Law & Order: SVU season 19 premiere date: When Mariska Hargitay, cast could return
The first thing to go in discussing the future of the show is reminding you that SVU is already renewed for a 19th season — it’d be great if it also had that season 20 renewal, but alas, nothing is confirmed there as of yet. NBC will be premiering the show this fall, and in the same timeslot Wednesday nights at 9:00 p.m. Eastern that it has called home for so many years. Nothing is changing there, mostly because there’s no reason for the network to make a change. Ratings are still solid, and the show remains a monster in syndication, streaming, and DVR viewing. There is probably not a scripted show on NBC right now, other than maybe This Is Us, that reaches more people in a variety of ways.
As for specific premiere dates, start by thinking late September / early October. This is the standard start time for many network shows, and there’s a little flexibility built in here depending on if NBC wants to wrap up America’s Got Talent or some other summer series in late September. Wednesday, September 20 is a possible SVU premiere date, as is September 27 and October 4. It’d be a surprise to see the show start later than that, mostly because ratings tend to be strong in the fall and it’d be a mistake for NBC to try to take advantage of that.
The structure for SVU seems to be fairly consistent — there will be new episodes airing throughout the first few months of the fall season, and then a hiatus most likely from November to January. After some more new episodes early in the year, there will probably be a few more hiatuses in the winter / spring before a run of episodes in late April and May. While it’d be nice to get more episodes in a row without the breaks, this schedule works for NBC.
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(Photo: NBC.)