LAST UPDATED: April 20, 2020
It’s always a fun moment when one of your favorite TV shows gives your hometown a shout-out.
It may be a little more rare to hear Jacksonville references on television than other “big cities”, but we still certainly get more shout-outs than the average city.
We decided to put together a list of the times our staff has noticed Jacksonville popping up in TV shows. One huge disclaimer: we definitely missed some!
We haven’t quite seen every show on television, as much as we may try. If you see a Jax shout-out that we missed, shoot us an email at info@thecoastal.com and let us know about it. We’ll get it added, and we’ll give you a shout-out for helping us out!
Without further ado, here’s what we’ve got so far (in alphabetical order).
2000s NBC sitcom 30 Rock gave Jacksonville a shout-out in its 100th episode.
Jack (Alec Baldwin) suffers a hallucination brought on by a gas leak, during which he imagines a conversation with his future self. Future Jack warns Regular Jack that if he cuts Liz (Tina Fey) out of his life, she’ll end up moving to Jacksonville to open an alligator farm with her boyfriend Dennis (Dean Winters).
Regular Jack responds with concern, indicating that Liz’s hair could not handle the humidity in Jax.
The original American Idol held auditions in Jacksonville back in 2009, where it handed out 16 “golden tickets.”
The PBS show Antiques Roadshow came to Jacksonville and St. Augustine in 2014, visiting Norman Studios, Flagler College, and a museum in St. Augustine.
Thanks to reader Jill Cruz for sending in this one!
Starz series Ash vs. Evil Dead references Jacksonville multiple times in its first season. It’s first mentioned as a dream destination for main character Ash (Bruce Campbell). In a dream sequence in the episode “Brujo”, shots of the Jacksonville skyline are actually featured prominently.
At the end of the season, Ash chooses to move to Jacksonville to live a simpler life – but this move will presumably be a temporary one.
As you can imagine, Best Sandwich in America was a show aimed at finding the best sandwich in America. It ran for one season on the Travel Channel.
Its championship finale episode featured a sandwich from Olio, a popular downtown eatery at 301 E. Bay Street. The sandwich in question was its duck confit grilled cheese; it unfortunately ended up losing in round one.
Paramount Network’s reality series Bar Rescue has come to the Jacksonville area three times in total – all during its sixth season.
The series visited Cap’n Odies on Mayport Road, Fatballs on 103rd Street, and Blue Water in Jax Beach. Unfortunately, the show wasn’t able to save Fatballs and Blue Water, which are now closed. Cap’n Odies is still hanging on for now!
Thanks to Carolyn S. for submitting this one!
Burn Notice
Jacksonville pops up from time to time in the USA series Burn Notice, including a season four episode wherein Michael (Jeffrey Donovan) assumes the identity of a Jacksonville drug dealer.
Thanks to William D. for this entry!
Shout-out to reader Nick De Nisco for pointing this one out.
Long-running CBS drama Criminal Minds has actually heavily referenced Jacksonville in two different episodes. In the season two episode “The Perfect Storm”, the team investigates a student’s death in Jacksonville. (A bit of trivia via the episode’s IMDB page: characters refer to the “Jacksonville PD”, which technically doesn’t exist. They meant to say JSO.) In season six’s “Big Sea”, the team returns to Jacksonville after discovering bodies buried offshore.
Neither episode was filmed in Jax.
Back before Jon Stewart retired from The Daily Show, he took aim at Duval County Clerk of Courts Ronnie Fussell.
Stewart – and many others – objected to Fussell’s insistence that no marriages would be performed at his office, because his staff was apparently uncomfortable about having to participate in recently-legalized gay marriage ceremonies.
Unfortunately, Jon’s segment didn’t make much of an impact. Despite his continued insistence on barring courthouse marriages in Duval County, Fussell somehow won re-election in 2016.
The eighth season finale of Dexter involves multiple characters taking a trip to the Jacksonville International Airport. (Thanks to Noah D.!)
Jacksonville restaurants have been featured four times by host Guy Fieri on the popular Food Network series Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives.
All of the Jax restaurants were featured in 2010. In order from first to last, the restaurants featured were Singleton’s Seafood Shack, 13 Gypsies, Culhane’s Irish Pub, and Metro Diner.
J.J. Abrams’ FOX sci-fi drama Fringe ran for five seasons and developed a cult following. The show featured a complex mythology, in which Jacksonville played a minor role.
In the Fringe world, Jax was the site of a trial for an experimental drug aimed at unleashing the brain’s full potential called “cortexiphan.” The trial took place at a childcare center, and Agent Olivia Dunham (Anna Torv) gained special abilities as a result of the experimentation.
Olivia is taken back to the center where the experiments took place in a second season episode that is appropriately titled “Jacksonville”.
NBC sitcom The Good Place loves to pick on Jacksonville.
One of its characters, Jason Mendoza (Manny Jacinto), is from Jax, and often indicates his affection for the hometown Jaguars.
Jax is (playfully) depicted as a bit of a wasteland in The Good Place. At one point, the city is referred to one of the top ten swamp cities in Northeast Florida.
Personally, we prefer to think Jax is the number one swamp city in NEFL.
Guilty Pleasures is a Food Network show featuring the network’s chefs and personalities highlighting their own favorite dishes at restaurants around the country.
In a 2016 episode of the show, chef and Chopped judge Amanda Freitag chose the Squawking Goat sandwich at Maple Street Biscuit Company as her favorite dish.
HGTV’s hit reality series House Hunters has featured Jacksonville in at least two different installments among its catalog of over 1,700 episodes.
Invention Hunters was a short-lived Food Network series aiming to find the newest, most innovative food inventions.
During their first and only season, the show went to Bold Bean to feature Steve Toney, the inventor of a travel espresso maker called the Travesso. His invention was competing against two other inventions, and his won the episode.
A&E’s reality show Intervention chronicled the struggles of a Jacksonville man addicted to crack cocaine.
Thanks to Aubrie T. for this entry!
The HBO documentary series McMillions prominently features the Jacksonville field office for the FBI as part of its plot.
Thanks to Andrew F. for this entry!
A second season NCIS episode, “The Good Wives Club,” involves a woman disappearing from NAS Jacksonville.
TIAA Bank Field is also briefly featured in a generic overhead stadium shot during an episode in NCIS‘s ninth season.
Jacksonville pops up from time to time in NCIS: New Orleans, as the real-life NCIS in New Orleans reports to a regional office in Jax. (Thanks to Frank T.!)
Food Network’s Restaurant: Impossible is a reality series that visits failing restaurants and tries to turn them around and restore them to profitability.
In 2011, during its very first season, the show visited Secret Garden Cafe in Jacksonville. They renovated the restaurant and revamped the menu. It’s since not only won back customers, but also opened a second location at the beach.
Pointman was a short-lived series from the ’90s on the (also short-lived) Prime Time Entertainment Network. Really, the only thing the show is notable for at this point is that it was filmed entirely in Jacksonville.
If you watch the show carefully – there’s a few episodes floating around the internet – you can identify several different Jax locations. The Bolles School campus, the Wells Fargo Center, the Jewish Community Alliance, and others were among the featured shooting locations. The city’s bridges and skyline were also heavily featured.
Sweet Pete’s was featured on an episode of the Marcus Lemonis reality series The Profit. Lemonis invested $750,000 to purchase a 50% share in the business, which then relocated downtown with his help. (Thanks to Pam S.!)
Jacksonville gets a brief shout-out in “My Five Stages”, a fifth season episode of 2000s NBC sitcom Scrubs. As J.D. (Zach Braff) speaks with a dying patient, he nervously blurts out part of his fantasy about going into private practice with Dr. Cox (John C. McGinley). Then, in his internal monologue, he insists to himself that it’s not an appropriate time to reveal the entirety of his secret plans: opening a Dorian-Cox clinic in Jacksonville.
Shout-out to reader Mike T for pointing this one out!
Cartoon Network’s surrealist talk-show parody Space Ghost Coast to Coast ran for 10 seasons and 14 years. With that kind of longevity, and the show’s particular brand of chaotic randomness, it was inevitable that Jacksonville would be mentioned at some point.
In a season three episode appropriately titled “Jacksonville”, Moltar (C. Martin Croker) flees on a train to Jacksonville, forcing Space Ghost (George Lowe) to find a fill-in director for the show. Ultimately, Moltar returns when confronted by Space Ghost.
The Adult Swim show Squidbillies‘ 11th season episode, “Jacksonville Jackass,” focuses on the “world’s largest annual tailgate” which takes place in Jax to celebrate Florida-Georgia weekend.
A 2019 episode of reality show Tiny House Nation, “Dad’s Tiny Homecoming,” revolves around the team trying to find a home for a veteran and his family in Jacksonville.
In the seventh season of the show Undercover Boss, the co-owners of Hamburger Mary’s in Jax go “undercover” to learn about their business.
Thanks to Jakari S. for this entry!
In HBO sitcom Veep‘s second season episode “Midterms”, the president’s chief of staff Ben (Kevin Dunn) suggests that Florida should be broken off at Jacksonville and cast away toward Cuba.
No word on if that means Jacksonville gets to stay or becomes part of the discarded corpse of Florida.
In the third season finale of FXX’s You’re the Worst, Dorothy (Collette Wolfe) decides to move back to Jacksonville, FL. (Thanks to Amber S.!)
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At least two Criminal Minds episodes. "Big Sea" 2011, and "Perfect Storm" 2006.
Good call! We'll get those added.
General Hospital, Bobbie and Ruby use to work in Jacksonville.
Scrubs - Season 5 "My 5 Stages" J.D. fantasizing about opening the Dorian/Cox Clinic but afraid to mention outloud the relocation to Jacksonville.
Nice one, Mike! We'll get that added.
Is there a tv show devoted to the jaguars
Ncis has an episode that focus on Nas jax
Pointman wasn't set in Jacksonville. It was set in an un-named city on the West Coast (Connie was shown jogging on the beach at sunset). It was, however, filmed in Jacksonville.
The West Wing they make a stop in Jacksonville. When Jimmy Smits is running for President.