Hey, I have a programming idea for Fox “When Network Programmeers Attack” they could just have some live cameras running in their offices.
My theory is that they think people actually watched it when it was on between The Simpson’s and the Family Guy, when in reality people just left their TV’s on but were doing more interesting things, like playing on the computer, reading, playing with their pets, clipping their toenails or picking their noses. I don’t know what time it’s on anymore, if I accidentally run across it I change the channel quickly. I’m hoping that it flounders enough in it’s new time slot to finally die.
Never. Why? It’s cheap. Costs next to nothing to produce. If it gets half the ratings of Drive it makes twice as much on the bottom line. Those shows live forever.
Local television has just starting showing “Wonderfalls”. What a great show: I’ve only seen two episodes, (the final is on Monday) but I have already fallen in love with the characters and the main actress…what a shame…
And no, tdn, nothing was wrong with the “advertizing” for AD. Nobody watched the flippin’ thing. That was the problem. Same problem with Drive. “Advertized” out the wazoo, but nobody cared. Well, I cared. I watched both. But I don’t equal a 23 share. As for *Arrested Development * not being on anymore, I blame the creator. Showtime wanted it, but he decided to let the show die, even after all his begging of the fans to support it. Turned out *he * didn’t support it, and that was more than a betrayal of anything Fox did.
And as much as I enjoyed Firefly, I guess the point was proved pretty quickly with *Serenity * that it was never going to be anything more than a low-viewed niche show. It’s not Fox’s job to make individual people happy. If 5th Grade was cancelled tomorrow, there would be a hell of a lot more people upset with that than there are upset with *Drive’s * cancellation. Does the fact that the show doesn’t get respect here invalidate the fact that people like it? Would you be dismisive of those who lamented the death of a delightful Jeff Foxworthy show? And don’t get me started on the people who (for some reason I can’t fathom) like War at Home…but the fact is, they do. And 8 million steady viewers will beat out 4 million declining viewers anytime, and that ain’t Fox’s fault.
…and the thing was, it wasn’t always like this. Take Married…with Children. Please! <rimshot> It and the Tracy Ullman showed launched the Fox network–literally–twenty years ago, April of 87.
Through cast changes, dog-actor changes, marriages and divorces, one of the Guys bailing, time slot changes, they kept it on for eleven seasons. Ten years, people! It made tons of money for Fox and gave them their name and reputation.
Of course, at the end, they shot it like a dog behind the barn, not even giving the writers a chance to end the show properly and not bothering to tell the cast, who learned it from radio, TV, shocked friends and agents, and in Ed O’Neill’s case, from a newlywed couple who approached him in a parking lot to say how sorry they were. He brought them breakfast.
So I’d say they’ve been like this since the late nineties, when they stopped being, as David Garrison once described them, “having viewers standing in meadows with cows in them with antennas waving in the air trying to get their signal” and became another fucking self-important Network.
I was right there with ya’ll before ya started messin’ with House. I could watch Hugh Laurie peel a grape and be tickled pink.
It’s interesting to me that with all the kabillion channels on cable that instead of taking the shows that do have potential for a following, they end up all airing Seinfeld and Friends episodes. HBO can have 51 showings of Sopranos showing in the next two weeks, my TIVO could fill up in a day of all the Seinfeld airings, that actually being able to see anything new is so rare that I am counting the weeks between new episodes of shows I like.
Even our movies are mostly remakes and sequels. How much new, new stuff do we actually get?
And as successful as Xfiles was, Fox screwed with that show pretty badly as well.
I hope you can find the DVD, it’s definitely worth it. I plan on rewatching it everytime in the mood for some smart-ass wisecracking. Which will probably be often.
