Fox pushes back 'Almost Human' premiere date

You’re going to have to wait a couple more weeks to get your robot cop fix: Fox is moving the premiere date for its big new action drama Almost Human.

Almost Human was supposed to premiere in just two weeks — Monday, Nov. 4. But the show will now launch it as a two-night event on Sunday, Nov. 17 and Monday, Nov. 18.

Here’s Fox’s stated reason for the shakeup (which in terms of scheduling a series premiere, and all the marketing and planning that goes into that, is practically happening at the last minute): There’s a football doubleheader on Sunday the 17th that could serve up a huge lead-in to sample the new show at 8 p.m. Fox must have figured the upside of getting a bunch of NFL fans checking out its sci-fi drama outweighed the downside to having a new series debut at an odd time and changing the date so close to premiere. Fox has used big football opportunities to launch 24 in previous seasons as well.

This also means Bones and Sleepy Hollow, which are doing just fine, will continue to be paired together for another couple weeks.

Football is definitely a potentially effective pairing for Almost Human. In fact, when Fox announced Brooklyn Nine-Nine was getting the post-Super Bowl spot along with New Girl, I pointed out last week that using the big game to launch Almost Human would arguably have been a better play.