Where are my shows? At least I know where one is!

Season 2 of "Orange is the New Black" was released on Friday, June 6th. After 10 months of waiting, it was great to see Piper and the women of Litchfield Prison back. If you did as my family did, as it seems most fans did, you had yourself a marathon viewing over the weekend. One thing that I have to say that I LOVE about Netflix series' is that they release the whole season of episodes in one day. So you don't have to make a date with the TV every Friday night or whichever night a show is on to watch. In this day and age there is a lot to be said for both ways of doing things, but for Netflix I'd say this is optimum. It gives viewers time to watch at their convenience and they aren't constrained by ratings for ONE night a week. One drawback on network TV and even some cable channels, although it is a lot rarer, is that they have a habit of breaking up their seasons. In fact the breaking up is getting to be ridiculous at best and ruinous at worse. I don't know about you but I grow weary of wondering if my show is going to be on from week or if it is going to be a new one or another re-run. It used to be that TV shows would run a typical season of a certain amount of episodes, usually starting in August or September with a few weeks off for holiday programming, then they would run until the end of May or June. At that stage they'd have a summer hiatus. During the hiatus they would play re-runs or sometimes have new show they'd air to test out. The logic seemed to be that most viewers would be on vacation or doing a lot of outdoor activities, therefore they wouldn't be watching much TV. 

These days it seems as though we view TV entertainment in so many different ways, some of it is our choice or a sign of the times and some of it is network dictated. For instance technology has given us new ways in which to view our favorite programs, which I covered in my last post. These "On Demand" choices are great. What worries me is how new shows are unable to find an audience these days. And old shows? Good luck finding new episodes, it's pretty much hit and miss. For example, I have a few shows that I watch that seem to air 3 new episodes in a row and then re-runs for a month. I do not understand the logic in this at all. It makes it hard to even keep up with shows that I love. And with the new way of doing things I'm no longer sure if a show's episode is a season finale or not. It is frustrating as a viewer! Of course then you have the presto-chango, the show has been moved to another night and time. I hate that! I understand that sometimes that is done to test out new shows, but at other times it just seems arbitrary. For instance FOX's "Bones" for some unknown reason was switched from it's usual Monday night time slot, which it has had for years, to Friday night. This change only lasted a few weeks, perhaps a month, for no apparent reason. Why???? Humans are creatures of habit and TV viewing is no different. We don't like it when we have to search for a show that has spent YEARS on the same night! Stop it networks, just stop it!!!!

Now new shows are interesting. This last crop of shows that have been cancelled have been confusing, you have shows that are cancelled because of low ratings that are just awful shows and then you have shows that are cancelled that may have lower ratings but are critically acclaimed. THEN you have shows that are neither critically acclaimed nor highly rated, yet are NOT being cancelled. As I happen to be a fan of a few that aren't being cancelled but have low ratings, I'm happy about those but I am also confused because none of it seems to make sense. Now admittedly some of the ones with the low ratings that aren't been cancelled are CW shows. It seems to me that in some cases the CW seems to let shows find their audience. But then again, there have been a few that haven't. Not sure where the rhyme or reason is but at least they seem to try harder at the CW.

My 30 year old son and I took a chance and watched a show on HuluPlus, that had been cancelled a few years ago. The show was called, "Flash Forward" and it ran from 2009-2010 and racked up 11 various award nominations, including an Emmy and a People's Choice Award for Best New Drama. "The Vampire Diaries" won for the PCA, "V" is the only show, besides "Flash Foward", that is no longer on the air.  After watching all 22 episodes of "Flash Forward" we were stymied. It was really a great show, well acted with an intelligent premise. So with all of those things going for it, why was it cancelled? The show averaged 8.5 million viewers per episode. Not a bad amount considering all of the competition, but it was not good enough to save the show. Although I noticed that there are many shows on today that have averaged less viewers and are still on the air. Some are older shows, like "Bones" and then there are new shows like "Marvel Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.", a freshman show, also on FOX that has been renewed. In fact they are planning a spin-off. Yet "Marvel AOS" averaged LESS viewers than "Flash Forward". But every network is guilty of it, although I'd be more inclined to invest in a CW show than an NBC, CBS, ABC, or FOX show. Even TV critics have a hard time understanding what moves executives to renews shows that average less viewers and cancel shows with better numbers. 

If any of you have an idea about it, I'd love to hear it. For now it makes it hard to invest in new shows, like I did with "Believe", only to have our hearts ripped out when they get cancelled. I know I'm not alone, I've heard it from friends and family. I just wish I could at least figure out their screwy formula.

RIP Believe...we hardly got a chance to know you.