That chill in the air isn’t just the arrival of winter in Los Angeles — it’s the cold realization that network TV is in trouble. BIG trouble. Really, really big trouble.
We’ve been watching the antics of NBC all season, and believe me, it’s been entertaining. Knight Rider is, technically, a bust. No new hits have been generated. ER, one of its top rated shows, is in its last season. Heroes has eroded pretty badly due to an uneven (and that’s being kind) season. Other dramas have all seen declines. The only bright spots for NBC have been Sunday Night Football and Saturday Night Live (during the election season).
And now they’ve locked up Jay Leno, every night of the week. At 10 PM. IN PRIMETIME.
Think about that a moment, won’t you? Five hours of television programming, mostly scripted dramas — GONE, once Leno takes over the spot. It’s cheap for NBC, much cheaper for them to give over an hour to the audience who will watch him at 10, rather than at 11:35 than it is to keep trying to find a ‘hit’ 10 PM show.
I am not typically a doomsayer, but this does not bode well.
We can hope that this is another boneheaded NBC decision — hey! Let’s get rid of pilot season! A 52-week TV season, how about that? Uh…the talking car from the 80’s, let’s bring that back!
But there’s something far more disconcerting at work here.
This might actually pay off for them.
On any given night Leno pulls almost 5 million viewers at 11:35 PM. If he doubles that audience, which he should, that immediately gives NBC better ratings on 3 of 5 nights of the week than they have right now with scripted one-hour dramas. ER is in its last season. KINGS will take its place come midseason. Law and Order shows will bump to 9 PM and suddenly, there aren’t as many time slots to fill (and futures for LIFE and LIPSTICK JUNGLE, which has already been on the verge of cancellation look pretty dim). Dateline NBC and The Apprentice can go back to midseason or ‘plug n play’ shows, filling gaps in the schedule when a new show crashes and burns.
Hopefully this will inspire some more cable nets to go scripted later at night…I gotta believe when a door closes, a window opens somewhere else.
Obviously this isn’t happening right away. NBC still has seven months with Leno at The Tonight Show. But then…all bets are off.
Posted under analysis, tv news
This post was written by Shawna on December 9, 2008
effffffffff.
I wonder if people will be as interested to tune in for lame monologs, stupid canned bits, and tepid celeb “interviews” at the same hour when those celebs are on other networks in the shows that give them celebrity in the first damned place. I mean, if you are a Keifer Sutherland fan, are you seriously going to opt to tune AWAY from 24 in order to hear hear Jay’s 6 minutes with Keifer?
I don;t think this is a winning play at all. That’s five hours of scripted shows which will no longer be available for replay on hulu. No longer sellable as DVDs and downloads in subsequent seasons (“Now on DVD– Season #3 of The Jay Leno Show!” ZZzzz…)
I think this is a stop-gap to prevent Leno from jumping to ABC or some other net, while it also helps NBC spackle over the fact that their primetime lineup for 2009 will likely be weaker than if they let drunken monkeys make the programming decisions.
dumb dumb dumb dumb