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/ (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. :o
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
Quote from: TinkTanker on April 13, 2011, 08:04:32 AM
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. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_advertisement) 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?
Quote from: TinkTanker on April 13, 2011, 08:11:03 AM
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.
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.
Yeah I was reading up on TV by the numbers ~ it doesn't look promising. Somebody on there commented, "My, my what big teeth that [cancellation] bear has. Chuck might save himself by pushing LOLA into its path." :rofl:
At least there is also sentiment of the Moore/Eick betrayal: "Worst thing in the world they [Chuck writers] could do would be to leave that [finale] open, or throw some new "twist" in that doesn't resolve things in a good way. For an example of the wrong way to finish a series, see Battlestar Galactica." :headbang:
Guess we'll just have to wait and see.
Does anyone else ever go over to the Chuck message board to read anything? That message site crashes
my computer everytime. I get the spinning ball from hell almost everytime I go there. I wonder why. It
never happens anywhere else.
Quote from: Phyll33 on April 16, 2011, 10:28:19 AM
Does anyone else ever go over to the Chuck message board to read anything? That message site crashes
my computer everytime. I get the spinning ball from hell almost everytime I go there. I wonder why. It
never happens anywhere else.
Get a Mac. :P
Quote from: TinkTanker on April 16, 2011, 10:56:08 AM
Quote from: Phyll33 on April 16, 2011, 10:28:19 AM
Does anyone else ever go over to the Chuck message board to read anything? That message site crashes
my computer everytime. I get the spinning ball from hell almost everytime I go there. I wonder why. It
never happens anywhere else.
Get a Mac. :P
:neener:
Just when I thought it was looking really freakin' hokey with Chuck's disguise, it goes and ends so nicely. <awwwwwww>
(http://us.123rf.com/400wm/400/400/pakhnyushchyy/pakhnyushchyy0805/pakhnyushchyy080500812/3073368-pink-piggy-bank.jpg)
That was a nice ep.
Monday's episode tied the all-time low. So I guess the news can be spun that it didn't go any lower.
Chuck is taking a beating going up against Dancing with the Retards.
Everybody is chiming in on tvbythenumbers.com ~ that the most fans could expect is 10 or 13 episodes, if not cancelled.
Either way, there is a "Broadcast Network Upfront Meeting" next Monday and we will probably find out then. (Other networks are meeting M-T-W or T as well.)
Here's a quote from a commenter over there:
QuoteAs a die-hard Chuck fan from the beginning, I hope they just cancel it. I'd love a 5th season, but this one has been so lacking that the budget cuts are really starting to show. Even Robert Duncan McNeil (one of the show's directors) said in an interview with TrekMovie.com
"...In terms of that kind of complexity, I think we all feel like all of the things that we've wanted to do we've really been able to do, which we couldn't say in the years past. Not that a fifth season wouldn't be incredibly exciting, and we could do a lot of fun things. But, I don't know, this year there's a different sense. I can't explain it. It's a resignation to "whatever will be will be". In the past we've always felt like, "Come on, give us one more! We've got some really cool things that we want to do that we haven't done!" This year I think there's a real sense of, "we've done a lot of cool things." We've done a lot of cool things that I think people didn't imagine that show could be or could do, with the way the characters have grown and with the mythology."
http://trekmovie.com/2011/05/03/exclusive-robert-duncan-mcneill-on-how-he-would-improve-star-trek-voyager-Chuck-renewal-chances-more/ (http://trekmovie.com/2011/05/03/exclusive-robert-duncan-mcneill-on-how-he-would-improve-star-trek-voyager-Chuck-renewal-chances-more/)
Josh Fedak (EP) said there will be stories that will be tied up nicely but that there will be a cliffhanger. Let's just hope it's not a horrible one, just in case.
QuoteDespite the finale being titled "Chuck vs. the Cliffhanger," Fedak assured me that the episode features "some fantastic resolution to a number of the stories that we set up this season." But as has become something of a Chuck tradition, the final scene features a "cliffhanger component that launches us very much into [a possible] Season 5," Fedak adds. What would such a season look like? "There were a number of stories that we've always wanted to do – even from Season 1 – involving who Chuck is as a person and as a hero. So [Season 5] would be an extension of that."
http://chucktv.net/2011/05/04/spoilers-season-finale-boasts-expensive-action-sequence/ (http://chucktv.net/2011/05/04/spoilers-season-finale-boasts-expensive-action-sequence/)
Quote from: Pearl@32 on May 10, 2011, 10:13:43 AM
Chuck is taking a beating going up against Dancing with the Retards.
I wish they could change the time slot, but I can't honestly say it would fair much better in any other prime time slot, maybe the Friday death spot? Don't think it would do any worse there.
But, I don't know, this year there's a different sense. I can't explain it. It's a resignation to "whatever will be will be". In the past we've always felt like, "Come on, give us one more! We've got some really cool things that we want to do that we haven't done!" This year I think there's a real sense of, "we've done a lot of cool things."
That's kind of how I feel about it. At this point, I won't miss it if it is gone, I'll watch it later in the week if it comes back. Ann always works on Monday and by the time she gets home and we get dinner plated up, House & Chuck have finished recording. And we watch House and then Castle if we aren't too tired. Chuck is usually Wednesday or Thursday night, if not the weekend. Though I will say the last couple have been better than rest of the season.
Quote from: TinkTanker on May 10, 2011, 10:28:47 AM
But, I don't know, this year there's a different sense. I can't explain it. It's a resignation to "whatever will be will be". In the past we've always felt like, "Come on, give us one more! We've got some really cool things that we want to do that we haven't done!" This year I think there's a real sense of, "we've done a lot of cool things."
That's kind of how I feel about it. At this point, I won't miss it if it is gone, I'll watch it later in the week if it comes back. Ann always works on Monday and by the time she gets home and we get dinner plated up, House & Chuck have finished recording. And we watch House and then Castle if we aren't too tired. Chuck is usually Wednesday or Thursday night, if not the weekend. Though I will say the last couple have been better than rest of the season.
It's the last of the shows that I DVR that I watch too. The lack of funds really killed this. Not being able to
have all of the characters on each episode and losing others just seemed to make things blah. They never
did make use of Adam the way they could have and yet they brought on other people that really didn't add
anything except irritation. Just let a network mess with a good thing and turn it into mediocre. I would like
them to have a satisfactory end though instead of leaving us high and dry. I hate that. Another half season
would be nice to wrap things up in a fun way.
Harry's Law renewed but L&O:LA cancelled. No word on Chuck yet. eek