So yes, it's that time of year again: Upfronts, when all the networks announce their newest attempts to convince marketing folks to spend less money on the dying beast known as "Network Television". What the fuck are you talking about, you non-industry folks might be asking? This single week is the culmination of the 51 weeks preceding it.
Quick tutorial. In June and July network development execs scour the agencies for good ideas, unique scripts, and simply smart writers. They find said products and do 1 of 3 things: buy a writer's pre-existing script; buy a writer's brains and later buy the ideas to come from a collaboration between the writer and said development execs; buy a writer's brain to write an idea the execs already had (say, for example, a SEX AND THE CITY prequel because that horse hasn't been beaten enough - and no, that's not a dig at SJP; at least not on purpose).
Then they spend the next 4 to 6 months taking the writer and the ideas and twisting them, handing them from small production companies to bigger production companies to finally trying to sell them to TV studios. Every step along the way means more money for the writer but also more cooks in the kitchen, like a gauntlet no doubt in place to try and crack a weaker writer. Out of these hundreds of projects, a much smaller amount is purchased by the studios around X-mas, happy Hannukah motherfuckers as your agent takes a much-deserved break and the studios go to work with you, said TV writer, figuring out the first steps of shooting a pilot.
Pilots are shot in the new year, ranging in price from a couple hundred thousand to the Martin Scorcese-directed BOARDWALK EMPIRE's monster $18 million dollar pilot (yes, the pilot to BOARDWALK EMPIRE cost as much as Scorcese's masterpiece RAGING BULL). These pilots are traded through the industry like herpes through the cast of JERSEY SHORE and so all the insiders form reputations based on the heat or lack thereof. All the TV agents scramble to get their writers who didn't get a chance to create a pilot onto the writing staffs of these not-yet-picked-up-shows. And then the second week in May everybody in the TV business converges on New York city as the networks present to their advertisers which of these many pilots they're actually going to buy and run as television series. Yielding the lucky few a fatty bonus but, on the other side, making 80% of the work done to develop these series and get clients staffed on them suddenly disappear into a black hole of uselessness from whence dreams rarely return (I say rarely because while most shows that get neglected during their first development season disappear forever, others - like Matt Weiner's MAD MEN, for example - can come back. Though it helps if you were one of the top writers behind the success of the SOPRANOS.) The idea is that these line-ups and the corollary parties will impress ad-buyers from Omaha and Great Falls and Dallas, big money staid corporate types looking to be wined and dined like only the entertainment industry can, into buying up ad time during the season's new run.
So they announced it, mostly. And above is a grid of the new scheduling I ripped off of Deadline Hollywood. Everybody's announced but CW but seeing as I imagine tween girls don't read Man's Ambition, I figured we could just go ahead without 'em. Below are the new wonderful pieces of shit to be splattered across your broadcast TV stations (ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox); and followed are my thoughts on those certain-to-be-amazing (cough cough) new network shows.
Quick tutorial. In June and July network development execs scour the agencies for good ideas, unique scripts, and simply smart writers. They find said products and do 1 of 3 things: buy a writer's pre-existing script; buy a writer's brains and later buy the ideas to come from a collaboration between the writer and said development execs; buy a writer's brain to write an idea the execs already had (say, for example, a SEX AND THE CITY prequel because that horse hasn't been beaten enough - and no, that's not a dig at SJP; at least not on purpose).
Then they spend the next 4 to 6 months taking the writer and the ideas and twisting them, handing them from small production companies to bigger production companies to finally trying to sell them to TV studios. Every step along the way means more money for the writer but also more cooks in the kitchen, like a gauntlet no doubt in place to try and crack a weaker writer. Out of these hundreds of projects, a much smaller amount is purchased by the studios around X-mas, happy Hannukah motherfuckers as your agent takes a much-deserved break and the studios go to work with you, said TV writer, figuring out the first steps of shooting a pilot.
Pilots are shot in the new year, ranging in price from a couple hundred thousand to the Martin Scorcese-directed BOARDWALK EMPIRE's monster $18 million dollar pilot (yes, the pilot to BOARDWALK EMPIRE cost as much as Scorcese's masterpiece RAGING BULL). These pilots are traded through the industry like herpes through the cast of JERSEY SHORE and so all the insiders form reputations based on the heat or lack thereof. All the TV agents scramble to get their writers who didn't get a chance to create a pilot onto the writing staffs of these not-yet-picked-up-shows. And then the second week in May everybody in the TV business converges on New York city as the networks present to their advertisers which of these many pilots they're actually going to buy and run as television series. Yielding the lucky few a fatty bonus but, on the other side, making 80% of the work done to develop these series and get clients staffed on them suddenly disappear into a black hole of uselessness from whence dreams rarely return (I say rarely because while most shows that get neglected during their first development season disappear forever, others - like Matt Weiner's MAD MEN, for example - can come back. Though it helps if you were one of the top writers behind the success of the SOPRANOS.) The idea is that these line-ups and the corollary parties will impress ad-buyers from Omaha and Great Falls and Dallas, big money staid corporate types looking to be wined and dined like only the entertainment industry can, into buying up ad time during the season's new run.
So they announced it, mostly. And above is a grid of the new scheduling I ripped off of Deadline Hollywood. Everybody's announced but CW but seeing as I imagine tween girls don't read Man's Ambition, I figured we could just go ahead without 'em. Below are the new wonderful pieces of shit to be splattered across your broadcast TV stations (ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox); and followed are my thoughts on those certain-to-be-amazing (cough cough) new network shows.
MONDAY NIGHT:
8:30
PARTNERS (CBS): About two male best friends: one gay and one straight.
Cue applause at the development meeting: "We need to find some GBF programming. Obama has endorsed marriage, it's now or never, goddammit."
10 PM
PARTNERS (CBS): About two male best friends: one gay and one straight.
Cue applause at the development meeting: "We need to find some GBF programming. Obama has endorsed marriage, it's now or never, goddammit."
10 PM
REVOLUTION (NBC): Postapocalyptic world where the human race must learn
to survive without modern technology.
Sounds like a world I'd like to see, actually. I constantly tell my wife all my working out and hoarding of survival gear and backwoods camping expeditions are to prepare for the big one hitting or some sort of forced post-grid eschaton. In a spin-off
show, Bear Grylls fights the Lannisters and that ginger from THE OFFICE to be
dictator of the world.
TUESDAY
NIGHT:
9
GO ON (NBC): About a sportscaster who attends therapy
Just what the world needs. Another show
that combines _________ with therapist and tries to pass it off as an idea.
9:30
THE NEW FORMAL (NBC): Blended family comedy, centers on a gay couple
and the woman who becomes their surrogate.
Cue NBC exec: “Fox has GLEE, ABC has MODERN
FAMILY, what do we have? Hmm, that’ll hafta do, I suppose. I swear, this is the year we move up from last place, fellas!”
THE MINDY PROJECT (FOX): Stars Mindy Kaling as a young Bridget Jones-type
ob/gyn doctor balancing personal and professional life
Mindy Kaling, the brilliant mind behind a
quarter of the office. Interesting this is on Fox instead of NBC, huh?
10 PM
VEGAS (CBS): Western that follows the original sheriff of Las Vegas in
the 50s.
What the hell, I’ll watch an episode or
two. Sounds like a real hoot. Back before gangsters were replaced by fatties
(cue last shot from CASINO).
WEDNESDAY
NIGHT:
8
ANIMAL PRACTICE (NBC): Centers on a vet who lives by the laws of the
jungle.
As a husband of a vet tech, I can already
picture this – I’ll give it about a 25% chance that it’ll be anything but crap
one-liners with animals replacing people in some static procedural ER/CHICAGO
HOPE/GREY’S wannabe.
8:30
GUYS WITH KIDS (NBC): 30-Something dads struggle with not being grown
up enough to be parents, but they are.
Is this the spin-off of WHAT TO EXPECT? Or
UP ALL NIGHT? Sure to make single men rush to the local vasectomy depot and
young fathers feel much lamer than they already did.
9:30
THE NEIGHBORS (ABC): Centers on a normal family who moves into a
condominium complex to find out that everyone else living there are aliens.
Sounds like my neighborhood. Oh wait,
aliens from outer space. Gotcha. Not Aliens like the south-of-the-border
apartment complex next door to me in Hollywood. Remember THE 'BURBS, anyone?
10 PM
CHICAGO FIRE (NBC): Explores the complex and heroic men and women of
the Chicago Fire Department.
RESCUE ME without the edge, CHICAGO HOPE
without the privileged doctors and Hector Elizondo, meets CHICAGO CODE. Wait,
haven’t all those shows been cancelled? Well at least RESCUE ME was good,
right?
NASHVILLE (ABC): Set in Nashville against the backdrop of the country
music world.
Playing to Network TV’s target market – the
fly-over states. Eat your heart out you anti-white-conservative racist fucks at GOOD CHRISTIAN BITCHES.
THURSDAY NIGHT:
8
LAST RESORT (ABC): Thriller set in the near future when the country is
very fractured and revolves around the crew of a U.S. nuclear submarine who
become hunted after ignoring an order to shoot nuclear missiles.
HUNT FOR RED OCTOBER but, like, shitty.
Unless this erupts into a RED DAWN-esque scenario. In which case this just
might be FUCKING AWESOME!
10
ELEMENTARY (CBS): Sherlock Holmes is in modern day New York City, after
a bout in rehab. His "sober
companion" is June Watson, a young "personal recovery assistant"
who used to be a surgeon, until she lost a patient. Together they will consult with NYPD in case
solving.
The part of me that loves both Sherlock
Holmes and rehab can’t wait for this show. The part of me that hates
procedurals and thinks they’re on their way out (seriously, how many fucking
concepts can these bastards desperately throw out to try and make cop shows
feel new and fresh – time travel, Elvis impersonation, dueling realities) wants
to burn down the local CBS tower. Seriously, an anachronistic Sherlock Holmes
with a female Watson helping the NYPD? How many episodes before they
investigate an Elementary school simply for the “fun” of dropping fucking puns
every other scene?
FRIDAY NIGHT
9
MADE IN JERSEY (CBS): Working class Martina Garretti is a first year
associate at the tony Manhattan law firm of Stark & Cohen, but that doesn't
mean she's made it. BABY BIG SHOT is a one-hour law procedural with a kick.
Imagine THE GOOD WIFE meets BRIDESMAIDS. Or, white trash meets WHITE COLLAR.
Y’know what, sadly this actually sounds
like the most promising of the bunch. Okay, maybe on par with VEGAS. BRIDESMAIDS
was fucking great. Though this sounds more like ERIN BROCKOVITCH meets LEGALLY
BLONDE. Not so great.
So there you have it. 11 new reasons NOT to switch off basic cable or HBO/SHO this fall. And 3 "maybes" that probably won't pan out.
Let the Golden Age of TV roll. At least they're bringing football back. The only guaranteed moneymaker they have anymore. Good 'ol pigskin.
- Ryan
So there you have it. 11 new reasons NOT to switch off basic cable or HBO/SHO this fall. And 3 "maybes" that probably won't pan out.
Let the Golden Age of TV roll. At least they're bringing football back. The only guaranteed moneymaker they have anymore. Good 'ol pigskin.
- Ryan
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