UnREAL

We haven’t yet seen if UnREAL can rebound from the misstep of Season 2, but an already-ordered fourth season is now making fans nervous. Long before Season 3 even premieres, Lifetime has decided to pull back its episode order for the fourth year.

We’ll have to wait until 2018 to find out if UnREAL can bounce back from its steep Season 2 decline, but Lifetime certainly has faith. The Shiri Appleby-Constance Zimmer reality drama will continue to push fake TV boundaries through a fourth season.

In the Golden Age of television — or Peak TV, or “oh god, please stop, I have enough to watch already” — shows aren’t just more cinematic, they’re offering us more of everything. That includes more sex scenes, which have become increasingly prevalent, revealing, daring and yes, even artful, reinforcing the notion that TV has become more like film. We recently chose the 25 best movie sex scenes of the last 25 years, and with the smaller screen’s growing resemblance to its big screen brethren, we thought it only right to do the same for television. We also assumed that making a list of the 25 best TV sex scenes of the last 20 years would be far easier and much less surprising. Spoiler alert: We were wrong.

The third season of UnREAL has quite a bit riding on it after the disaster of Season 2, and Lifetime isn’t taking any chances. The once-breakout reality drama has officially pushed back Season 3 to 2018, leaving the whole of this year in Everlasting wait.

The missteps of UnREAL Season 2 guaranteed that Lifetime would take a more cautious approach in Season 3, and the switch to a Bachelorette-type format is already off and running. We’ve officially found our next Everlasting star, now that Masters of Sex alum Caitlin Fitzgerald has signed on as the new leading star.

Off the rails as Season 2 of Lifetime’s breakout UnREAL went, the initial attempt at exploring racial politics with an African-American Everlasting suitor was well-received. Season 3 has its own issues behind the scenes, but will again attempt to change the conversation of reality TV, this time switching genders with a female suitor.

UnREAL hasn’t always been tidy in its storytelling, but the messy quality of its characters — specifically Quinn and Rachel — are part of what makes the Lifetime series so painfully relatable and endearing. Unfortunately, Season 2 was just plain painful to watch as the show transformed into an ouroboros of melodrama, blatantly manufacturing its shocking twists and ultimately becoming the very thing it originally set out to deconstruct: An exploitative feat of narrative engineering. Spoilers to follow.

Boy, that was quick. 2016 Emmy nominees were announced this morning, and special presenters Lauren Graham and (a very excitable) Anthony Anderson wasted no time in revealing this year’s crop of nominees. While there was rightfully plenty of love to go around for dramas like The People v. O.J. Simpson and Mr. Robot, and comedy faves Veep and Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, there were a few disappointments — namely, where the hell is UnREAL?! Or The Leftovers? Come on, Emmys.

That time of year is upon us again, as this coming Thursday, July 14 sees the announcement of the 2016 Emmy Awards nominations, in a field that seems tougher by each year. Favorites like Game of Thrones hit new levels of spectacle this year, while newcomers like UnREAL and Mr. Robot could split the nominations wide open.

If the Golden Globes can reward Lady Gaga, surely ScreenCrush can recognize TV’s best too, right? Right? By gum, we’re going to try.