Chuck vs.The All-Time Series Low (ALL-TIME!!!)

[TinkTanker]

Well Chuck a duck – NBC's spy dramedy returned to action this Monday with barely 4 million total viewers and dropped 13 percent to a new all-time low demo rating of 1.3. Your mission moving forward, tweets series boss Josh Schwartz: "[There are] 4 more episodes left. You all watch 'em = good things happen. You don't and... Well, you all will."

http://www.tvline.com/2011/04/ratings-chuck-spies-series-low/

I'm less and less enthused every week about this. Chances are, AB will have his schedule clear for D*C this year.

[Phyll33]

  The major networks kill their own shows with repeats and long hiatuses and then they wonder where their
audience is? They do it to themselves!  If I didn't have a DVR I wouldn't bother to find half of what I like.
It's just too much of a pain.

[TinkTanker]

Due to Ann's work schedule, we don't bother to DVR this any longer. I get it off the internet and watch it within a few days or so. This way I don't even have to zip through the commercials.

There really isn't any good solution to the problem. There are only 22 or so episodes to air in a network season that runs roughly 39 weeks or so (Sept-ish thru May-ish). If they run them sans reruns, they are done too soon. Run in blocks of 5-6 episodes, reruns or skips or whatever, people lose interest. The last couple of weeks they had basketball on Monday nights, so they would have really got creamed in the ratings. Summer is here with daylight savings time, so folks are out doing summery things and not parked in front of the tube.

Anyway, the basic cable networks have it figured out. They run their shows in 13 week blocks without interruption. Then again, having to wait a whole year for a new Closer or Burn Notice blows.

[Eric]

I think you have it right with the "without interruption" part.  We're creatures of habit, and if we can't count on something being on we often simply forget.  I think this used to be status quo for networks, but Fox or some other podunk network started broadcasting new episodes in the off-season, and everything went downhill from there.

I'd say cable is far from perfect, though. I seem to recall getting into Burn Notice or a similar show and after six episodes being told they'd air new ones in a couple of months.  And then there's Battlestar Galactica's final season which had more holes than an Obama deficit reduction plan.

[Phyll33]

  I guess it's the month long hiatuses that I have a problem with. They used to intersperse a rerun now and
then but not have 3 weeks of them.  The long layoffs during a season just irritates people and they give up.
You can't count on when they will be on or even the time in some cases. People are creatures of habit with
their favorite shows and when they mess that up they lose their audience.  I also hate the long waits between
the 13-15 episode shows. Those I just wait for the DVD on.  It didn't used to be this way. We had a show start
in the Fall and last until May with the occasional rerun and then have Summer reruns.  A lot of us older folk
really don't like all of the hopping around or long waits. It is hard to keep up with and unless you have a setup
like I do with the DVR and setting up for a series it is impossible for many to even bother with. There is a lot
of frustration out there with a large segment of the viewing public that have the time to watch TV. I wonder
if the powers that be even care how much of this audience they have lost. Apparently not.

[TinkTanker]

The business model of delivering entertainment product is in flux, no doubt. As Americans, we want it all and we want it now. We want a full uninterrupted 24 new episode season 52 weeks a year with no repeats.

[TinkTanker]

Phyll, you and I are the oldest here. Am I misremembering this, or did not the networks used to back in the 50s and early 60s have 39 episode seasons? I'm mostly think sitcoms like Ozzie And Harriet and Leave It To Beaver and stuff like that. As a kid, I remember being told that they rarely showed reruns and only then during the summer when nobody was watching anyway. If I'm off on this, please say so.

[Eric]

The business model of delivering entertainment product is in flux, no doubt. As Americans, we want it all and we want it now. We want a full uninterrupted 24 new episode season 52 weeks a year with no repeats.

The thing is that's what TV execs probably think that we, the unwashed masses, want. The truth is that they 'FOX-up the Firefly'  almost every decent show.  They shift times, days, make long stretches of no new shows in-season.  They've even slowly doubled the number of minutes advertising over the years, from 1960's-era's nine minutes, to modern day's eighteen per hour. And that's not even including in-show ads that go above-and-beyond mere product placement.  Subway anyone? 

We're not all that hard to please if it's a decently-produced show. The real question, IMHO, is this:  Are we easy to abuse?

[Phyll33]

Phyll, you and I are the oldest here. Am I misremembering this, or did not the networks used to back in the 50s and early 60s have 39 episode seasons? I'm mostly think sitcoms like Ozzie And Harriet and Leave It To Beaver and stuff like that. As a kid, I remember being told that they rarely showed reruns and only then during the summer when nobody was watching anyway. If I'm off on this, please say so.

  You are right. That is how I remember them.  They started in the Fall, Sept. and went to early May. We then
had summer reruns.  There was a break of a week or so during the season with a rerun but never the months
long ones we have now. Shows like I Love Lucy and Ozzie just seemed to go on forever. I would really have
to go back and look at seasons of old shows to see if I'm all wet though.  I watched a lot of old westerns
back then like Maverick so it would be interesting to see what their episode season was. I do remember the
30 minute comedy shows had a lot of episodes. We had a lot of variety shows like Ed Sullivan, Jack Benny etc..
that were always around to.

[Phyll33]

  Okay, I just looked up Maverick. Someone said they had 5 seasons with 124 episodes. The last season
season was only 13 episodes which has the rest of the seasons having about 27-28 episodes. Definitely
longer but not as long as I thought. I guess what made the difference with many of these is the occasional
rerun during the season but not for weeks on end plus the extra month of shows we got. Now that extra
month is gone and we get nuthin'.

  The second season of I Love Lucy had 31 episodes so we did get extra months of the shows and now we
just get the long breaks which loses the audiences. I think you can blame this on Union contracts. Everything
they seem to do ends up killing the very thing they work for.