The late summer TV calendar is getting a little more jagged: FX has set a premiere date for The Shards.
The drama, based on a novel by Bret Easton Ellis and executive produced by Ryan Murphy, is set to debut Aug. 5 on FX and Hulu. The premiere date caps a winding road for The Shards, which Ellis initially developed at HBO in 2024. It stalled there before Murphy and FX rescued it in May 2025; a series order followed two months later.
Ellis published The Shards in print form in 2023 after first releasing it as a serialized audiobook on his podcast. The novel is set in 1980s Los Angeles and takes inspiration from Ellis’ high school days. Here’s how FX describes it: “The series follows a group of privileged high school seniors at an elite prep school as they navigate identity, sex, jealousy, obsession and the dangers lurking beneath the surface of American adolescence.
“At its center is Bret (Igby Rigney), an aspiring writer and keenly observant teenager whose reality begins to unravel with the arrival of a mysterious and magnetic new student, Robert Mallory (Homer Gere). Transferring in just before his senior year, Robert’s appearance coincides with the growing terror of The Trawler, a serial killer targeting teenagers across the city.”
The cast also includes Kaia Gerber, Hayes Warner, Graham Campbell, Evan Rachel Wood, Wes Bentley and Jordan Roth.
20th Television is producing The Shards. The executive producers are Murphy, Nina Jacobson, Brad Simpson, Ellis, Eric Kovtun, Scott Robertson, Nissa Diederich, Tanase Popa, Nick Hall, Michael Uppendahl, Max Winkler (who also directs), Kathleen McCaffrey and Brian Young.
