Fall TV Predictions For 2019-20 Season

It's time once again for the TVLine staff to share its predictions for the upcoming TV season. Scroll through the gallery below to see our forecasts of hypothetical castings, storylines, cancellations and more, and then (UPDATE) see how they compare to the actual outcomes!

ALMOST FAMILY

PREDICTION: After weeks of low ratings, Fox's Jason Katims drama will be the first freshman series to get the ax this season.

OUTCOME: Almost Family did arrive DOA and it was  sperminated, but NBC's Bluff City Law, which premiered weeks earlier, technically got the hook first. (Score So Far: 0-for-2)

ARROWVERSE

PREDICTION: Many of the "Crisis on Infinite Earths" crossover's "classic" cameos (e.g. Burt Ward, voice actor Kevin Conroy) will be blink-and-you-missed 'em cutaways during a fun montage.

OUTCOME: Kevin Conroy actually appeared in several scenes (as an old Bruce Wayne), but "many" of the cameos (as predicted) indeed were fleeting. (Score So Far: 1.75-for-5)

BOB HEARTS ABISHOLA

PREDICTION: The Chuck Lorre comedy will be the first freshman series to secure a "back-nine" order — and a Season 2 renewal.

OUTCOME: 💔💔. Fox's Prodigal Son scored the first full-season order, while CBS' Evil scared up the first Season 2 renewal. (Score So Far: 1.75-for-7)

CHICAGO FIRE

PREDICTION: After skirting around their feelings for each other, Casey and Brett will share their first kiss in the midseason finale, while Severide and Stella will get engaged.

OUTCOME: Ouch, doubly dissed! (Score So Far: 2.25-for-10)

CHICAGO P.D.

PREDICTION: Atwater will finally get a love interest when he hits it off with the show's new undercover cop Vanessa Rojas (The Fosters' Lisseth Chavez).

OUTCOME: Atwater and Rojas struck an undeniable spark, but have yet to do anything with it. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-9)

BATWOMAN

PREDICTION: Having proven her badassery on Blood Drive and Valor, Christina Ochoa will be cast on Batwoman (or Supergirl) as a supervillain.

OUTCOME: Hey, there's always Season 2! (Score So Far: 1.75-for-6)

EMERGENCE

PREDICTION: When either or both premiere to lower-than-desired numbers, ABC's Emergence and Season 2 of The Rookie will swap time slots, returning the latter to its original Tuesdays-at-10 home.

OUTCOME: Nope, Emergence stayed put, where ABC aired new episodes at rather random, ultimately damning intervals. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-11)

EVIL

PREDICTION: Aasif Mandvi's Ben, whose whole job is to debunk demonic possessions, will be the first among himself, David (Mike Colter) and Kristen (Katja Herbers) to have a malevolent spirit control his actions.

OUTCOME: Yet another point exorcised from our potential total. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-14)

GREY'S ANATOMY

PREDICTION: Whatever calamity befell Jackson in Season 15's foggy finale, it's dire (as teased by Season 16's first trailer) — so dire, in fact, that it brings to his near-deathbed ex-wife April and her much-missed portrayer, Sarah Drew.

OUTCOME: Not only did Drew not return, but Jackson's fate was never close to dire. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-15)

HOW TO GET AWAY WITH MURDER

PREDICTION: Three big deaths will go down in the final season: Tegan, Nate, Bonnie. (In that order!)

OUTCOME: Actually, there were four, and Bonnie was one of them. And that, folks, is how you get away with 1/4-point. (Score So Far: 2.5-for-17)

MADAM SECRETARY

PREDICTION: Dmitri and Stevie will be reunited and get their very delayed happy ending at some point during the series' final season.

OUTCOME: Helloooo, series-finale wedding! (Score So Far: 3.5-for-19)

MODERN FAMILY

PREDICTION: The series finale will revolve around Alex's wedding and feature a massive, whomever-is-available RSVP list of past guest stars.

OUTCOME: The series finale was moving, indeed... in that it revoved around many characters moving. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-21)

NCIS

PREDICTION: Fans will get to see Ziva reunite with Tony and their daughter Talia — though DiNozzo will only be seen from the back, as a stand-in used for busy Bull star Michael Weatherly.

OUTCOME: Since a whopping four episodes were left unfilmed, and because we're big ol' romantics, we're taking an "incomplete" on this one. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-21)

PERFECT HARMONY

PREDICTION: At some point in the NBC comedy's freshman run, Anna Camp's Pitch Perfect co-star Anna Kendrick will pop up, appearing in one episode as a childhood friend of Camp's Ginny. (And they'll find some reason to duet, of course.)

OUTCOME: We should have gone with "West Wing reunion," seeing as Joshua Malina showed up at one point in a scene with Bradley Whitford. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-22)

RIVERDALE

PREDICTION: One of the show's core couples will fight against the uncertainty of post-high school life by getting engaged by season's end. (Our money's on Betty and Jughead.)

OUTCOME: How much you wanna bet the pandemic-delayed time jump that was supposed to close out the season would have revealed an engagement? We reserve the right to revisit this scoring come early 2021. INCOMPLETE! (Score So Far: 3.5-for-23)

SUPERNATURAL

PREDICTION: One of the core four will die in the series finale — but Billie will resurrect them.

OUTCOME: This, too, deserves to be filed under "incomplete." (Score So Far: 3.5-for-24)

THE MASKED SINGER

PREDICTION: Due to amped-up interest and despite stronger safeguards, Season 2 will be plagued, very early on, by leaks about each crooner's true identity.

OUTCOME: No major leaks, no, but how about that use of the word plague? Eerie. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-20)

THE RESIDENT

PREDICTION: Despite agreeing to keep things platonic with one another, Kit and Dr. Bell will sleep together before the midseason finale.

OUTCOME: Bell made no such house call. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-23)

THE UNICORN

PREDICTION: Walton Goggins' Justified co-star Timothy Olyphant will guest-star as a rival "unicorn" (i.e. too-good-to-be-true bachelor) who's harboring a very un-unicorn secret.

OUTCOME: Did we say Justified co-star Tim Olyphant? Pesky typo. We meant to write Natalie Zea. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-26)

THE WALKING DEAD

PREDICTION: Season 10 will remain true to the comic books, at least in the way that it redeems Negan — a development that will allow the departing Danai Gurira's Michonne to feel that she can safely pass the bat(on) of leadership to him as she pulls a Maggie and hits the road.

OUTCOME: Michonne didn't bequeath her leadership role to Negan, but his redemption arc was completed, as in the comics, with his beheading of Alpha. And Michonne did hit the road (a la Maggie), to set off in search of Rick. So we'll wrap things up here with a final awarding of 3/4-point.

Our Final* Score: 4.25-for-27 (or 16% success)

*Depending on how NCIS and Supernatural ultimately play out

THIS IS US

PREDICTION: The boy glimpsed in the flash-forward at the end of Season 3 will turn out to be Kevin's stepson — not his biological son, like viewers assumed — from his marriage to Jennifer Morrison's character.

OUTCOME: This is... complicated, since the show has shed so little additional light on exactly who that rugrat is. But it's sure looking like he is Kevin's biological kid, so.... another whiff for us. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-25)

EMPIRE

PREDICTION: Embattled former cast member Jussie Smollett will make a stealth, unpublicized guest appearance in the series finale to give closure to Jamal's arc.

OUTCOME: We never got the actual Empire series finale (due to the pandemic), but it is a fact that Smollett would not have returned for it. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-13)

SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE

PREDICTION: Despite extending her contract for another year, Kate McKinnon will be MIA for a third of this season's episodes while she juggles SNL with her booming film career.

OUTCOME: We were never so glad to be wrong. (Score So Far: 3.5-for-24)

MAD MEN

PREDICTION: In the wake of the enormous success of Netflix's Jesse-centric Breaking Bad movie, HBO Max will announce that Matthew Weiner will write and direct a standalone Mad Men movie that picks up in 1984 with Don Draper working on the launch campaign for "New Coke."

OUTCOME: We apparently had been shot up with a cocktail of B vitamins and stimulants when we wrote this one. (Score So Far: 2.5-for-18)

AMERICAN HORROR STORY: 1984

PREDICTION: When Sarah Paulson eventually shows up this season, she'll once again be playing newswoman Lana Winters. After all, who better to interview the survivor(s) of Camp Redwood than the woman who fought her way out of Briarcliff Manor?

OUTCOME: This Winters was never coming. (Score So Far: 0-for-3)

CHARMED

PREDICTION: Much to the delight of fans who have been 'shipping them since Day 1, Macy and Harry will share their first kiss before the midseason finale.

OUTCOME: That anticipated liplock came four episodes after the midseason finale. It's the thought that counts, though, for a quarter of a point. (Score So Far: 2-for-8)

ARROW

PREDICTION: The CW will order a spinoff centered around Team Arrow 2.0 in the year 2040 before the mothership show signs off early next year.

OUTCOME: A spinoff pilot was ordered and aired... set in 2040... and it included Mia as one of its three central characters. Not a bull's-eye, but we'll take partial credit. (Score So Far: 0.75-for-4)

HBO MAX GETS SUPE'D UP

PREDICTION: Concurrent with news of a Titans Season 3 pick-up and the live-action Stargirl's premiere date, it will be announced that the DC Universe subscription service will become a subchannel included with HBO Max.

OUTCOME: We reckon we're just early with this one, but a miss is a miss. Our pride as prognosticators is long gone. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-16)

THE AFFAIR

PREDICTION: Joshua Jackson will make a surprise cameo as Cole before the final season is over.

OUTCOME: This is an Affair prediction to not remember. (Starting Score: 0-for-1)

EMMYS

PREDICTION: The cast of Friends will reunite on the show's exact 25th anniversary — Sept. 22 — to present the trophy for Outstanding Comedy Series.

OUTCOME: Maybe that was the plan but they decided to wait for HBO Max...? No? Fine. (Score So Far: 2.25-for-12)