Is ‘Madam Secretary’ season 3 new tonight on CBS? Behind the move

Tonight is technically the first Sunday of the fall season, and as a result of that we’re accustomed to getting the start of many familiar programs — “Madam Secretary” included.

Unfortunately, that is not happening tonight. CBS is airing the premiere of “NCIS: Los Angeles” over the course of two hours, and following that they’ve got a repeat of “MacGyver” coming up after it which has proved itself to be a fairly solid hit for the network in its debut airing.

Originally, tonight wasn’t even going to feature “NCIS: Los Angeles”, and CBS was going to air the final part of the JonBenet Ramsey miniseries. However, they decided to cut that down from six hours to four, and therefore the LL Cool J – Chris O’Donnell drama was pushed forward a week.

Keeping “Madam Secretary” off of the air for one more week is a move that is likely being done with the show’s long-term interests in mind. After all, just remember for a minute here that in starting later, there will be fewer hiatuses throughout the season (less repeats is always a better viewing experience). Given how frustrating CBS can be with airing repeats over the course of a year, to us, this is very good news. The only downside here is that in starting the show a week later, you’re missing out on the opportunity to get another episode before the Presidential election. Given the cliffhanger from season 2 revolved around Elizabeth McCord getting an offer to be Vice President, we absolutely understand why they would want to milk that for ratings.

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