TOM PETTY: I WON'T BACK DOWN
Reelz Channel, 8:00 p.m. ET
DOCUMENTARY PREMIERES: Three new Tom Petty-related documentaries are unveiled tonight on Reelz, starting at 8 p.m. ET with the one I’m most eagerly anticipating and recommending: Tom Petty: I Won’t Back Down. That’s followed by two series premieres with installments devoted to Petty, Autopsy: The Last Hours of Tom Petty and Life, Death & Money, which looks at the estate he left behind. But for me, who had a chance to see Tom Petty with his newly former Heartbreakers when they were a local band in Gainesville, FL and I was a graduate student there, I’m most interested in Petty’s musical history and evolution, from his Florida roots to his solo career and his time as a member of the all-star Traveling Wilburys. I have to admit that I enjoy noting that, though Petty died in 2017, his family continues to pursue his purist rebel spirit. In June of this year, when Donald Trump played Petty’s “I Won’t Back Down” at his super-spreader political rally in Tulsa, Petty’s family filed a cease-and-desist order. And held their ground – hence the song’s title and inspiration. Oh, and by the way, though Petty and I co-existed in Gainesville, I never went to see him play back then. Why waste money and time on a local bar band? (Whoops.)