BattleBots returns on Discovery Channel January 5. Fifty teams battle in Las Vegas, fighting to qualify for the BattleBots World Championship VII. The action happens at Caesars Entertainment Studios.

Tantrum is the reigning world champ. It will battle with End Game, Witch Doctor, SawBlaze, Hydra, Hypershock, Minotaur and other robots.

Chris Rose and Kenny Floria offer commentary, and Faruq Tauheed is the ring announcer.

Ed Roski and Greg Munson created BattleBots. It ran on Comedy Central, then ABC. Science Channel, part of Discovery, Inc., ran off-network episodes in 2017. Discovery premiered BattleBots in 2018, with episodes on Science Channel appearing  a few days later. ■

A new series in the BattleBots franchise debuts August 4, when BattleBots Champions airs on Discovery Channel. Each week, eight elite bots face off in what Discovery calls a “Sin City Slugfest,” fighting for the right to compete in the showdown in Vegas. Winners from the first five episodes will join three winners of the Giant Nut, the trophy BattleBots champions receive, in the final episode. The ultimate winner gets the brand new Golden Bolt trophy. 

Discovery did not reveal which bots will do battle in the new series. 

Discovery Plus will air BattleBots Champions as well. The streaming network got its own BattleBots series, when BattleBots: Bounty Hunters premiered in January 2021. That series pitted current bots against “legends” in BattleBots history. 

Ed Roski and Greg Munson created Battlebots. It ran on Comedy Central, then ABC. Science Channel, part of Discovery, Inc., ran off-network episodes in 2017. Discovery premiered Battlebots in 2018, with episodes on Science Channel appearing  a few days later. ■

A new season of BattleBots starts on Discovery January 6, with 14 episodes featuring robots beating each other down to pieces and parts. Chris Rose and Kenny Florian offer play by play and Faruq Tauheed is the ring announcer.

The action has shifted from Long Beach, California to Las Vegas, which Tauheed told B+C is “a match made in combat heaven.”

“I mean, c’mon–Las Vegas is the fight capital of the world,” said Tauheed. “What’s better than bringing the biggest bots to the biggest fight capital?”

Tauheed, who hosted esports events before shifting to BattleBots, of course prefaces each bout with a clever bit of ringside poesy. He said the rhymes start with the show’s writers, and then he sprinkles in a bit of flavor. “I always say, they’re the doctors who put Frankenstein’s body together,” said Tauheed, “and I’m the lightning that brings it to life.”

New Zealand bot End Game is the reigning champ, and holder of the so-called Giant Nut. Those looking to unseat End Game include Blacksmith, Minotaur, Witch Doctor, SawBlaze and Whiplash. 

Tauheed said the current batch of bots is constantly evolving–faster speeds, greater power, lighter weights and better protection. “Everybody looks to push the envelope of robotic engineering,” he said. “There are so many more great fights because of the evolution of engineering.”

Asked to name his favorite bot, Tauheed mentioned a machine from the days of yore. “Black and yellow, old-school Stinger,” he said. “I miss Stinger.”

Among the more recent bots, he singled out HiJinx and Switchback. 

The show streams on Discovery Plus. 

BattleBots founder and CEO Edward Roski said this season’s battles “are beyond amazing.”

“The builders did an incredible job raising the bar to a completely new level of imagination, skill and, frankly, violence,” he added. “There are shocks and upsets, and heartwarming triumphs over technical and personal challenges.”

The previous season, which began in December 2020, did not feature studio audiences. Typically, some 1,000 to 1,500 fans would be in the old Boeing hangar, known as the BattleBox. Amidst the pandemic, producers set up “builder boxes”--the bot builders and teams watching from sectioned-off boxes. That meant a few hundred people in attendance. 

Studio audiences are back in Vegas, and Tauheed said it makes all the difference in the world. “For me, it means everything,” he said. “For our Battlebots and builders, it means everything. Fans are one of the best things about BattleBots. I love the fights, the builders, the engineers, but the fans are what it’s all about.”

Tauheed said the builder boxes worked fine last season, “but there’s no energy like a live BattleBots crowd.” ■ 

Battlebots returns on Discovery Jan. 6. The robot-fighting competition sees more than 60 teams head to Las Vegas to compete for The Giant Nut trophy. There are 14 episodes. 

End Game of New Zealand is the champ. After missing the 2020 season, Blacksmith, Minotaur, Duck! and Icewave get back in the ring. Also in the running are Witch Doctor, SawBlaze, Hydra, Whiplash and Valkyrie. 

“Delighted to kick off the new year and welcome viewers back into the BattleBox with 14 all-new episodes filled with some of the most intense bot battles we've ever seen,” said Scott Lewers, executive VP, multiplatform programming, Discovery Factual, and head of content, Science. “Thursday night robot fighting action's back and better than ever!"

Chris Rose and Kenny Florian offer play by play and Faruq Tauheed is ring announcer. Pete Abrahamson is the so-called Bot Whisperer. 

“This year’s World Championship was the most exciting ever, and the battles are beyond amazing,” said BattleBots founder and CEO Edward Roski. “The builders did an incredible job raising the bar to a completely new level of imagination, skill and, frankly, violence. There are shocks and upsets, and heartwarming triumphs over technical and personal challenges. It’s going to be our best ever season, and we can’t wait for the start of January so we can share all the drama with our millions of fans.”

Battlebots is produced by Whalerock Industries and BattleBots, Inc. Executive producers are Chris Cowan, Edward (Trey) Roski, Greg Munson, Tom Gutteridge, Aaron Catling and Evan Gatica. For Discovery Channel, Scott Lewers, Joseph Boyle, Caroline Perez and Wyatt Channell are executive producers. ■

BattleBots: Bounty Hunters premieres Jan. 4 on Discovery Plus, the series pitting current fighting robots against BattleBots “legends.” The bots that will appear include Tombstone, Bronco, Witch Doctor, Son of Whyachi, Beta and Icewave.  

In each episode, challengers compete for the right to become the Bounty Hunter and fight a Legend. 

Discovery Plus debuts Jan. 4, featuring content from HGTV, Food Network, TLC, OWN, Animal Planet, Discovery and other Discovery Inc. networks. It costs $4.99 monthly with commercials and $6.99 monthly without. 

Related: Discovery Enters the ‘Plus’ Wars

A new season of BattleBots premiered on Discovery Dec. 3 after its May premiere was pushed back due to COVID. The new season happens without a live audience. 

Ed Roski and Greg Munson created Battlebots. It is produced by BattleBots, Inc. and Whalerock Industries. BattleBots previously aired on Comedy Central, where it launched in 2000, and ABC. It began on Discovery in 2018. 

Battlebots is back! Production was held up due to COVID, but a new season is under way on Discovery. Tombstone, End Game, Whiplash, SawBlaze, Captain Shrederator, Lock-Jaw and Bloodsport are among the heavy metal in the competition. 

The season had been scheduled to start in May. A total of 60 bots did battle, down from the usual 100 or so. Bouts went on without the usual studio audience in Long Beach, but “builder boxes” were constructed, according to executive producer Chris Cowan, so the half-dozen team members for each bot could watch together, and cheer. 

“There’s a large amount of stress and worry producing a normal year,” Cowan said. Shooting in 2020? Way worse. 

But it all came together. 

Chris Rose and Kenny Florian return to do commentary, Jenny Taft reports from the pits and Faruq Tauheed is ring announcer. A new expert joins as Bot Whisperer: Battlebots veteran Peter Abrahamson.

Battlebots is just what some viewers desire as this nightmarish year winds down. “It’s such fantastic family escapism,” Cowan said. “It’s a sport that’s incredibly violent, but no one gets hurt.”

Cowan noted the “primal need” for violent collisions on Battlebots, not to mention the sight of busted bot pieces flying around the venue. But Battlebots also offers “the intellectualism of chess,”
he added. 

The Great Christmas Light Fight begins on ABC Dec. 9. It is season eight, and the lights displays are bigger and brighter than ever. Carter Oosterhouse and Taniya Nayak are the celeb judges. 

Brady Connell, executive producer, said viewers have asked for years if Great Christmas Light Fight would showcase a Christmas parade. This season, it does, visiting a memorable parade in East Peoria, Illinois, for the “Heavyweights” special. “It’s a small town, but they put on an amazing parade,” he said. 

Other memorable sights include a family in Utah who turned their garden into a light display, down to stalks of corn that light up. “Their garden is gorgeous,” Connell said. 

One can’t help but wonder about Connell’s
light display at home. He admitted he’s more of a Halloween decorations guy: “We definitely have the best Halloween display on the street.” A couple months later, when Christmas rolls around, “we do a little,” Connell said. 

Before coming on board at The Great Christmas Light Fight, Oosterhouse was on Trading Spaces and Million Dollar Rooms. Nayak’s TV work includes Billion Dollar Block and Restaurant: Impossible. They bring “a complete and utter love of Christmas” to Light Fight, Connell said. “We selected them because we know they enjoy every minute of the show, the way that we do.”

After a lengthy delay related to the pandemic, robot-fighting show Battlebots is back on Discovery Dec. 3. The season was set to premiere in May, but had to be put on hold. 

A typical season has between 90 and 110 bots competing for the 32 spots in the championship. This season, 60 bots are in the running for The Giant Nut. 

It’s a two-hour premiere, entitled “Return of the Bots.” The episodes happen without the studio audience that usually turns up to watch at the old Boeing hangar in Long Beach, California where Battlebots is shot. In previous seasons, between 1,000 and 1,500 fans would be in the BattleBox. But the producers did set up what executive producer Chris Cowan called “builder boxes”--bot builders hanging with their teammates in separated opera box-style partitions. That means a few hundred people are in the BattleBox, cheering. 

“It has a Thunderdome-type quality,” said Cowan. 

The action kicks off when Ray Billings’ Tombstone bot faces End Game, from Jack Barker of New Zealand. Other robots in the running include Whiplash, SawBlaze, Captain Shrederator, Lock-Jaw, Bloodsport and Skorpios. 

Who might go home with The Giant Nut? “The truth is, the more you participate, the better you get,” is all Cowan will allow. 

Chris Rose and Kenny Florian return to do commentary, while Jenny Taft reports from the builder pits and Faruq Tauheed is the ring announcer. A new expert joins the commentary team as Bot Whisperer: Battlebots veteran Peter Abrahamson, the brains behind the bot Ronin.  

Ed Roski and Greg Munson created Battlebots. It ran on Comedy Central, then ABC. Science Channel, part of Discovery, Inc., ran off-network episodes in 2017. Discovery premiered Battlebots in 2018, with episodes on Science days later. 

This is season ten. Cowan called Battlebots “fantastic family escapism.”

“It’s a sport that’s incredibly violent,” he added, “but no one gets hurt.”

Battlebots returns to Discovery with a new season starting Dec. 3. After production was halted due to COVID, the fighting machines are back in the ring as they battle for The Giant Nut. The action kicks off when Ray Billings’ Tombstone bot faces Jack Barker’s End Game. Other robots include Whiplash, SawBlaze, Captain Shrederator, Lock-Jaw, Bloodsport and Skorpios. 

Chris Rose and Kenny Florian return to do commentary, while Jenny Taft reports from the builder pits and Faruq Tauheed is the ring announcer. A new expert joins the commentary team as Bot Whisperer: Battlebots veteran Peter Abrahamson. 

The season was supposed to launch in mid May. The new season happens without a live audience. 

Ed Roski and Greg Munson created Battlebots. It is produced by BattleBots, Inc. and Whalerock Industries. Executive producers are Chris Cowan, Edward P. Roski (Trey), Greg Munson, Tom Gutteridge and Aaron Catling. For Discovery Channel, Scott Lewers, Joseph Boyle and Wyatt Channell are executive producers. 

The third season of SuperMansion starts on Sony Crackle May 7. Dr. Devizo, voiced by Chris Pine, is declared a hero and he and the Injustice Club are made members of the League of Freedom. “The good guys have to live with the bad guys,” explained Zeb Wells, who created the show with Matthew Senreich.

The animated series has always attracted some biggish names to voice characters, including Bryan Cranston and Keegan-Michael Key. This season sees Minnie Driver join the cast. Driver will voice Debbie Devizo, Dr. Devizo’s ex-wife. “I am thrilled to put on my superhero cape,” Driver said.

“We’re all super-excited about Minnie joining,” Wells added. “She brings a lot of humor and a certain gravitas.”

How does SuperMansion end up attracting boldface names? Well, Cranston is an executive producer of the show, besides voicing Titanium Rex. “They just like what they’ve been reading,” Senreich said of the scripts. “They get excited about playing these characters.”

“And there’s no hair and makeup,” Wells added.

Season three sees the mythology surrounding the League of Freedom get a bit deeper. “You can watch it for the superhero mythology, or you can watch to see some superheroes farting around,” Wells said.

Indeed, SuperMansion remains zany as ever. “I don’t think anyone can predict the way it plays out,” Senreich said. “That’s what makes it so fun.”

And BattleBots starts on Discovery Channel May 11; it pits the most badass robots against each other in battle. Tombstone, Minotaur, Witch Doctor, Bronco and Bite Force are among the battling bots this season.

BattleBots previously aired on Comedy Central, ABC and Discovery sibling Science Channel. Why is it right for Discovery? Wyatt Channell, executive producer, describes the show as a “remarkable mix of things,” including intriguing builders, who drive the bots, and “tremendously kinetic, engaging battles,” he said. “And it’s just a lot of fun.”

Discovery is doing 20 episodes, which were shot in an airplane hangar in Long Beach, Calif., over the course of two weeks. Five days after they premiere on Discovery, episodes run on Science. Channell described the Science episodes as “the same plus more” — repeats, but with additional stuff, such as a bout you didn’t see on Discovery or behind-the-scenes info.

This year’s competition features a mix of horizontal and vertical spinners, and bots with flippers. Of the latter, Channell noted the “hang time of various bots caught on the wrong end of flippers.”

Discovery is doing the BattleBots Twisted Metal Giveaway, where fans of the series have a chance to win a piece of a bot that was presumably smashed to bits in a battle. “A lot of the shrapnel is surprisingly iconic,” Channell said.

Science Channel has secured off-network rights to ABC’s robot-fighting series BattleBots, the network announced Wednesday.

Science will air 16 episodes of the series, which ran on ABC from 2015-16, beginning July 12, according to network officials. BattleBots pits homemade, next-generation robots against each other in a fast-paced, single elimination tournament.

The series also ran on Comedy Central for five seasons from 2000-2002. Science Channel has no plans to create new episodes of BattleBots, according to network sources.