NBC ’s announcement that Jay Leno will be appear on your concealment at 10 pm every weekday go this fall may revolutionise the industry – in a way that may not be secure news for SF dramatic play .
Traditionally , NBC has fill the 10 - 11 expansion slot with hour long dramas aimed at elderly audience ; this seasonstarted withMy Own Worst Enemy , Law & Order : SVU , Lipstick Jungle , ER and Life in the timeslot across the week , but this approach met with vary degrees of success – bad Enemy and Jungle have already been cancelled , and Life is manifestly in risk of the same thing . Given that their surrogate have been Dateline special and reality shows that’ve been getting ratings that are as good as , or higher than , their more - expensive drama counterparts – andformer Jimmy Kimmel Live executive producer Duncan Gray suggests that Leno ’s new hr will be ten time less expensive than an hour - long dramatic event – why should n’t NBC prefer for a cheaper way of filling five hours of television system a workweek ?
( It ’s deserving channelize out that this move is not only inexpensive in terminal figure of money , but also in term of stress ; have a public lecture show take up almost a quarter of your primetime hour each calendar week also take those hours strike - test copy in the consequence of a repetition of last twelvemonth ’s WGA walkout , or the discussed Screen Actors Guild action . )
confessedly , looking at it from NBC ’s point of view , it ’s almost a no - brainer ( NBC ’s competitors are n’t too confused by what they see as a withdrawal from the military rank battle , either ) , but here are two reasons why witness may want to be concerned about the conclusion – and one reason to bosom change :
What designate Die So That Leno May survive ?
This may be a moot point , given that two of the original pin launch show in that expansion slot have already been cancelled , but giving Leno five hours of primetime mean value that five hours need to become usable , by hook or by felon ( “ It ’s a bummer for the author who are writing for drama . There are five less written shows at 10 p.m. That ’s bad for writer . citizenry do n’t get it . They ca n’t understand,”according to one agent ) . Does this think of unlimited cancellation of series ( Although ER is already due to finish this year , freeing up one more hour ) , or something more originative ? We ’ve already seen Knight Rider ’s season become shortened , but with rumors rise that Heroes will be following causa next yr , will be see the same act of dramas , but each with sawed-off seasons on NBC ? NBC / Universal co - chairman Ben Silverman ishinting that this may be the case :
We ’re still doing as much development … Overall the payload will be similar .
If so , that may be a good face scenario ; ABC ’s lose ( and many British dramas ) have shown that shorter seasons can allow for less plot filler and more incisive storytelling , and if NBC reduces the length of season , that could free up time slot for unexampled appearance in the future , instead of letting the subsist hits ( or , in the pillowcase of Chuck and Heroes , quasi - hits ) bogart the air .
( give this year ’s craw of unexampled SF on NBC – Knight Rider , My Own Worst Enemy – and last yr ’s – Chuck , the dear departed Bionic Woman – you may be forgive for not being peculiarly worked up about what the mesh will come up with next , of class . But I ’ll come back to this in a minute . )
What If Leno ’s Show Is A Ratings Success ?
expect , I like talk display ( Well , some lecture shows ) . I even like Jay Leno . But I ’d be lying if I order that I want his show to be a striking , because the last thing I want issomething like thisto become a reality ( from Variety ):
Meanwhile , others wonder whether the NBC move will lead its competitors to make similarly drastic move amid the low publicizing market .
“ It ’s shuddery , ” say one rival web exec . “ It couch the pressure on the rest of us . Any time a internet does something drastic like that , there ’s the opening of someone else doing something . ”
Among the other drastic steps that one or more networks may kick around : turn back time , such as Saturday nights , to the affiliates . ( In another recent unprecedented move , Fox just gave one-half of its Saturday daybreak slot to stations and will programme the other half with infomercials . )
The idea that meshwork television will ( continue to ) drop into the cheapest , lowest common denominator computer programing is something that I do n’t want to see happen but , at the same time , can easily see happening . What worry me is n’t that internet TV moving aside from dramas will see an end to tone drama in general on American idiot box , because there ’s definitely an argument to be made that the good quality dramatic play on American television has n’t been on net TV in quite some time . No , my concern is more that it means the ending for quality SF / fantasy drama on American television .
cerebrate of the slap-up SF / phantasy show that American TV have get lately – not the “ hunky-dory ” ones like Sanctuary , but the one that you make a point of follow week after workweek – and then believe how many are n’t from internet goggle box . I come up with Battlestar Galactica ( and , depend on my taste for refugee camp , peradventure Brave and the Bold , Stargate and True Blood ) and … that ’s about it . I ’m sure I ’m forgetting something obvious , but show like Fringe , Terminator or even Heroes all seem so web television that I ca n’t conceive of where they ’d fit on cablegram , or even if interchangeable show would be greenlit on comparatively genre - unfriendly channels like Showtime . If net television abandoned hourlong dramas , would SF and fantasy display be left to a world of SciFi Channel schlock ?
television set , Like Nature , Abhors A Vacuum
Well , probably not . Yes , Divine like Joss Whedon and Ron Moore lead to the web with their latest display when , let ’s face it , they could ’ve go anywhere . But if rumors of their experiences at say networks ( Well , internet ; both are at Fox ) are to be consider , it ’s not necessarily a selection they ’d make again . In fact , with Fox shew a distinguishable deficiency of receptivity to raw idea and intriguing programming despite being the internet most active in commission new SF , it depart an opening for a cable length channel front for critically - applaud Jehovah and new show – Hello , HBO – to swoop up in and satiate the interruption in the market place . But would they want to spend the money to do so ?
One thing is for indisputable ; until the fiscal situation starts improving , times are bleak for expensive SF dramatic play on boob tube – and when lecture point pop out making such strong-growing pushes into primetime , you may expect thing to take care just a little bit bleaker .
Joss WhedonRon MooreTelevision
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