Megorious

It’s upfronts week.

Every year the major broadcast television networks (and The CW) gather to unveil their fall schedules to hungry advertisers. If the advertisers like what they see, or even if they don’t, they shell out billions for primo ad time.

There power of the primetime schedule is not what it used to be. Over the years the clout of the fab five will continue to dwindle as innovations such as DVR and internet streaming force the networks to rethink the way they do business. There isn’t one show on television that I watch live. The few shows I do watch, Lost, Battlestar Galactica, 24, Heroes ect. I watch at my own leisure, without the annoying interruptions of commercials.

First up, as always, is NBC.

NBC’s Last Stand?

NBC, which started to slowly bleed when Seinfeld left the airways in 1998, ruptured when Friends left the airways a few years ago. Thursday night is the best example of how NBC crumbled. Over the last decade or so, NBC sandwiched awful sitcoms (The Single Guy, Boston Common, Coupling, et al) between the good ones on Thursday nights and as a result people stopped watching. Now, with the strongest Thursday night comedy lineup in history, NBC can barely get people to tune in. The Office is its biggest hit, but draws less than 1/3 the audience Seinfeld did; in fact, it draws less than half the audience of CBS’s generic number one comedy, Two and a Half Men. But NBC is so bad off on every night of the week that they’ll take those numbers.

Last year, NBC unveiled a fairly impressive schedule that included the hottest and most buzzworthy new show, Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, on Thursday nights. But just a few days later, NBC drastically changed that schedule to protect the now debunked Aaron Sorkin dramedy from ABC’s Thursday-bound Grey’s Anatomy. Besides Studio 60, NBC had the best slew of new shows last season with 30 Rock, Friday Night Lights, and Heroes. But only the latter became a hit. Studio 60 is long gone but 30 Rock and Friday Night Lights will return with the hopes of finding an audience.

NBC’s game plan for the fall is stability. That’s both a good thing and a bad thing. For instance: Thursday night practically stays the same – four comedies (the good) followed by ER (the bad.) NBC will never be able to rebuild its Thursday night empire with the decade old medical drama dragging down the night. Pardon the cliché’, but it’s time to pull the plug.

Monday nights stay in tact with NBC’s number one show, Deal or No Deal, leading into their number two show, Heroes, followed by a new show, Journeyman. And, in an effort to milk Heroes for all its worth, NBC has a spin-off called Heroes: Origins, to fill in the gap when the original Heroes goes on hiatus.

The original Law and Order and Medium will be held for Sundays after Sunday Night Football ends at mid-season. Law and Order: SVU will continue to hold down Tuesday nights and new episodes of Law and Order: Criminal Intent will move to USA with only repeats airing on NBC.

In a no-brainer, Friday Night Lights, will actually come on Friday nights now, though the 10 PM timeslot may be a little late for a family audience. They should swap FNL with Vegas, which airs before it.

The majority of the rest of NBC’s schedule looks a mess, with reality and game shows dominating the opening hour every night of the week, save for Thursdays.

NBC needs to come out of this season with multiple hits. The worst-case scenario for NBC is far too dangerous for the net. If none of the news shows spark any interest, Heroes hits a sophomore slump, and none of the Thursday night comedies explode, NBC may find itself in big, big trouble.

ABC goes Tuesday.
CBS goes Wednesday.
FOX goes Thursday.

This TV entry was posted Monday, May 14th, 2007 at 1:10 pm.
Tags: ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC, upfronts