After just six episodes, there is some bad news for Matlock fans. The series is taking an unexpected break tonight, Thursday, Nov. 20.
This wasn’t something CBS made a big deal of promoting, and the decision does seem odd considering the rest of the Thursday night shows are airing new episodes. It’s likely that this is a behind-the-scenes situation, as we noted when we first realized Matlock season 2 was taking a break.
Why isn’t Matlock new tonight, Thursday, Nov. 20?
The reason behind the lack of new episode isn’t all that clear. The rest of Thursday night will run as expected, with Georgie & Mandy’s First Marriage and Ghosts kicking things off. However, Elsbeth is on the move. Rather than a Matlock rerun, we’ll get the new episode of Elsbeth in the 9/8c timeslot, and then we’ll get to see a rerun of the quirky crime drama with Carrie Preston.
It’s likely that it’s to do with filming schedules. Matlock had to go through some script rewrites after David Del Rio was fired due to sexual assault allegations. It looks like, rather than recasting Billy, the show is opting to write him out completely, and that could mean a new law associate is coming into the series. With the rewrites and change to the filming schedule, it’s likely that there isn’t an episode ready just yet.
There won’t be a new episode the following week, either, but this is a planned break. Thursday, Nov. 27 is Thanksgiving, and CBS doesn’t air new episodes of hit shows on that night!
When will Matlock return with new episodes?
The show should return on Thursday, Dec. 4. While the full CBS schedule wasn’t out at the time of writing this, Soap Central shared that Matlock season 2 episode 7 is scheduled to air the week after Thanksgiving.
It would make sense. With the later October starts for the shows, CBS tends to run episodes into December. Then there is likely to be a break until late January. It helps with the spacing of the episodes to keep the breaks to a minimum throughout the TV year.
At the end of Matlock season 2 episode 6, Olympia and Matty learned that they had the votes to oust Senior. Of course, Eva is likely to take that top spot in the firm, but is she actually the worst of the two evils? That’s the problem when you remove someone bad from power — you don’t know if there’s something just as bad or worse to take over the spot.
Matlock is available to stream on Paramount+ if you want to catch up or get your fill during the break.
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