Text 699, 182 rader
Skriven 2005-03-15 10:35:00 av Tony Underwood (1:278/230)
Ärende: Scores
==============


At 02:26 hours 03/15/2005, you wrote:

>----- Original Message -----
>From: "David A. Berkowitz" <dberkow@wowway.com>
> > Production cost is not the big factor.  It's advertising revenue that the
> > suits have to watch.  When a network completely gives up on making a
>profit
> > on a timeslot then production cost may be worth considering.
>
>Maybe, but ENTERPRISE still performed a good bit better than the movies that
>ran on Fridays previously or even the reruns of TOP MODEL and THE ROAD TO
>STARDOM don't do all that well, either.  Granted, all of these cost
>nothing --- I believe most (all?) of the films UPN ran in the last couple
>seasons were Paramount/Viacom productions (at one time, they had a few
>"originals" shuffled in, bujt that died pretty fast).   OTOH, populating the
>night with second runs might not be entirely healthy for the series being
>rerun.  In addition to the possibility of splitting the audience ("Darn, I
>missed TOP MODEL tonight... I might as well catch it on Friday"), it also
>could overexpose the concept.  I think reality series can be even more hurt
>by this than dramas or comedies, making them easier to "burn out."   I
>haven't seen TOP MODEL, but it would seem to be that particular concept will
>run thin pretty quick with only one run a week and, in fact, the ratings
>*have* been down for the first run episodes.
>
>It isn't unheard of that a network gives up a particular timeslot -- FOX and
>the WB gave up on Sundays at 7 p.m. Eastern/6 p.m. Central a long time ago,
>filling it with reruns of "expendable" series that need to be burned off
>anywya (like, say, FUTURAMA) --


....I went to extra trouble to watch Futurama, and now I hang out on the 
Cartoon Network's late-nite "Adult Swim" session for Futurama, Family Guy, 
Aquateen Hunger Force, and The Venture Brothers and on occasion (when  I 
catch it) Sealab 2021...  NONE of which are kid's cartoons by a long shot.

It's reminiscent  of MTV's "Liquid Television", back when MTV used to be 
something I'd watch.

Damn, I wished I'd taped every single episode of Liquid Television from 
Day-1...  it vanished and has not been seen since, and it featured not only 
a variety of innovative animated short subjects (as well as some obscure 
live-action short-series works like Dog Boy and Art School Girls Of Doom 
etc) but also featured several complete animated series works like Aeon 
Flux, The Professionals, Wynter Steel, and...  before they hit the 
bigtime...  early versions of Beavis & Butthead.    Some of the stuff was 
hilarious, some was rather dark, and some was straight animated 
sci-fi.    All in all, great stuff and I really miss seeing it late at 
night.    It was some time before I started taping the show, noting that it 
had been airing for a while and MTV had started moving it around (a sure 
sign that it's days were numbered) and I managed to get about 9 hours of 
stuff before MTV suddenly yanked the plug and Liquid Television simply 
vanished.

So far, the only LT spinoff survivors to show up on home video are Aeon 
Flux and The Maxx... with Beavis & Butthead already having found an 
audience concurrently with LT elsewhere on MTV.    Nothing else managed to 
make it to home video, or at least show up anyplace where it can be 
found... and that's a shame.   So much of it was really innovative.

It's like Nite Flite on The USA Network...  gone without a trace.   Seems 
everything I really liked seems to vanish.

But I digress...    (if ANYBODY knows where any additional LT stuff might 
be found, let me know... and yes I know about the DVD that MTV made 
available with about 1/50th of the total material that Liquid Television 
actually ran)

Sheesh, did I get off onto a tangent...


>Add to that the fact that UPN had next to *no* promotion this season for
>ENTERPRISE -- although, ironically, I think they've sped things up *after*
>canceling it.


Again, UPN must have a promotions director with their own agenda and it 
doesn't include their flagship show, which really sounds like shooting 
one's self in the foot.


>Of course, it is no secret that UPN (or, rather, Les Moonves)
>really didn't want a fourth season of ENTERPRISE to begin with... but was
>kind of pressured to by the give and take of corporate politics.


The show should have then gone into syndication and promoted.   It would 
have been a success, particularly seeing that the show has now found it's 
"sea legs" and with the current management in place, really coming into its 
own.

And THEN they pull the plug.   What's the deal with that?   Does UPN really 
know what they're doing?


>So the question is... what will UPN put in place of ENTERPRISE that can help
>it out on Fridays?  I really have no idea.


Nothing that *I* am likely to watch...  because:


>Of course, I'm not their in
>their "new" target audience (younger women and urban minorities),


Neither of which I am, nor is it enough upon which to base the survival of 
a network.   Somebody at UPN really needs to wake up.


>which is
>also the exact same niche that the WB focuses on...

Yep, and WB seems to be working on promotions, lining up their targets, etc.


> > Enterprise has the fatal flaw of costing a bundle and not drawing an
> > audience that commands  big advertising revenue even in its hopeless
>Friday
> > time slot.

....and it aired on UPN's "available network affiliates" most of which were 
the johnny-come-lately independents working off UHF slots and running 
surplus equipment and transmitting a somewhat less than spectacular 
product, technically.   Thus is the fate of most independent stations 
without a major network affiliation.

Again, ENT would have fared much better if it had been syndicated from the 
start and promoted efficiently.


>Incidentally, there's a rumor that, following the end of filming for the
>series finale last week, the Trek sets are being packed up... and shipped to
>Vancouver.  Apparently, when the next series comes along in five years or
>so, it will be filmed in Canada to save costs, much the same way as the
>Stargates or BATTLESTAR GALACTICA or any number of other genre offers are.


....what might be the possibility that ENT may get a reprieve along the way 
and actually get picked up by another Viacom property...?    I've heard 
some bits and pieces about how one or two other "outlets" had mumbled some 
interest in picking up/carrying ENT but no clue whether or not there's any 
merit to any of it.


>On the production end, that'll probably make little difference.  A set is a
>set, no matter what country it is in... and realistically Vancouver actually
>has more climate variety than Southern California.  Still, it might affect
>being able to get some of the higher profile, Hollywood based guests,
>although ENTERPRISE has actually had very few, if any of those, anyhow.


"Hanging face" likely won't garner more attention to ENT, and lately it 
hasn't really done much of this as mentioned...  with a couple of Trek film 
alumni showing up now and again like John Shuck and some other supporting 
player regulars like Brian Thompson who was a semi-regular on X-Files 
etc... none of whom I'd really call high profile    Besides, should 
somebody decide they wanted to do a Trek episode for whatever reason, 
what's a plane ticket from Hollywood to Vancouver?



>Also, it's kind of sad to think that these particular soundstages have been
>the "home" of Trek from the films to TNG to VOYAGER to ENTERPRISE...


Like Billy Connally said, "Things may change but standards must 
remain."    Trek has become a standard in today's society but someone 
somewhere counting beans can't see any farther than the bottom line.


tony..

-----  Does your bologna have a first name?     



---
 * RIMEGate(tm)V10.2á˙* RelayNet(tm) NNTP Gateway * MoonDog BBS
 * RgateImp.MoonDog.BBS at 3/15/05 10:35:21 AM
 * Origin: MoonDog BBS, Brooklyn,NY, 718 692-2498, 1:278/230 (1:278/230)