Anyone else get pissed by bullshit tv scheduling?

[Danny]

So the series K-ville premiered on the basic tv over here. 5 minutes in it appears shit gets real and im digging the show, so i google it.
First thing i see is "as of may 2008 this show was cancelled". Now for all i know it gets really, really shit. But still, if a show only runs for 11 episodes 3 years ago why bother airing it over here to begin with?

This is not the first time this happened and its incredibly irritating. Theres dozens of times an american tv series airs here after its already been cancelled so you will never see more than the initial set up season.

See, this is why i watch tv online. i get it either just after it airs in the states or sometimes AS it airs. That way if something is getting cancelled i know pre-emptively rather than get it years later as i get into a show. The biggest one for me was getting really into twin peaks and finding that it just ends because of bad ratings and internal conflicts in studios.

Now see, when i watch stuff online a friend of mine always gives me shit because im "not helping". I assume he means uk ratings and the piracy diatribe. but the thing is, with any of these hour long american dramas IT DOESN'T FUCKING MATTER. because its either renewed or cancelled long before it reaches our tv channels.

Granted this is mostly a problem for non american forum members but god damn this is annoying.

[krakenslayer]

This is one of the many reasons I don't own a TV anymore. Between YouTube, BBC iPlayer and 4OD, everything I want to watch is online (many a year has passed since there was anything I wanted to watch on any of the ITV channels, filled as they are with tabloid news for imbeciles and schmaltzy, smarmy, populist confections like Dancing On Ice, etc. for the plebs).

I tend to stay away from American drama shows, just because they're very involving and I don't really have the time to get involved in them, but I'm a huge fan of Lost (which I follow through the DVD boxsets, so no spoilers please). Other than that, I just follow stuff like Doctor Who, Peep Show, etc.

Don't know where I'm going with this so... Yeah...

[MinionZombie]

Speaking of scheduling - the BBC are taking the piss with CONSTANTLY shifting the time of Doctor Who EVERY-FUCKING-WEEK. Seriously, it's a flagship show of the corporation, and they screw around with its time like that?!

Fucking knob'eds don't know what they're doing. :mad:

[JDFP]

Understand exactly where you're coming from, Hells.

I don't watch network television. If it's something I think will be worth watching, I'll put the season set into my rental queue. If it's cancelled half-way through the season or ends after the first season -- out of my queue it will go. Why bother with something if it's just going to be cancelled. This happened this last year with "Flash Forward", "Day One", "V", and a few other shows I decided would be worth watching. As soon as I hear that "Flash Forward" and "Day One" are cancelled -- right back out of my queue they go. No point in getting interested in it. "V: Season 1" is still in my queue though because it hasn't been cancelled and has finished the first season with being renewed, so I'll be looking forward to seeing it when it comes out to rent.

I just don't see the point in getting interested in something just to see it be cancelled with no conclusion/ending. Plus, the idea of sitting through 18 minutes or so of commercials just doesn't really interest me. I'd rather wait 6 months to see it on DVD commercial free and not only be broken up into one episode increments at a time.

This is an issue as far as purchasing a series on DVD/Blu-Ray though. I'm not going to spend money to purchase a series on DVD/Blu-Ray unless the ENTIRE series is first released on DVD/Blu-Ray. A lot of times studios will only release the first or second season of a series and if it doesn't sell well so they don't release any more seasons -- but it's a double whammy, because there are a lot of people like me that just won't spend the $$ on one season of a show we want to collect unless the full series is available first.

j.p.

[MinionZombie]

You know what also confuses the fuck out of me - American TV scheduling, whereby you've got so many shows having a week off here, two there, four there, even six or eight weeks - like Lost ... season three, I believe ... where they showed six episodes and had three sodding months off!!!

If I was in America and my shows were being jerked around like that I'd go mad. I mean wtf is the problem? Just SHOW THE FUCKING SHOW. A two week break over Xmas and a week off if there's something like the Superbowl on, fine, but goddamn looking at the air dates of so many shows there are huge gaps through the respective seasons - seriously, wtf America?! :shifty:

:D

[Danny]

You know what also confuses the fuck out of me - American TV scheduling, whereby you've got so many shows having a week off here, two there, four there, even six or eight weeks - like Lost ... season three, I believe ... where they showed six episodes and had three sodding months off!!!



uuh... writers guild of america strike of '07-'08 dude?

[BillyRay]

It's not the scheduling that bothers me. I don't have cable, let alone DVR, but I know that the shows I really like are being taped by somebody in my extended tribe.

Everything comes out on DVD eventually. I can watch a whole season of something at once, if I'm patient enough to wait.

If only there were enough shows to get excited about. Apart from Doctor Who and the Simpsons, there isn't anything on TV I'm really dying to catch in it's first run...

[Mike70]

You know what also confuses the fuck out of me - American TV scheduling, whereby you've got so many shows having a week off here, two there, four there, even six or eight weeks - like Lost ... season three, I believe ... where they showed six episodes and had three sodding months off!!!

If I was in America and my shows were being jerked around like that I'd go mad. I mean wtf is the problem? Just SHOW THE FUCKING SHOW. A two week break over Xmas and a week off if there's something like the Superbowl on, fine, but goddamn looking at the air dates of so many shows there are huge gaps through the respective seasons - seriously, wtf America?! :shifty:

:D

seems like there is a lot more block type scheduling nowadays. instead of spreading 22 eps over a tv season that runs from sept-may, more shows are being split into two sections. a network will show the first 10 or 11 and then poof! nothing for 6 or 8 weeks. i think networks are hoping the long breaks will whip folks into a frenzy to see the second half of the show. the syfy channel in particular is rather infamous for this.

the other new trick is just to hold a show back long after it would've normally premiered and then show the entire 22 ep run in successive weeks. i prefer this approach. especially since there are so many shows that form cohesive story arcs across their entire run (lost, 24, babylon 5, supernatural, deep space 9, etc.) i think it is a better experience (story wise) when there aren't huge breaks in ep showings.

[MinionZombie]

I remember when 24 used to be shown with so many gaps, then they decided with season four to show them properly - and then heck, we got into this 2-day-four-hour premiere business with a double-ender mid-season and a double-episode-finale - now that is how you show a show America! :)

Lost got around to it in season four as well.

And hellsing ... I'm pretty sure it was actually season four of Lost that was affected by the Writer's Strike. I remember they made this song and dance about there being "three more seasons, 16 episodes each!" - and then immediately, the first season of doing sixteen episodes they got scuppered by the writer's strike and had to cut it short to 14 episodes (hence why season six was 18 episodes long).