Broadcast networks revamp lineup

Fans talk, ratings walk.

For network executives this season, the calculation involved in culling a revamped mid-season lineup seemed as simple as that. With the advent of Hulu, Netflix, DVR technology and readily available links to illegally stream shows online, the television industry’s cherished distribution model (“You’re going to sit through these commercials, and you’re going to like it!”) is on its way out. And that has networks worried.

That worry at the executive level translates to a simple dictum for shows’ audiences: Don’t get too attached. The learning curve for new shows is shorter than ever, allowing a show to “find its voice” is quickly becoming a luxury afforded to only the most high-profile debuts, or those with the most money sunk into their pilots.

In the present climate of industry uncertainty and hard-to-define audience tastes, failing to post respectable ratings from the premiere and to hold on to solid numbers in the crucial episodes that follow is usually enough to sign a fledgling show’s death warrant.

Broadcast networks’ unending struggle to identify and to cater to the tastes of a mass market led to two of the most high-profile cancellations of the fall season.

In hopes of riding the wave of retro fever, set in motion by AMC’s awards show juggernaut Mad Men, NBC launched The Playboy Club.  The show missed the mark, and NBC pulled the plug after a catastrophically brief three-episode run.

ABC enjoyed comparatively greater success in capitalizing on audiences’ renewed fascination with the 1960s with the sleek aesthetic of Pan Am.  With the network’s dismal Charlie’s Angels reboot, however, ABC also ended up realizing that nostalgia alone was not a stand-in for real writing or acting. The show’s hasty cancellation appears to suggest that ABC learned its lesson.

At times during the slash-and-burn reshuffling that was the fall season, it seemed as if the better question come springtime would be which new shows would survive the winter hiatus.  Thankfully, there were at least a handful of programs that networks were reluctant to show the door.

For its part, NBC is bringing back two of its freshman comedies, Whitney and Up All Night, but the network will be trying out new nights and time slots for both. Suburgatory and Once Upon A Time, both in their first season, are returning this spring to ABC, and CBS’ widely touted fall releases 2 Broke Girls and A Gifted Man also have places in the network’s mid-season weeknight lineup.

As indicated by NBC’s death-grip on Whitney, networks are increasingly pinning their hopes on shows headed by strong female leads, often — although not always — of the bad girl ilk. ABC currently has two shows awaiting release: Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23 and GCB (allegedly short for ‘Good Christian Belles,’ and not the other B-word), both predominantly filled by mean girls. Krysten Ritter in Apartment 23 verges on sociopathic, while Kristin Chenoweth and company in GCB are the clique-y, catty frenemies you knew from high school — just all grown up with implants and a Texas twang.

And Are You There, Chelsea?, a mid-season launch on NBC starring talk-show host Chelsea Handler, follows as closely in the footsteps of Whitney’s model as it can without being a reboot. FOX’s Zooey Deschanel vehicle, New Girl, had a strong showing in the fall and is definitely returning for the spring. Though the “simply adorkable” lead might not fit the mold, it’s still indicative of a trend toward embracing female leads.

FOX’s supernatural mystery Alcatraz (executive-produced by Lost creator J.J. Abrams) and ABC’s The River, a “found footage” thriller by Paranormal Activity director Oren Peli in the style of The Blair Witch Project, suggest a possible future for big-budget thrillers — if FOX isn’t still gun-shy from the less-than-astronomical success of Terra Nova this past fall.

Discouragingly, broadcast networks seem hell-bent on appealing to the lowest common denominator with some of their spring launches. Earlier this month, ABC unveiled a critically reviled “high-concept comedy” (their words, not mine) about two men, desperate to find work in the female-dominated salesforce, resorting to drag.  This came after the network already debuted one of the most gendered shows in recent memory: Last Man Standing, starring alpha male Tim Allen.

Intent on staying competitive in the race to the bottom, this Thursday CBS is premiering ¡Rob!, a show based on actor Rob Schneider’s real-life experiences marrying into a Mexican family. If I were to find out that writers are now being paid by the cringe instead of by the laugh, I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised.

But things aren’t all bad this spring. Steven Spielberg’s Smash looks to have tremendous entertainment value, and the fare on the premium networks promises to be better than ever.

So don’t cancel your cable or hurl your TV set out the window just yet. This spring has a lot of potential to advance the cause of the inexorable march toward a new golden age of television … or at least keep you entertained until Community comes back on the air.

 

Louis Lucero II is a senior majoring in environmental studies. His column “Small Screen, Big Picture” runs Tuesdays.