Picking the Trailer of the Week Is a 3 Body Problem

On Monday, the best shows of last year will be lauded once more when the 75th Emmy Awards air on Fox. But if you’re ready to look ahead to all the TV that’s coming in 2024, there are a ton of new trailers for the most exciting shows debuting late winter and early spring, from daunting adaptations to Larry David’s swan song. It was difficult to narrow down our selections, but we got the job done. The envelope, please…

Best trailer for the week of January 8: 3 Body Problem, premieres March 21 on Netflix

A lot of books have been dubbed “unfilmable,” only to finally be adapted with varying degrees of success (but Foundation, we always believed in you!). But 3 Body Problem, which is set to debut on Netflix this spring, has had an especially circuitous journey to the screen. It certainly didn’t help that two of the co-creators, David Benioff and Dan Weiss, still haven’t completely escaped the shadow of their latest big genre show, Game of Thrones — or rather, outrun the infamy of having whiffed one of the biggest shows of the 21st century so far.

Nevertheless, Benioff and Weiss have teamed up with co-creator Alexander Woo on an ambitious adaptation of a sci-fi book series that the word “sprawling” can only begin to describe: Liu Cixin’s The Three-Body Problem. The trailer, which features several Thrones alums, including Liam “Ser Davos” Cunningham, doesn’t give much away, so you’ll want to track down the books or a primer, stat. But it looks like, come March, we’ll have our minds blown.

Curb Your Enthusiasm Season 12, premieres February 4 on HBO

We’re prett-ay, prett-ay glad to have Curb Your Enthusiasm back for one final outing (though, you never know with Larry David, who’s brought this show back from the dead once already). Season 12 of the hit HBO comedy will have the usual murderers’ row of performers, including Susie Essman, J.B. Smoove, and Ted Danson, as well as guest stars like Vince Vaughn and Tracey Ullman, who’s back for more. And it will raise the usual seemingly knotty (but ultimately petty) questions about social customs.

Honorable Mention: Halo Season 2, premieres February 8 on Paramount+

The world of Halo gets a lot bigger in Season 2, judging by this trailer, which is packed with glowing weapons, big brawls, stirring speeches, and Pablo Schreiber in all his 6’5” glory. The first season was a bit of a mess– okay, a big mess. But we’ll take “space-war mess with potential” over “competent video-game adaptation” any day.

Honorable Mention: Will Trent Season 2, premieres February 20 on ABC

Will Trent the character isn’t much of an outlier in the world of TV detectives — he ALSO applies his preternatural skills of observation to solve cases the regular cops/agents can’t. But thanks to Ramón Rodriguez, who plays the titular character in this adaptation of Karin Slaughter’s novels, Will Trent the TV series is more than a run-of-the-mill procedural. Rodriguez imbues the character with intelligence and vulnerability, but credit is also due to his co-stars, including Erika Christensen and, most importantly, Betty the Chihuahua.

Honorable Mention: The Walking Dead: The Ones Who Live, premieres February 25 on AMC

Let’s go ahead and get the obligatory, sigh of “The Walking Dead is still going?” out of the way already — Dead City and Daryl Dixon are proof that this franchise still has some life in it yet. The Ones Who Live will (eventually) reunite the two characters who cast the longest shadows over the show: star-crossed lovers Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) and Michonne (Danai Gurira), who battle their way through hordes (how are there STILL so many walkers??) and other people (who have always been the real threat, never forget) to find each other again.

Honorable Mention: Parish, premieres March 2024 on AMC

We’ll watch Giancarlo Esposito in anything (which we recently proved by sitting through Kaleidoscope), but this new AMC crime-thriller looks like a prime opportunity for the Better Call Saul alum. As Gracian “Gray” Parish, Esposito confronts the demimonde of New Orleans and his own past as a wheelman, all while wearing a spiffy cap. Bradley Whitford and Amanda Brugel (having a bit of a Handmaid’s Tale reunion of their own) co-star.