphia’s Lee Daniels, will bow out in May after six turbulent seasons. ABC’s Philadelphia-set How to Get Away with Murder ends on May 14.

Here’s some of what we have to look forward to:

Homeland (9 p.m. Sunday, Showtime). In its eighth and final season, the spy series comes full circle, as a former captive again becomes the focus of suspicion. This time, though, it’s CIA agent Carrie Mathison (Claire Danes) whose loyalty is questioned just as her old boss, Saul Berenson (Mandy Patinkin), sends her back to Afghanistan on a crucial mission.

For Life (10 p.m. Tuesday, ABC). Fictional legal drama starring Nicholas Pinnock (Counterpart) was inspired by the life of Isaac Wright Jr., who won his own freedom after a wrongful conviction under New Jersey’s kingpin law and went on to become a lawyer and represent others.

High Fidelity (Feb. 14, Hulu). Zoë Kravitz stars as Rob, the owner of a record store who’s recalling past relationships after having her heart broken, in what’s obviously a different take on the Nick Hornby original. Fun time-flies fact: Kravitz’s mother, Lisa Bonet, played one of the exes of the movie-version of Rob (John Cusack). That was 20 years ago.

Utopia Falls (Feb. 14, Hulu). Billed as “the first ever performance-based sci-fi series for culturally diverse and socially and politically minded young audiences," it’s a teen drama with music, set on a postapocalyptic Earth. And you thought Hollywood had run out of ideas.

Outlander (8 p.m. Feb. 16, Starz). The fifth season of the time-traveling romance finds Jamie (Sam Heughan) and Claire Fraser (Caitriona Balfe) navigating the tricky loyalties of colonial America, where Claire knows that the British won’t be in charge forever. Brianna (Sophie Skelton) and Roger (Richard Rankin), more comfortable in the 1960s, must meanwhile find ways to make the 18th century their own.

Duncanville (8:30 p.m. Feb. 16, Fox). New animated sitcom created by Amy Poehler, Mike Scully (The Simpsons, Parks and Recreation), and Julie Thacker is about a teenage boy named Duncan and his family. Voice cast includes Poehler, Ty Burrell, Wiz Khalifa, and Poehler’s former Parks costar, Rashida Jones.

Zoey’s Extraordinary Playlist (9 p.m. Feb. 16, NBC). After a Jan. 7 preview, this charming musical dramedy is making its time-slot premiere. Jane Levy (Suburgatory) stars as a talented coder who suddenly develops the ability to hear other people’s thoughts — expressed through music. Mary Steenburgen plays her mother, Peter Gallagher her father (who has a progressive neurological condition), and Lauren Graham (Gilmore Girls) her boss.

The Good Lord Bird (10 p.m. Feb. 16, Showtime). Eight-episode adaptation of Lambertville, N.J., author James McBride’s National Book Award-winning historical novel was written and produced by Ethan Hawke, who also plays abolitionist John Brown.

Hunters (Feb. 21, Amazon). Al Pacino — yes, Al Pacino — stars as one of the people tracking Nazis living in 1977 America in this new series, which The Irishman star reportedly prefers to think of as a “10-hour film.”

Better Call Saul (10 p.m. Feb. 23, AMC). After its fifth season premieres following The Walking Dead, the Breaking Bad prequel moves on Feb. 24 to 9 p.m. Mondays, with Jimmy McGill (Bob Odenkirk) at last embracing the name Saul Goodman. And if you didn’t catch the Breaking Bad sequel El Camino on Netflix, you can see it when it makes its cable TV premiere on AMC Feb. 16.

Dispatches from Elsewhere (10 p.m. March 1, AMC, moving to 10 p.m. Mondays on March 2). Can I tell you exactly what’s happening in this new, filmed-in-Philadelphia series in which executive producer Jason Segel plays a man who stumbles into a highly stylized adventure? I cannot. I will say that Philadelphia looks great — at times even magical — and that Sally Field, Richard E. Grant, André L. Benjamin, and Eve Lindley also star. For those who refuse to go in blind, a 2013 documentary called The Institute might shed some light.

Hillary (March 6, Hulu). Filmmaker Nanette Burstein explores the life and career of Hillary Clinton in a four-part documentary series.

The Plot Against America (9 p.m. March 16, HBO). What if Charles Lindbergh, not Franklin D. Roosevelt, had been elected president in 1940 and led us toward fascism? That’s the question that was posed in Philip Roth’s 2004 alternate history, which has been adapted into a six-part miniseries by The Wire’s David Simon and Ed Burns.

Little Fires Everywhere (March 18, Hulu). Reese Witherspoon and Kerry Washington produced and star in an incendiary adaptation of the Celeste Ng bestseller about mothers and daughters, race, and class.

Self Made: Inspired by the Life of Madam C.J. Walker (March 20, Netflix). Oscar winner Octavia Spencer headlines this miniseries about the pioneering African American hair-care entrepreneur who made her own large fortune.

Ozark (March 27, Netflix). Third season of the crime drama picks up six months later. Jason Bateman, Laura Linney, and Julia Garner — who won a supporting-actress Emmy for her role — all return.

Killing Eve (April, BBC America). The network has not yet announced an exact date for the return of its addictive spy thriller, which pits Sandra Oh’s Eve against the charismatic psychopath known as Villanelle (Jodie Comer).

Masterpiece: World on Fire (9 p.m. April 5, WHYY12). Seven-part British drama stars Helen Hunt, Sean Bean, Lesley Manville, and Jonah Hauer-King in a story about ordinary people living through World War II.

Mrs. America (April 15, FX on Hulu). In yet another sign of how complicated watching TV has become, this FX miniseries about the 1970s fight over the Equal Rights Amendment premieres not on the cable network, but on FX’s new portion of the streaming service Hulu, which, like FX, is owned by Disney. Cate Blanchett stars as ERA opponent Phyllis Schlafly, Rose Byrne (Damages) as feminist leader Gloria Steinem, and Uzo Aduba (Orange Is the New Black) as U.S. Rep. Shirley Chisholm, the first African American candidate to seek a major party’s nomination for president.

Fargo (10 p.m. April 19, FX). After a nearly three-year wait, the fourth season of the Noah Hawley anthology series — inspired by the Coen brothers’ 1996 film — will premiere with back-to-back episodes. Chris Rock stars as the leader of a crime organization in 1950 Kansas City.

Defending Jacob (April 24, Apple TV+). The 2012 best seller about a father whose 14-year-old son becomes a murder suspect has been adapted for a limited series. Chris Evans and Michelle Dockery (Downton Abbey) star as Jacob’s parents and Philadelphia native Jaeden Lieberher — now billed as Jaeden Martell (It, Knives Out) — as Jacob.

Billions (9 p.m. May 3, Showtime). Julianna Margulies (The Good Wife) will guest-star in the fifth season of the high-finance drama as “an Ivy League sociology professor and best-selling author.”

Genius: Aretha (9 p.m. May 25, National Geographic Channel). After profiling Albert Einstein and Pablo Picasso, Nat Geo’s anthology series takes up the story of Aretha Franklin, and plans to run the first four episodes on consecutive nights. Cynthia Erivo (Harriet), who is playing the Queen of Soul, has said she will do all her singing “live on set.” Mad R-E-S-P-E-C-T.