Joss Whedon, a great man who has not been given the time of day since Buffy, has had his minion of fans come together already to support his new show ‘Dollhouse’. They have come together though to hopefully support the show and make sure that it does not get axed. The strange thing is, the show is not due to be released until 2009.
Look at that Hollywood Pose
Reported on Wired, fans have come together on Facebook to create a petition to try and make sure that the show is not cancelled.
However it is not just Whedon who is suffering from this lack of drive from studios to have faith, as George Micheal so wisely put it. On topic of George Micheal, new lawyer show Eli Stone was subject to being cancelled with fans posting all over the internet asking each other if the apocalypse had arrived. However, the first series went without a studio hitch and is returning in the fall.
Lost is still being put on by studios as the first series pulled in such a fanbase, however, numbers of viwers have started to dwindle over the past series, so is it possible that Lost could get cancelled. In my mind the answer to this is no, why lose one of the best producers of the time J.J. Abrams in some sort of argument about ratings.
Lots of Nuts
Jericho on the other hand got cancelled, even though it delivered the same or even better drama than lost did. Set in a post apocalyptic present day America (long sentence), Jericho followed the lives of characters trying to cope with the idea that the central cities had just been destroyed by a nuclear bomb. The storyline was gripping, the characters interaction was gripping, the cliffhanger was incredible, so the studio binned it, leading to a massive fan uprising. This led to the show being brought back but sadly only for a small series as it was cancelled again due to ratings. It is sad that the world of television is being run by ratings, but that is how business goes. So as long as Big Brother keeps on pulling in the punters, it is highly unlikely that promising new series’ will ever get past the first series.
I wish i was CHUCKNORRIS!! 
Yes, it sad that quality scripted TV is being overtaken by lame reality, unfunny sitcoms and CSI type shows. Makes you wonder just what kind of people Nielson is using to come up with there numbers in their ratings. Jericho fans won a big battle after season 1’s cancellation and hear they are not giving up in their efforts for a season 3. The fans are spending a large amount of money on adveritsing through trade magazine ads, TV ads and a billboard trying to convince CBS Paramount that this show is worth producing for another network.
Thank you for nailing what’s wrong with the world of television. We lost one of the last few “thinking mans/womans/persons” televison series when they canned Jericho. Now, we’re in a sea of CSI clones, reality tv (which is unreal because they’re all people trying to act out for television – and quite badly I might add), and game shows…yeee haww ! I’ve tuned into cable for more of a variety of programming, scripted shows, and movies. The major 4: CBS,NBC, ABC, and FOX are just pleasing Nielsen paying them all the money they do for those numbers as those families are acting badly as well, and don’t represent the majority of viewers. Thank god our elections aren’t done that way, we’d be in even a worse mess than we are already! So while the numbers rule the game, the players have already left and gone elsewhere to spend their advertising dollars. All I can say is good luck to the so called major 4. I think they’ll be usurped by Sci Fi/TNT/USA/Universal HD/Hallmark/A&E and some other more forward thinking cable stations that are learning from the soon to be former major 4. And while the article is very true it’s also very sad at the same time. I guess that’s what we get now though when we attempt to watch broadcast television…like the article it leaves you feeling quite empty with a feeling of hopelessness for quality programming in the future.
You are absolutely right. LOST was the last new programming that was given a chance. ABC is giving another new drama a good chance by renewing “Eli Stone” next fall. I plan to make sure I tune in to Eli, last I saw it will be on Tuesday night at 10 when new episodes start. I intend to show my support for quality scripted drama with good acting and good stories to tell!
Unfortunately, I am afraid my viewing won’t be counted. The major networks – CBS moreso than the others- rely on antiquated Nielsen ratings system as their primary definition of “success.” If NBC had reacted with such knee-jerk reactions to Nielsen ratings back in the 90’s, we never would have had nine seasons of the gem known as “Seinfeld.” I believe if CBS had owned it, “Seinfeld” would have been canned after its first round of Nielsen numbers showed that it had tanked.
I totally agree with this article!!! I feel totally that way about Jericho!! That was the 1st program that I watched from the original three. I am 31. I feel CBS and the other networks want to put the same old crap on and wonder why they are losing viewers instead of getting new ones. I am so tired of all the exotic game shows (they call reality TV), cloned police, hospital and comedy shows. Jericho was everything I was looking for in a televison drama!! It is Fresh, Intelligent and Original!! I know unlike most who have always depended on those networks for their entertainment I have not. I know I watched live and was never counted by the out dated system called Nielsen. I am still trying to figure there is approximately 330 million people who live in the United States and I am trying to figure how 5 to 10 thousand boxes can figure out who is watching what and be accurate. Plus I have heard people who were Nielsen say after their time being a box holder that their box was never poled!!!
As far as Mr. Whedon’s work I watched Buffy. It was good entertainment and I really enjoyed it. When Angel aried as a seperate series the story lines and characters were deeper. Angel was better than Buffy. When Firefly aired this show was the best out of all three and Fox really blew it. For a couple of reasons one is because they did not much in the way of advertisement for the show and #2 the way the aired originally you did not know who the charcters were.
CBS and Fox made really bad decisions on the way they handled these two programs.
These kinds of dramas need time to do two things and they are place where they fit in the scheme of programming (the proper time slot) and be allowed to build a loyal following!!!! To all networks remember you are no longer the only game in town this is why you will eventually be on the loosing end unless you listen to your customers (the viewers)!!!!!!
Many of your points are obscured by your idiosyncratic writing. (What, pray tell, is a “minion of fans?”) Some of it is self-contradictory. Whedon is right now working on Dollhouse, so by any reasonable definition HAS been given the time of day after Buffy. You (or at least the commentor) can’t say Lost was the last show given a chance and then immediately point out that a few years later, Eli Stone was in fact given a chance.
Have you even followed the public discussions of Lost? It won’t be cancelled. The network and producers have an agreement for exactly how many more years the program will run. In fact, many people–professional entertainment writers and spare-time fan-bloggers–have commented that this will probably make the show stronger, since the writers know exactly how much time they have to complete the story ideas they’ve got in the vault.
In light of increased competition, with more and more channels popping up with specialized programming, I don’t see *any* way for the broadcast networks to maintain their supremacy in viewers. And certainly the answer for them, as they are businesses and have to pay the bills, is NOT to lose more and more money on shows they can only HOPE will eventually draw viewer numbers sufficient for a profit. I am not happy about this, but I don’t see outrage changing anything.
All this hand-wringing over Nielsen killing Jericho is mere catechism repeated by the faithful. The makers of Jericho had many sources of income for the show which they had direct access to (the iTunes sales, the streams on their own website for which they sold ads, DVD sales, etc.) and the fact is the show didn’t make enough money. It’s ridiculous to compare it to Seinfeld for many reasons, but the three biggest reasons are that Seinfeld had a small cast while Jericho’s is very large, Jericho has lots more special effects and location shooting, and Jericho was a serial. The first two mean that Jericho is a much bigger financial risk in nurturing over time (and don’t forget the number of viewers fell considerably in the second year) while the fact that it’s a serial means that it’s far harder to get new fans to tune in. Too bad, I actually liked Jericho, but I don’t know anyone else who watched it.
If CBS had counted all the viewers, no matter where they watched Jericho, Jericho would still be on television. Unfortunately they’ve thrown away six million+ dedicated viewers. Too bad.
This article is right on the money about Jericho and other cancelled shows. Nielsen is an company that is past it’s prime in the way it reports who is watching. If anything, the noise made by fans everywhere for all cancelled show will make the networks more interested in true numbers.
No serial drama will ever take off and be successful as long as networks create long hiatuses and inconsistent airings of the show. That’s what happened with CBS and Jericho….and then CBS says it canceled due to low ratings. What about CBS’ bad programming decisions? We are held hostage by that.
I wonder how it is that mpbnice knows the truth of his/her statement. Does he/she know the cost of Jericho? How does he/she know that “counting” all the viewers would have resulted in sufficient revenues to both cover costs and make a profit? Can he/she tell us how much money is made by CBS from an iTunes download? Can he/she give us a comparison in viewer value (to CBS) between live network viewing and online streaming? The amount of commercial time on the latter is tiny compared to the former, so my assumption is that online viewers don’t add nearly as much to the bottom line as live network viewers. I’d be interested in some figures from mpb, since he/she seems to know what these are.
Does he/she think that CBS and the producers don’t know exactly how many people downloaded eps from iTunes? Ditto for streaming online? CBS *did* know these things, and you can’t blame the insufficiency of revenue here on Nielson. Sure, people watched other ways, but the reasonable conclusion is that they watched in ways that didn’t pay enough to make the show profitable.
Nielsen reported a 25% percent drop in the number of Jericho viewers from the end of season one to the beginning of season two. Where’s the evidence that Nielsen got 25% worse in “counting” people between the first season and the second?
I also wonder what mpb means by “dedicated viewers.” The sales for the first season DVDs of Jericho were nothing special. “Dedicated” viewers could have made those sales tremendous. I suspect that season two sales will be worse, proving only that a handful of truly dedicated viewers like to imagine that anyone who watched the show is as devoted as the fanatics are. Prove it. Give us some numbers to back up your claims.