Breaking News and Headlines

Two weeks since canceling “The Lying Game,” and a week after canceling “Bunheads,” ABC Family has announced it has ordered a third season of “Switched at Birth” and has given both “Twisted” and “The Fosters” back-order pick-ups. The new episodes will all premiere alongside “Pretty Little Liars” in January 2014, it was announced today by Michael Riley, President, ABC Family.

CBS has renewed “Under the Dome,” the summers most watched series in viewers and key sales demos, for a second season. Based on the Stephen King novel of the same name, “Dome” follows a small town suddenly sealed off from the rest of the world by an enormous transparent dome. The citizens must now deal with ways to survive amid post-apocalyptic conditions, while seeking to find answers to what the dome is and why they’re all stuck in it and when they might get out (not likely anytime soon with the renewal).

CBS has released a breakdown of how its top shows left off with their season finales in May and what viewers can expect when their new seasons premiere in the fall. “It may only be July, but it’s never too early to get caught up on where CBS series left off last May. And there’s no time like the present for a sneak peek at some surprises and guest stars coming in the fall,” reads the network press release.

CBS Corporation and Time Warner Cable (TWC) have been embroiled in a carriage dispute since the expiration of their contract on June 30, and as a result the two sides gave Wednesday, July 24 as their deadline to come to an agreement before millions of CBS viewers were left in the dark. Thankfully, the two companies continued discussions and were able to extend their deadline several times since. Last night was the latest scheduled deadline, but both parties failed to come to an agreement yet again and have now set Friday, August 2 at 5:00 PM ET as the next deadline. The extension occurred nearly a half hour after TWC blackened CBS programming in various markets.

In May of this year, David Zaslav, CEO, Discovery Communications, stated that OWN: Oprah Winfrey Network would turn a profit for the first time at some point later this year. The network, which launched January 1, 2011 as a replacement of the Discovery Health Channel, has done it ahead of schedule.

“Tainted Dreams,” the new web series from the creative mind of “All My Children” supervising producer Sonia Blangiardo, which looks to provide a rare, realistic view behind the scenes of producing a daily scripted drama (show within a show – “Painted Dreams”), has added Bobbie Eakes (“All My Children,” “The Bold and the Beautiful”) to its cast. Eakes joins the recently signed Ilene Kristen (“One Life to Live,” “Ryan’s Hope”), James DePaiva ( “OLTL”) and Tonja Walker (“OLTL”) to round out an all star cast of soap stars.

Earlier this year, ABC’s “General Hospital” released “Love In Maine,” which was a corporate tie-in with Disney/ABC Television Group’s Hyperpion Books and the debut novel by the fictional “GH” character Molly Lansing-Davis (Haley Pullos). Unfortunately, upon release Connie Falconeri had all the credit until TJ (Tequan Richmond), Alexis (Nancy Lee Grahn) and Shawn (Sean Blakemore) helped Molly set the record straight on the soap. Five months since the release of “Maine,” Hyperion Books has announced it plans to release the sequel to the novel as an eBook.