| Scoreboard |  |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-49 | 2.2/7 | 1.7/6 | 1.3/5 | 1.2/4 | 0.6/2 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 9.89 | 5.30 | 3.56 | 4.32 | 1.33 |
Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles ended its season (and almost certainly, series) on a flat note with 3.6 million viewers and a 1.3 adults 18-49 rating. Dollhouse was down a tenth versus last week with a 1.4. But last week Dollhouse had a 1.4 in the overnights that went up to a 1.5 in the finals.
Another tenth of an 18-49 point won’t likely save Dollhouse and it’s too bad because last night’s episode was actually pretty good ( I liked it at least as much as the vaunted sixth episode, perhaps more).
Ghost Whisperer had 10.23 million viewers and a 2.5 rating in its first new episode in a while and as usual, led all Friday viewing. Flashpoint was flat from last week with 9.7 million viewers and a 1.9. Numb3rs pulled a 2.2 in the demo. I’m not sure if Numb3rs having identical viewing numbers to Flashpoint is mere coincidence or Berman typo, but I’m pretty sure the 18-49 numbers are right either way. Note, an earlier version of the data table below listed Numb3rs as a repeat, but it was a new episode. I make plenty of typos myself!
Friday Night Lights season three finale drew a 4.4 and a 1.3 rating with adults 18-49. Why does one show with a 1.3 rating survive while another won’t? The DirecTV checkbook!
ABC came in second for the night both in the demo and overall viewers with its unscripted Friday night lineup.
You can compare with previous Friday overnight reports.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating/Share | Viewers (Millons) |
| 8:00 | CBS | Ghost Whisperer | 2.5/9 | 10.23 |
| ABC | Wife Swap (R) | 1.4/5 | 4.64 | |
| FOX | Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles | 1.3/5 | 3.56 | |
| NBC | Howie Do It | 1.1/4 | 3.86 | |
| CW | Everybody Hates Chris (R) | 0.6/2 | 1.47 | |
| 8:30 | CW | The Game (R) | 0.6/2 | 1.38 |
| 9:00 | CBS | Flashpoint | 1.9/6 | 9.72 |
| ABC | Supernanny | 1.8/6 | 5.36 | |
| FOX | Dollhouse | 1.4/4 | 3.56 | |
| NBC | Friday Night Lights | 1.3/4 | 4.36 | |
| CW | America’s Next Top Model (R) | 0.6/2 | 1.23 | |
| 10:00 | CBS | Numb3rs | 2.2/7 | 9.72 |
| ABC | 20/20 | 1.9/6 | 5.89 | |
| NBC | Dateline | 1.1/4 | 4.76 |
Shows are sorted by 18-49 rating in each time slot.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved. Source Marc Berman/Mediaweek.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101.
Not surprising
I thought it mightve hit 4 million at least. so long TSCC you were fantastic!!
Flashpoint had a 1.5? You mean a 1.9, right? Marc has the numbers up at his website.
I´m with you, Robert. Shame about “Dollhouse”. Last night´s was the first episode I truly enjoyed and I also thought was better than the hyped sixth episode. We can only hope “Dollhouse” comes back next season, even if it is a shortened run, but it doesn´t seem likely.
very disappointing…
a 1.3 on a season finale…
Now we’ll just wait for RSH to post his 10000-word reply on how Josh Friedman “burned the show down to the ground”
Oh and does anyone know how the Emergency Weather reports at 8EDT affected FOX’s ratings? Were those counted for TSCC or were they disregarded?
hafoleyj, what market had emergency weather reports? These numbers include any viewing of FOX at 8pm last night, whether they were watching TSCC or it was preempted, but the final numbers will remove it. But if the market was small, it won’t make much difference.
Was anyone expecting a really big bump? Anyway the final was totally satisfying for fans. Very well done. Unless a cable network pulls out its check book(not happening)the show won’t be back but it was a really good series in my opinion.
chuck
it was good ending nice to see it finish i dont know if i should watch any more tv cause its not looking like any show can make there ratings back……….. i try blame the strike for killing network tv
Mea culpa Flashpoint — it has been corrected and data tables etc, added.
I forced my family to have the tv on while we were having our Good Friday dinner (with relatives over). I told them that the only way I would join them is if I was guaranteed to watch T:TSCC. Since the dinner started late it meant we were watching from the dinner table. [I had to keep explaining what was going on and who was a cyborg and who wasn't and why "will you join us?" had significance].
FNL was quite low (not that it matters) but still season finale was one of the best season finales i have ever seen ….. story and plot for next season is wide open now … sad thing is most of the characters will be gone …. about tscc haven’t seen the finale but i like that show …….. i hope some cable channel (preferably sci-fi) picks it up ….. Dollhouse well i honestly don’t care much about that show …..
Numbers did a 2.2 in repeat? Is that right?
No real surprises anywhere else. I enjoyed last nights Dollhouse (mainly because it wasn’t all about Echo, which has been the huge flaw of the show so far) but those numbers aren’t good and I can’t see the Prison Break lead-in for its return in two weeks making any real changes. Oh well.
Question about Nielson and fox. At my parents we watching on the Fox HD channel. Do the nielson boxes at the nielsen houses differentiate between watching on Fox HD and regular Fox? Is Fox HD broadcasted or just accesible through cable?
damn Hilary Duff was great last night on the Ghost Whisperer….a small ratings boost
Honestly gutted about TSCC. Can’t believe this has happened, it’s a good show!!!
@Julia,
I wouldn’t know the market size but there were some states that couldn’t watch TSCC because of a special weather report. In any case, according to what you said, we would expect a drop from this in the final numbers?
poor TSCC, it left silently…sad.
Now, Dollhouse won’t be returning will it…it better not end in a cliff hanger. Or maybe it might return…
Nielsen should measure both and differentiate them but still add it up into viewing for FOX. FOX (and all network HD) is broadcast over the air as well as being available on cable and satellite offerings.
Dollhouse is the new definition of dead:(
wow what happend to this tv season
Great episodes of SARAH & DOLLHOUSE – “SARAH” has been great the last few weeks – I suppose if it started on the CW or cable – it would be different…either one of those types of networks would love those numbers…but I think they did a good job in closing it up – although I did notice the “string of hope” for the direction of the show, that it could take if it was renewed… with the scene with SARAH in her cell being questioned about the son of Dyson…
it was fun – enjoyed the preview of T-4 too – awesome – and it’s only 6 weeks away – can’t wait – that will ease the pain of saying goodbye to SARAH & FRIENDS…
“Numbers did a 2.2 in repeat? Is that right?”
I think thats a typo. I believe the episode was new.
what’s the new excuse this week?
Numb3rs wasn’t a repeat last night. At least my DVR didn’t think so and I hadn’t seen it.
hafoleyj, yes, if it was several states that were preempted, the numbers will drop. If it was just one or two small markets, it might not actually drop and just stay about the same.
the REPEAT is a typo, the number isn’t. will fix.
Wifeswap was also a repeat.
Fantastic news for Ghost Whisperer, and the ratings will probably only get higher next season when Sci-Fi or SyFy starts airing GW on their weekly schedule.
I thought Dollhouse was fantastic. Best episode so far and one opening incredible possibilities. Perhaps Whedon should try at least disguising it as crap, because it seems that’s all that people watch nowadays.
TSCC finale was great. It had no chance to survive but at least it went out with a great episode. I don’t care if no one saw it – I did. Goodbye.
Tornados hit the mid west Friday all day – any neilson families or friends of theirs affected could effect the ratings for last night – they hit about a 30 minute drive from me – thousands of people effect – hundreds of homes destroyed – and I know the storms and tornado warnings and watches rolled into the east as well into the night…
Well, perhaps I guess, I’m just guessing, but seeing how repeats of Family Guy and other shows on TBS skyrocketed the show’s regular ratings…
Marc Berman reported:
Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles
8:00 p.m. V: 3.76 m, A18-49: 1.4/ 5
8:30 p.m. V: 3.37 m, A18-49: 1.2/ 4
Is this what usually happens, or is it reflective of the Emergency Weather reports? (People started leaving after watching 30minutes of some impending storm)
I wonder if the Hannah Montana movie hit Dollhouse last night? I mean, they’re share the same fans!!!
jk
DOLLHOUSE likely will end in a 1.5 again. So it appears to have most definitely bottomed out. Can it raise up? I don’t know, but the clock is ticking.
The show is profitable for FOX, so it’s possible it gets renewed for a 13 episode order and airs in the Spring annually. It’s possible, and about the only hope the show has right now. That’s the talk, and I’m not sure how it will end up. It’s 50/50.
I don’t know why but i like to watch Hilary Duff. She is like Amanda Bynes and Anna Faris, they are kinda catchy.
Great episode of Dollhouse! The best so far.
In the words of EM Forster,” Two cheers for democracy.” Canceled shows nowadays get syndicated on basic cable – depending onm your willingness to spend – or put on DVD. I don’t see why people, even TV fans, sweat it so much. Facilitate repeated viewings with whatever necessary antidepressant. Anyway, tornados, baseball, karioke night at Applebee’s or whatever … the excuses are endless, which is why the imperfect Nielsen system works. It’s interesting to read say an encyclopedis entry for TV in 1958: viewing habits across age and gender were almost identical then to what they are now. Shows have always been pitched mainly to women 18-35 who shop and have kids – including daytime soaps, gameshows, Queen for a Day talent contests, reassuring cop and detective shows even going back to to the first procedural, Dragnet. ( I think the Untouchables with Robt Stack was one of the greatest crime dramas ever ohn TV. ) Even on the Twilight Zone and Outer Limits you saw almost no bimbo or helpless housewife syndrome, not compared to actual social mores of the time. The only real difference is, bachelors are bachelors longer, and a new niche has been created or old one supplemented with shows for guys mainly – Star Trek knockoffs ( Star Trek being clearly a James Bond in space knockoff itself,) etc. If anybody reads this, hope I at least stimulated ideas or controversy.
Dollhouse was reallllly good last night. Lots of twists.
I enjoyed it, last nights episode was probably my favorite as well.
Ghost Whisperer was awesome as well!
@ Nick C. if I’ve learned anything from this blog, it’s that whenever you think something has bottomed out, it will surprise you and go even lower. I thought Heroes had bottomed out at a 3.6, but now it’s at a 2.6.
They can always go down.
Ack thats a really dissapointing finale number for TSCC.
Well if it goes down in two weeks people will say it’s because it took a week off. next week is two hours of Prison Break. DOLLHOUSE returns on 4/24.
I’m surprised and disappointed by last night’s numbers. Terminator brought its “A” game and if the show had been this good all season, they wouldn’t have had any ratings trouble at all.
Unfortunately, everything was left on a cliffhanger that will likely never be resolved. I think if they continued on that course Season 3 would be a good one.
I don’t think DOLLHOUSE will go up to a 1.5 in the finals again, since it averaged a 1.4 in the first half hour and a 1.3 in the second.
wait…people are watching GHOST WHISPERER then DOLLHOUSE ?
Robert, yeah and 4/24’s ratings will set the future in stone. If it goes down in two weeks it’s because it didn’t catch on. Fox promised to give it a shot, and did. They believed in it to the point of doing midseason promotions for it.
wait, are people watching Dollhouse?
so can we say that TSSC is the second show in its timeslot in live+7 demo numbers (yes we can), after ghost whisperrer… Than it might not be surprise this show to be renewed since one of fox officer said weeks ago (i do not remember exact date) that the advertisers like the live+7 numbers of TSSC and dollhouse….
R.G; I watch Ghost Whisperer then Dollhouse haha
Hmmmm….I noticed DOLLHOUSE is doing a nod to GHOST WHISPERER in 2 weeks. Sooo maybe that’s how a few more maybe pulled in to watch the Dolls…
Joss Whedon was at Harvard last night accepting an award, and said – effectively – he doubted Dollhouse’s chances. But you never know. I hear they’re still talking about it at Fox.
gossi — if he talked about that during his acceptance speech, that makes me sad.
Well at least Whedon is being honest about it.
All night, Fox wasn’t even broadcasting in HD. Was I the only one affected by that problem ?
Concerning TSCC, it’s one of the best tv show ever and I still hope for a season 3
and pathetic at the same time.
Nehalem, don’t know if you were the only one with the problem, but I had no issues with FOX HD for either TSCC or Dollhouse (both DVR’d in HD just fine).
I must be the only one who liked Terminator but can’t stand dollhouse.
I can’t imagine that Fox would be dumb enough to pull the plug on TSCC before Terminator: Salvation gives it hundreds of millions of dollars in free advertising.
It would also be incredibly foolish for the studio to let the show drop, even if it has to practically be given away to a cable network or something. For them, it’s a long-term money maker: Part of a huge franchise, and pretty damn good. If it’s allowed to tell a complete story, it can become one of those shows that sells on DVD/Blu-Ray/whatever comes next forever. It’s Fox’s Battlestar Galactica–the studio can make a killing off of DVDs and iTunes, if the network can afford to keep it on the air.
I mean, this is the 21st century. Ratings aren’t everything (to anyone but Fox, ironically,) anymore. DVD sales, digital sales, Hulu… This is where the money is very often made now.
Robert
perhaps you can answer this question for me- How can the FX cable network afford to produce shows like Nip Tuck and Rescue ME(both excellent in my opinion)which attract around 4 milion viewers a week and call them successful while Fox now treats Dollhouse and Terminator: Sarah Conner Chronicles like the plauge. The bottom line is no scripted show is cheap to produce yet those shows are thriving on basic cable with viewership less than five milion viewers. Isn’t it all relative at the end of the day?
chuck
“I must be the only one who liked Terminator but can’t stand dollhouse.”
I thought it was decent, but it’s a struggle to get wrapped up in a show where their personalities are always changing. Echo remembering past missions wasn’t exactly subtle either. It was a somewhat clever choice for her alias though.
Someone should show Caroline what happens when you let loose animals in a research lab, a copy of 28 Days Later would suffice.
The the minimum pay scales involved for doing a cable show are less across the board than a show on broadcast networks. So it’s cheaper out of the gate since just about everyone is usually paid less than if the exact same show was airing on a broadcast networks. This is one of the reasons I think it’s hard in most cases to move scripted dramas from broadcast to cable, since almost everyone involved would be asked to take some kind of pay cut.
“Fantastic news for Ghost Whisperer, and the ratings will probably only get higher next season when Sci-Fi or SyFy starts airing GW on their weekly schedule.”
I believe ION is also airing Ghost Whisperer in their 2009 Fall Lineup.
It is obvious that Hannah Montana and Dragonball Evolution was the reason why Dollhouse went down. Next week there are no big time movies coming out so I expect a jump to around 6 million and a 2.0 in the demo. Count on it……………..
Jimmy, lol. but since it doesn’t air next week (two hour Prison Break)….
Good Friday might have affected the ratings some as a lot of Christians go to church that night. Anyways, I hope TSCC will get picked up by a cable channel because it and Dollhouse look to be dead.
gossi – who was joss accepting the award on behalf of lol
TSCC ran into the ground and played out its end to its hardcore fans only.
dollhouse hasn’t even picked up a head of steam to run into the ground.
i haerd joss choked oh his own talent once, turns out it was just a boiled sweet.
I’m probably one of the few who turned the TV off right after TSCC and not watch Dollhouse. It just didn’t appeal to me. Too much sexual stuff. If I want that, I can check out almost any other show on TV.
As far as TSCC’s ratings, that’s an extreme disappointment, any way you look at it. The show deserved better; the ratings just don’t match up with the quality of the series. A shame, a damn shame.
I can only hope and pray now a network will be smart and pick it up.
Robert, I agree with Jimmy. It not being on the air next week is beside the point… it will STILL get 6 million/2.0! The real problem was, like Jimmy said, the Hannah Montana movie and TSCC dragging it down.
Some could say this was an excuse, but the combination of Good Friday, some big movie releases, and severe storms didn’t help the situation at all either.
TerminatorSite, that there is the rub… IF it had been this good all season, it would likely still be pulling in good numbers. If I were FOX, I would have dumped Friedman after the first 13 and let someone else who understands what Terminator really is, take the reins.
TS, for some reason I doubt a huge number of fundamentalists are watching Terminator.
the128boy, I swear, I have no idea where the hell people like you think TSCC is dragging down Dollhouse. That’s just plain rubbish,
What you’re saying is someone says, “Well, I was going to watch Dollhouse, but since TSCC is on before it, meh, forget that!”
Please…..If you want to watch the show, you tune in to watch it. It’s that simple.
Dan, too much sexual stuff? Like Cameron taking her bra off and being felt up by John? lol
the128boy, i was being completely sarcastic.
Dan, pretty sure “the128boy” was being completely sarcastic too (getting 6 million viewers and a 2.0 on a night it won’t even air wasn’t enough of a tip off?!)
R.G; I watch Ghost Whisperer then Dollhouse [2] because of Lizzie McGuire LOL
I think tscc was great last night. I think it would be a huge mistake to get rid of it at this point. They already have so much invested in the show. They just cut out all the bullshit with sarah, lets hope. The show I think turned a corner to bring it more in line with the movie, yes the movie. have people forgotten there is a terminator movie coming out. From the movie alone this show will get more viewers. all they have to do is keep running repeat episodes during the summer- get the kids hooked and promote the new season with the dvd release. Personaly I don’t know why they would cancel this show. It just doesn’t make sense.
mec452, how many TV shows have been bumped up to ratings winners because of a movie? I can’t think of any off hand.
Mec you don’t see the sense in cancelling a show that pulls a 1.3 for its finale?
To put that into some context Ghost Whisperer nearly doubled Terminator’s numbers last night and a repeat of Wife Swap beat it. It can’t even match let alone beat a repeating reality show. That’s really quite spectacularly bad. And all this talk of the up coming Terminator Salvation movie being the shows saving grace is just pointless. The show isn’t compatible with the movie, there’s no crossover in back story or history – Salvation isn’t name checking the show. Anyone who might tune in because of the movie would tune right back out again because there’s just no overlap between the two.
On top of that Fox would have to spend a fortune on advertising the third season (or summer repeats) for this ‘the movie will save it’ theory to pan out and why on earth do you spend a small fortune on a show that can’t beat a repeating Wife Swap?
Sarah connor’s ending was a little confusing but it was an open ending. With the show’s storyline, there was no way it cud of concluded in just one hour.
I loved Dollhouse episode this week. I wanna see how the show does without Sarah connor and having Prison break as a new lead in. I really like Dollhouse and personally it is my favourite show of the season.
John T. Folden says:
“TS, for some reason I doubt a huge number of fundamentalists are watching Terminator.”
I think Good Friday is a pretty dopey explanation for the ratings, but suggesting that it is somehow a “fundamentalist” holiday is simply moronic.
The quality of TSCC dropped off dramatically in the second season. TSCC had a tough break by being put in two impossible timeslots — Mondays at 8 against probably the heaviest competition for the male 18-49 demo, and then the dead zone of Friday night — but I still think the drop in quality hurt the show. The finale wasn’t very good either, IMO.
Dollhouse is basically a goner. The fact that Fox refused to air the extra episode is very, very telling. I don’t fault Joss Whedon for that show’s failure; the problem was with the concept, which Whedon was given and told to work with. Whedon did the best he could, but the concept was just too wacky to work.
BTW — “In Plain Sight” comes back next Sunday on USA. They haven’t promoted it very heavily, but I hope it does great.
I think the downloads from EZTV says it all. 107304 + 8K in HD within 18h 52m says that a lot of people likes the show. Bones was downloaded 69667 times in 1d 18h.. It problery just that a lot of ynger people watch TSCC, “geeks” at universities ect. I hate the fact that people in the US (often dummer than people in europe) only wants to see no brainer TV and we in europe are forced to watch that **** as well because our networks don’t produce enough TV them selves.
Nice to see a satisfying ending to a series with the TSCC finale. A huge improvement over the ‘leaked’ script. Thematically they really brought things to a close.
For whoever said if people watch Ghost Whisperer then Dollhouse, you can’t generalize and assume that this show is only for this audience, and they won’t watch another type of show, everybody has wide interests. People listen to rock, but that doesn’t mean that everybody who listens to rock refuses to listen to rap or country or what have you.
My friends and I watch Ghost Whisperer, then we watch Dollhouse.
Also, even if die-hard Scifi nerdy fans don’t realize, GW has a lot of science fiction themes in it, and hello? Why did those sci fi nerdys’ beloved Sci-Fi Channel pick it up to start airing this fall if it didn’t have something relevant to science fiction?
I also love Sci-Fi by the way, I wish they would air Roswell again so I can DVR the original episodes with the original soundtrack, and I hope they finally go HD here in L.A., so tired of having to denoise my recorded videos when i h264 them.
whats going in the 8o’clock slot now for FOX??
last night episode of dollhouse was crazy! after i saw the trailer for first time i thought it was boring, but…. there is one word: AWESOME! the show is getting so dark! anyway, i read that the rating were 3.60 and 1.5/4. it’s a little improvement from last week, isn’t it? i know its done and fox will cancel the show, prison break or not, but as the episodes go on, and the show gets better i really hope SCY FY CHANNEL to pick it up. i mean, the show get more than 3 million, and usually a hit show on scy fy gets 2-2.5 million.
I thought the second season, especially the final few episodes, were some of the crowning moments of Terminator. The writers did a great job of knowing what their audience was thinking, like the pause with “Carrots and apples… I don’t think that’s a real saying,” building to the whole Allison conclusion and making you feel like you should’ve known how that was going to episodes ago. That season also drew out the fact that John Connor is not an ordinary kid, but under deep psychological pressure, since he lives in a horror film.
The dream episode and the UFO bit were a bit of fluff, but it all tied together rather nicely; at the end of the show, everything fit. Compare with Battlestar Galactica, hailed as a triumph even while so many plotlines (Lee’s prostitute, the little kid following Starbuck around in season one) were simply dropped as soon as they got in the way.
Shame that BSG is considered a smash hit with 2.5 million viewers, Terminator gets a million more people tuning in, has a more consistent storyline and is considered a failure.
http://is.gd/rXCY
the only thing that could explain the low ratings for dollhouse is passover and the recent news yesterday that dollhouse wasnt going to air it 13th episode and alot of people just thought it was canceled and decide not to watch!
Outlander, didn’t Whedon come up with the show together with Dushku? Whedon deserves a lot of the blame. And there were several ways to “tweak” the concept to make it work. For example, Caroline and Ballard are FBI agents tracking down the Dollhouse and every week they encounter a new Active.
Why terminator should probally not be terminated.
1) did it really get a fair chance here…
OK..so lets cut the first season off early (while having a writers strike). Then…. next season change its days around and make it go on hiatus for what like 3 or 4 weeks. Put it on a Kill slot at which anyone who has a life can now never commit to watching it and wounder why its ratings suck.
2) Tv ratings mean nothing now a days …unless its a sports event. Hulu, on demmand and teevo are the future. If the networks have not figured that out yet they are way behind on the times.
Look at hulu for example…notice all these high rated tv shows are NOT being watched. In fact just look at the highest rated and most popular shows watched on that website. Dollhouse, the office, terminator, fringe..these are your real ratings champs. This is what people watch when they CAN watch something.
3) I have been reading fourms like this all day why covering for a friend at work…terminator (the show) clearly has a fan base. people are apparently petioning fox to keep it on…nuff said there.
4) On a personal note…
this show rocks and me and alot of people i know who cant watch it live will be sad to go…but then again i guess im not the target audience like many of the people i know who watch this show. We rarely watch network tv and actually enjoy watching a show with substance.
k done ranting
Charles, the average TV viewer doesn’t know ANYTHING about a 13th episode. They don’t even pay attention to ratings or fan sites.
Boris, no, “moronic” is reading more into what I said than was actually there. I didn’t say anything about the holiday itself but the idea that it would effect TSCC when it didn’t seem to have an effect on any other show would imply the series had it’s core following among a very narrow, devout audience.
The Hulu argument…
Just to put this out ..in april as of right now as far as MOST POPULAR EPISODES
out of 80ty episode dollhose hase 5 of those eighty and terminator has 4 of those 80ty…which is 9 of 80 of the top most popular shows being watched.
As of today alone …. dollhouse and terminator are in the TOP 4!
And they are actually thinking of droping both shows…kinda funny in a sad way.
Thats alot of advertising btw.
check it out for yourselfs
Kmoney, of course they are the most popular today because they are just about the only new episodes on Hulu today (with apologies to Friday Night Lights).
I’ve heard estimates for Dollhouse episodes on Hulu that were in the range of 150,000 to 250,000 views per episode. It’s not nothing, but it’s not big enough.
Sure BSG has a smaller audience, its coverage is roughly 68% of the nation.
But it also has something that Sarah Conner didn’t and thats very strong DVD sales.
T:SCC didn’t even clear 2 million in sales before falling of the DVD charts.
nBSG did over nearly 9 million before following off the charts. Considering thats for only ten episode and you have paid for half your season already. And that type of performance still wasn’t enough for BSG to thrive. It only managed 4 years (and that was just barely).
TSCC couldn’t even cover 1 full episode.
Sure I liked the program well enough, but the general audience didn’t seem to care (for whatever reason).
I had more promotion than any fox show, it had the lead off of the Superbowl and couldn’t keep the numbers that fox needed. This was a show that Fox really wanted to succeed, and it didn’t.
Unfortunately it is the fate of many good shows.
BTW, SCI FI’s coverage is more like 83%
http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/02/02/nielsen-cable-network-coverage-estimates-october-2008-update/
And yes the audience of online viewing is increasing, but the amount of money generated in ads is next to nothing compared to the amount generated on broadcast tv or DVD sales. Then you have off network syndication and overseas broadcast. 5 years, ten years down the road online revenue will be huge, but we aren’t even close to their yet.
To this date though DVD sales for the series aren’t good, TV ratings are very bad, and syndication is something that generally starts up on year 5 (so thats a huge gamble), that leaves it needing to generate almost all its profit potential overseas. That rarely is enough to keep a show going (Baywatch is a good example, but its very rare).
Thats for the update Robert (I knew I was going off fairly old cable penetration data, but I hadn’t seen anything new on it. So that list is awesome.
So cable is not the far off the CW’s level of penetration?
Actually Robert I don’t think that list is right, there is no way that some cable shows are getting 97% coverage of the US. Perhaps that is coverage of those who get cable get those channels?
Mark, you’re reading the chart wrong. The highest coverage is around 85%, which is around 97 mil households.
Mark, you’re not reading the chart correctly. The left column isn’t labeled very well, which I’ll take the blame for.
Left column = millions of homes the channel is available to. Right column = percentage of homes.
dont mid if some of the shows i watch are cancled there will be always news ones to watch……. and lately i been whacing HBO on Sundays since the others are still re runs
The TSCC finale was poor, although we did get enough action in Cameron’s reprise of the Arnold police station massacre – notice she did not kill ONE COP in the process! just like Arnold in T-2 did – although he did cripple an entire SWAT team – and the HK attack on the Weaver building (a really stupid attack – crashing into the building? What were the writers thinking?)
The whole “sex scene” between John and Cameron was unbelievably bad writing. Here’s how the writers decided to end their relationship: “Cut open my stomach and put your hand under my breastplate” – “It’s cold. That’s good, right?” “We’ve got to go.”
Brilliant writing. Set up the Jameron shippers (of whom I consider myself to be, if not simplistically), then shaft them. I’m sure the writers are very pleased with themselves.
Then they ship John Connor off to the future (WTF?) in a nod to T-4 where he’s not the leader of the Resistance yet (what happened to “John Connor put the whole Resistance together” – a problem for T-4 as well?) Obviously Friedman, on the off chance he really believed a season 3 was possible, left Sarah in the past with the intent of focusing season 3 EVEN MORE on her than he did in season 2, while leaving John in the future so Friedman could concentrate on his favorite character there, Kyle Reese. Friedman always wanted Kyle on the show, but couldn’t figure out how to do it, so we had his brother Derek instead. So now Friedman figures out how to get Kyle in every show.
And I really don’t want to see a season 3 where Summer Glau is playing the human Allison, rather than Cameron – although if they managed to show that whole relationship developing after Cameron came on the scene, it would be interesting.
Brain dead. Incredibly bad sci-fi.
The leaked spoiler script, the fake one, was better than this.
Dollhouse, on the other hand, was quite good. Part of that is the fact that Adelle DeWitt has taken on more of the focus of the show from Echo, which is fine by me, since I like Olivia Williams a lot. The story in the last few episodes has been more about DeWitt’s problems in running the Dollhouse as well as Ballard’s pursuit of the Dollhouse than about Echo. I think it’s probably too late to save the show, however.
It will be interesting to see how the on-screen advent of Alpha, the rogue Active, will change the direction and ratings of the remaining episodes. I’ve been waiting for this character to debut since he – or she – is clearly the most interesting character in the premise – an out of control “composite” Active.
John T. Folden says:
“Boris, no, ‘moronic’ is reading more into what I said than was actually there. I didn’t say anything about the holiday itself but the idea that it would effect TSCC when it didn’t seem to have an effect on any other show would imply the series had it’s core following among a very narrow, devout audience.”
Remapping “fundamentalists” to “a very narrow, devout audience” really just compounds my objection, but I suppose it’s best left at that.
Thanks for the correction. I
If most stations wait until the mid of may to make decisions about renewal and cancelations why do they wait so long if the actual viewer numbers are out the very next day. wouldn’t they just say that they are done with all the disappointments and move on? If it is a money business then the devout fans will buy the seasons reguardless of cancellation. I would anyway. I’m a hardcore sarah connor fan and even if fox say no to anything terminator i would still buy the season. That is their money right there. I dont know why they have to mess with the fans when the numbers are right in front of their faces.
I guess literally the future will tell with the terminator show. i am a fan so my veiews are jadded. The truth is with the new movie comming out its hard to say anything, puting the show in an akward position.
the last summer movies christain bale was in was the secound highest grossing movie ever next to titanic. Now…T4 wont do anywhere near that well but if its at least a sucess at the box office then not following up with a 3rd season would seem unwise.
Mr wood does have a good point..Fox did invest alot in this show and it has failed to comethrough on the ratings…why could be debated.
No one did over a 2.0 demo except GW and N3rs – that’s telling about the total fragmentation of the audience, as if it were hit with a 2 megaton Terminator fragmentation bomb (remember the ABC Friday nights of old? I hated Urkel, but I watched anyway)…
…and FNL did the best in the demo for NBC – Howie can’t do it like DirecTV can, it seems…
…and Jo Frost deserves a reasonable bonus – the production cost to demo points received for Supernanny has to beat just about anything on Friday night (the only possible exception is 20/20) – especially the CBS scripted programs (even though they do lead in the useless metric of total audience (however, perhaps not useless to major consumer advertisers with excellent long time relationships with CBS, like P&G, however))…
…and don’t even ask about T:SCC and DH – Jeff Foxworthy and Wayne Brady have to be smiling if they really want to work for FOX next season…
…as for CW? NBC has more of a clue than they do, apparently.
Kmoney – the issue is whether T-4 will have ENOUGH impact on the Terminator franchise to justify 1) Warner Brothers continuing to produce an expensive show, and 2) some network picking that show up and then making AD revenue from it (since they don’t get any of the movie revenue, the movie’s revenue is meaningless for them.)
Count up how much a million or more dollars per episode times 22 episodes costs, then compare that to the intake of one hit movie – factoring in the actual PROFIT of the movie, not just what it cost to make or how much it made in GROSS revenue.
Then compare that to the possible ad revenue from a TV series which is entirely different from the movie and which has already had incredibly bad ratings enough to damage the entire series from being renewed in the first place.
I can’t see how anybody can imagine that the movie would generate enough profit for any network to justify returning the TV series. And without that calculation resulting in a positive number, it’s not going to happen.
Poeple who assume the movie will justify the series are just hand waving. The fact that having the series would be a nice PR move for Warner Brothers to keep the franchise name in the public eye and produce revenue for future movies has nothing to do with the economic justification for the TV networks. Unless Warner Brothers really believes and can prove to their board of directors that the actual PR value of the TV series MONETARILY translates into enough money to produce and essentially GIVE AWAY the series to a network even though the ratings are horrible, it would be idiotic for them to do so.
It’s just hand-waving to say the movie can save the TV show.
NBC actually takes into account for their shows watched on hulu. I don’t know how, but they do.
T4 may not have anything to do with the TV series at all. if people dont buy the seasons on dvd or blu-ray then i’m sure Warner will not want to invest in it even if they get someone else intersted to air their series.
may i also add that i was sad to see journeyman go last year. it was smart and had a lot going for it. at least it ended with good closure. TSCC ended with me wanting more, but i guess thats good reguardless. I will always love the Terminator series, comics, movies(even the third one a little) and some videogames. At least the Sarah connor chronicles had a chance and its light was bright as far as the story goes, but not as far as the numbers are concerned. When they announce in may my heart may be broken, but it will never forget.
I am very disappointed, last nights finale was so good especially the last 10 or so minutes, I really thought there would be a little boost. I was really hoping the movie would be able to help save the show, but thats probably not going to happen no matter what. so if the movie does do huge business, I’d like to give a great big preemptive F*** YOU to the people who will go to see the movie but did not support the show. I hope Fox’s fridays, for the rest of the season are an abysmal dump. although I have always like Eliza, I dont give a rats ass about Dollhouse, I couldnt even make it through one episode cause it was so bad. and prison break was the dumbest serial ever, it was unwatchable. now I’m sure some would say the same thing about terminator, but I would like to invite those of you who do, too suck it. and who the hell are the 10.23 million people watching ghost whisperer? Who the hell watches anything on CBS for that matter? like 9 year old girls and their grandmas? Come on, I feel like I’m taking crazy pills. If it wasnt for 24, I’d swear off FOX right now, but you got me by the balls dont you, you bastards.
I’m kind baffled that some people seem the think the TSCC finale was written to setup a third season. To me that couldn’t have been a more finale final. Sarah had to let John go, her job is complete. That was a series ending. Josh Friedman did the opposite that the Richard commenter up above described.
It still makes me sick that there are more people watching suppernanny than dollhouse…WTF is wrong with people…NO one have the brain functions to watch a show that lets you think a little?
I really got the impression All My Circuits ended last night the way it did because the makers knew the show wasn’t going to be renewed. There was no cliff-hanger, as such, and while there were some questions still unanswered the major ones were explained.
I was actually fairly disappointed by the last five minutes. The entire show finally appeared to be going somewhere, something that’s only happened two or three times this season, and then from the moment everyone goes down to see John Henry, nobody makes any decisions that make sense.
I honestly think they knew the show was going to be canceled.
Agree with Robert about Dollhouse (I don’t know if I’d say it was better than six, but on the other hand I really liked seven too, and he didn’t. I rather like the humanizing the show is doing with characters like DeWitt and Topher. If this was any other show, DeWitt would be a cold, calculating, b-word, and Topher would be evil Chloe.) The fact it isn’t improving in the ratings makes every awesome episode depressing. Who knows though, Fox has done weird things before.
I’m amused that people keep mentioning it was Good Friday and that hurt TV. It was also pass over! Meaning technically only a gentile could turn on the TV for the ones following the rules. I’m sure it hurt TV all around to some degree.
No, Evan, I can see how Josh might have looked to setup HIS vision of Terminator for a season 3.
There were some otherwise unnecessary points made during the episode that would mean nothing unless you were thinking of a season three – such as Danny Dyson, Miles Dyson’s son, who hasn’t appeared on the show at all, disappearing for the last three months. That was clearly a setup of some sort.
The whole bit of John Henry disappearing with Cameron’s chip clearly indicates some sort of setup for a season three – as well the potential of bringing Cameron back, even though the ending indicates John meeting Allison Young, the model for Cameron, in the future. It’s likely Friedman would want to show future John’s relationship with Allison Young, then bring Cameron into the picture in the future and show that developing relationship as well. That would satisfy the Summer Glau fans while leaving Cameron off the show in the present.
Sarah being left behind clearly indicates Friedman intends a “split show” in a hypothetical third season – Sarah in the present, John in the future – although the otherwise pointless discussion of Cameron possibly being a cancer-inducing radiation source and Sarah’s body weight loss indicates that he left open the possibility of Sarah dying of leukemia just as the T-3 movie indicated was her fate.
There is some speculation that Friedman might intend a 3rd season to be a “John-centric” one just like the T-4 movie is. If so, this would be because either Warner Brothers or his other producers prevailed on him to stop being so “Sarah-centric” in order to tie into the T-4 movie better.
I agree, the way the series ended was more in line with a series finale than a season finale, but I can conceive of ways they could continue the series – however badly – if there were a season 3.
But there isn’t any chance of a season 3 unless somebody literally “bails out” the show with Warner Brothers and a network.
Well, with T:TSCC almost certainly dead, Friday night is now a complete wasteland for me as a tv night. I lost interest in GW when they killed off Jim and brought him back as a ghost or whatever. I do like Flashpoint so I guess there is that to look forward to. I’ll have to consider signing up at hulu just to have something to watch.
Don’t care what anyone else says, last night’s finale for T:TSCC was very good–even if it did leave some questions and had me wanting more.
Nick C says:
“I’m amused that people keep mentioning it was Good Friday and that hurt TV. It was also pass over! Meaning technically only a gentile could turn on the TV for the ones following the rules. I’m sure it hurt TV all around to some degree.”
Yah, but Friday was Shabbat in any event.
“Ghost” February 13, 2009 2.8 5 2.0/6 4.72
“The Target” February 20, 2009 2.7 5 1.7/5 4.22
“Stage Fright” February 27, 2009 2.7 5 1.6/5 4.13
“Gray Hour” March 6, 2009 2.3 4 1.5/5 3.55
“True Believer” March 13, 2009 2.6 4 1.6/5 4.30
“Man on the Street” March 20, 2009 2.6 5 1.5/5 4.13
“Echoes” March 27, 2009 2.5 4 1.3/4 3.87
“Needs” April 3, 2009 2.2 4 1.4/5 3.49
“A Spy in the House of Love” April 10, 2009 2.2 4 1.5/4 3.60
When you look at the ratings Dollhouse is really just holding steady. It has an overall series rating of 3.89 million. While that isn’t great, I can see why Nick C. believes there’s a 50/50 chance of it returning.
I’m 25, my friends and I are like 18-25 and we watch Ghost Whisperer. And no, we’re not in some hick town over-conservative over-religious place, we’re here in Santa Monica, Los Angeles, Rodeo drive is just a few minutes off and we club and party like everyone else. It has a strong audience in 18-34 and 18-49, well obviously since it’s up on that chart in plain English. And well, obviously a lot of people watch CBS since (with the exception of American Idol nights) it gets the most ratings week after week doesn’t it…
“It still makes me sick that there are more people watching suppernanny than dollhouse…WTF is wrong with people…NO one have the brain functions to watch a show that lets you think a little?”
Seriously? This again? People can watch reality because its better then half the scripted crap on tv anyways. People do have brains because they realize Dollhouse is a crappy show and would rather watch something that will acutally get renewed.
“When you look at the ratings Dollhouse is really just holding steady. It has an overall series rating of 3.89 million. While that isn’t great, I can see why Nick C. believes there’s a 50/50 chance of it returning.”
In what land is 3.89 a chance of renewal? (Maybe the CW) A major network like FOX wont take 3.89 million viewers. That is TERRIBLE!
“In what land is 3.89 a chance of renewal? (Maybe the CW) A major network like FOX wont take 3.89 million viewers. That is TERRIBLE!”
Maybe you missed the part where I said THAT WASN’T GREAT. I was just backing up Nick C. view that the show had a 50/50 shot. Chill out RJ, it’s just tv.
“Maybe you missed the part where I said THAT WASN’T GREAT. I was just backing up Nick C. view that the show had a 50/50 shot. Chill out RJ, it’s just tv.”
Sorry about posting terrible in all caps to look like I was yelling. Anyways, I don’t think the show has a 50/50 shot with only 3.89 million viewers.
We all (at least those of us who do not deny reality) know that TV networks always work off what they assume is the bottom line, and never do the unexpected. But to assume this is the way to be, to casually accept that this is okay, and not to rail against it at every opportunity, is the true sin being committed here. By all means, deliver the bad news, but make it utterly and totally clear that the networks, by measuring things the way they do, do nothing more than slit their own throats with their short-sided belief in the “Nielsons”, which have become perhaps the most irrelevant statistic of the modern age. In a few years, the details of DVR viewing, iTunes distribution, Hulu viewing, and good old fashioned piracy, will have worked themselves out to reveal a true picture of what people are or are not watching. The networks must develop a new business model based on this, or they will surely perish, to no one’s regret. Time marches on; you can either join those marching, or be crushed beneath their boots.
“I rather like the humanizing the show is doing with characters like DeWitt and Topher. If this was any other show, DeWitt would be a cold, calculating, b-word, and Topher would be evil Chloe.”
Actually, DeWitt and Topher ARE monsters but they lie to themselves about it. A lot of people seem to be missing this.
In general, DeWitt and Topher shouldn’t be “humanized”. Topher is supposed to represent the “amoral geek” and so far they’ve done that well, without making him into a “real” villain. DeWitt is supposed to one of the villains of the piece and they should keep her mostly that way.
The episode a week or two ago where they tried to make her FUNNY was just horrible. This week’s episode where they made her more pathetic was more acceptable, since villains frequently do turn out to be pathetic.
The real “villain” of the show is presumably the rogue Active “Alpha” – but we don’t know that yet. Perhaps he or she will turn out to be the “good guy” who brings the Dollhouse down, like Weaver and John Henry turned out to be “good guys” on TSCC.
It’s not like anybody on the show is actually “likable”, which may be one of the show’s problems. They ALL signed on to do something illegal and immoral by most normal lights – or for the Dolls themselves, downright stupid – except the FBI agent. And he’s obsessed.
And having characters on a show nobody can really like doesn’t bode well for the show.
This was one of TSCC’s problems this season – everybody disliked the way John handled himself with his mother and Riley, Sarah was alternately nuts and bitchy, Cameron was glitched or emotional, Ellison was a moron, Weaver was a Terminator, Riley was annoying, Jesse was presumed evil or just plain wrong, Derek got sucked into her plot, etc. Only Cromartie generally got a good review because he was a straight-forward Terminator and then he became a “good” Skynet!
Richard Steven Hack: Why do you even bother watching the show at all? Nothing pleases you. You must have a really sad, pathetic life that this is the only enjoyment you get (whining for paragraphs at a time about a TV show on the Internet).
Majarvis, I think Hack should be a writer here. He has plenty of doom and gloom to spread around.
Oh and I forgot to mention… Chola, DAMN. I was rather shocked how hot she looked in TSCC’s finale.
The interesting thing about TSCC is the fact it was tied for second place in market share for the time slot. Not that horrible in my opinion. Not many people watch TV on Friday night so none of the shows have huge numbers of viewers. It would not shock me if they do another season and it won’t surprise me if they don’t.
The fact that most of the posts on here are about that show goes to show it has a rabid fan base.
Majarvis, don’t waste my time. I’ve never hated the show – only what it became due to the clueless fans like yourself.
You’re far more pathetic wasting time trying to insult me than I am analyzing why this show went into the toilet.
Chad: Yeah, I was really surprised when the Latina showed up in this episode. See, the writers can do something smart once in a while. The interaction between her and Cameron was always one of the fun parts of season one, even if it did nothing to advance the plot. The scene where they try to “out-cool” each other in episode two of season one was hilarious.
“Actually, DeWitt and Topher ARE monsters but they lie to themselves about it.”
That doesn’t really make any sense. If they “are” monsters, then there’s no reason to lie to themselves about anything.
In any case, that’s not what I meant. What I meant is that Dollhouse is portraying DeWitt and Topher as human beings, in contrast to cardboard villians. It is not portraying what they do as decent or humane, but it’s bravely avoiding the archetype portrayal. DeWitt is not being portrayed in the same way as, say, Dr Renfro in Dark Angel, or Madeline in La Femme Nikita, or even as Miss Parker in The Pretender. DeWitt is someone who could easily be your boss, except the job she’s doing is (apparently, unless they’re setting up some kind of bizarre twist) utterly reprehensible.
And the same goes for Topher.
I wasn’t saying that what Topher and DeWitt are doing is humane. I said that one of the things I’m digging about the show is that Topher and DeWitt are not being portrayed as plastic villians, they’re human beings (as are most villains. Ask their neighbors. “He was such a nice, quiet man, who would have thought”)
We’re getting off-topic. I understand others don’t like the fact Dollhouse is doing this, and were very offended when both Topher and DeWitt were portrayed humorously in Ep7 and presumably were similarly offended by the last episode. But I do like it. I think it’s smart, and I’m enjoying the fact that the only cardboard villains thus far have been throwaway characters we’re not supposed to get to know.
And it may be that RSH is right, and that what I like about the show isn’t “right” from a show running point of view and people want plastic, easily to hate, characters, and that’s why it’s losing audience. Still, that doesn’t mean I can’t like what they’re doing.
tvmegafan said: It still makes me sick that there are more people watching suppernanny than dollhouse…WTF is wrong with people…NO one have the brain functions to watch a show that lets you think a little?
Try reading Heinlein’s “Starship Troopers” (or, for that matter, almost anything of his), Asimov’s “Foundation” trilogy (or, for that matter, almost anything of his – I particularly recommend “The Last Question”), Stanislaw Lem’s Pirx the Pilot stories, Anne McCaffrey’s Pern stories, Arthur C. Clarke’s “Rendezvous with Rama” and “2001: A Space Odyssey”, Alan Dean Foster’s script for the animated Star Trek series (published as “Star Trek: Log Ten”), as well as his short stories, or even Harry Harrison (“The Stainless Steel Rat” series).
I have a working knowledge of science fiction – whether you do or not is your concern.
However, you cannot presume that those who do not like Dollhouse have no knowledge of science fiction, which is what many Dollhouse fans seem to presume.
I can’t speak for anyone else – but, for me, watching Dollhouse makes me think of, at best, the Stanislaw Lem story, “Solaris” – which was made into a film starring George Clooney (whom I loved in ER), and both the film and book I severely disliked.
Whether Dollhouse is science fiction or not (imo, it’s more fantasy, less science fiction), the fact is that I came, I saw, I left – I didn’t like it, and much prefer Supernanny…
…and apparently, I am not alone…
…but for you to imply that anyone who does not like Dollhouse, and prefers Supernanny, does not have “the brain functions to watch a show that lets you think a little?” presumes an awful lot.
Let’s appeal to the court of statistics – the numbers – only 22 percent of the demo audience was watching any of the broadcast networks on Friday night. Why only blame people who watch Supernanny, with merely a 6 share of the demo? There’s 78 percent of the demo share not watching Dollhouse, but watching cable instead. And how many demo audience members were not watching TV at all, when they should, according to you, be watching Dollhouse?
If you call them out by show name as well, fine. If not, you’re missing the ice chip for the iceberg…
puredieselbc, it might be holding steady but I hardly believe it’s 50/50 at this point. The ratings only look good when compared against TSCC… and that doesn’t really help any. Unless it were to rise sharply over the next 3 episodes, I doubt it has much of a chance to return.
Whedon even seems resigned to this fact.
Actually, I do like DeWitt. She may be ruthless, but a case could probably be made that she’s doing this to people who were morons to begin with, i.e., the Dolls. Now if the Dolls hadn’t been recruited but instead were enslaved into doing this, then she would be a classic villain and would not be likable at all.
But it seems from the episode where she was recruiting Echo and some of the remarks she’s made over the season, DeWitt really feels that that while what she’s doing is illegal and may require ruthless measures, even murder, to protect it, what she’s doing is not necessarily “immoral” in her own terms. She’s just “providing a service”. In that, she’s probably not much different from your average AIG executive.
It’s also not clear how much she knows about the ultimate motives of the corporation running the Dollhouses. The spy inside the Dollhouse told the FBI guy that there is more to it, and the NSA guy this week said something similar. I could see her possibly turning against the Dollhouse at some point.
Besides which, I think she’s hotter than Echo. Must be the Brit accent and the fact that she reminds me of Kate Beckinsale. I always like cool executive babes like Pamela Landry as portrayed by Joan Allen in the Bourne movies.
Although I gotta admit, Echo in dominatrix garb was pretty hot this week.
Richard Steven Hack says:
“Majarvis, don’t waste my time. I’ve never hated the show – only what it became due to the clueless fans like yourself.”
Guruji make esquish!
My obsessed fan is back.
The Executive Producers of Ghost Whisperer are suffering from the same type of syndrome as the Lost E.P’s: The “We Are Golden Syndrome”. In reality, neither of the shows are golden. They need to get off the ego train. At this point, GW needs a new showrunner because Simmonds isn’t cutting it anymore.. I luv Ghost Whisperer but last night’s ep with Duff was TRASH – a series low in quality!!!!! I would grade it a strong C – .
The reasons why I strongly disliked the Duff episode:
1. Duff: She cannot act and as she tries to, she becomes increasingly annoying. (I hope the pilot she’s in crashes and burns)
2. The resurrection of Jim: This continued storyline is working my last nerves. The beginning of the story was interesting, then it dissolved into lovey dovey TRASH (ANYTHING to draw in female viewers, huh? That’s straight out of the ABC scheduling playbook). If I hear that Sting song which is used in the promos one more time, I’m gonna…
3. The story behind Graham’s character: This was probably the worst “task” Melinda had to complete. It had a very weak foundation
The producers/writers better watch it because the series will probably never leave Fridays, its ad rates will decline as it ages, and it skews older than many series on broadcast nets. If this crap continues, then GW deserves to be thrown out just like trash, even if DirectTV wants to play TV God.
Dollhouse: Last night’s episode was really good. I hwould grade it a strong B. I hope it gets renewed for another 13 episodes. The only problem I have with the series is that extremely annoying guy (character and actor) who imprints Echo. Why did they get rid of Reed Diamond!? He’s a very good actor who portrayed an interesting character. Just think of the story possibilities. The FBI guy researching the dollhouse is mighty fine, if you know what I mean.
FRIDAY 2009: There are several “leaked” CBS 2009 sked/projected ad rates floating around – Is this one the REAL deal? PAR = (Projected Ad Rates)
Friday: Ghost Whisperer ($81,000), Numb3rs ($79,000), The Unit ($82,000)
Friday (March): Ghost Whisperer, Back, The Unit
The Unit on Fridays!? Aren’t those with inside information saying that TU sets have ALREADY been destroyed like E! News? I would welcome this timeslot with open arms. I can just hear the theme song now: Give me a reason, give me a sign…LOL
Question: When’s the last time a Friday series commanded more than $100,000 in ad rates? Family Matters (ABC)
First Dollhouse episode I can say I truly enjoyed. If it had been the premiere
I would be telling everyone to check out this show.
Unfortunately the Nielsen families didn’t agree.
Richard Steven Hack says:
“My obsessed fan is back.”
I am but a simple postulant, Your Hortatory Subjunctiveness, in the study of the Mysteries (and errant Foul Habits) associated with mastery of the Nearly Universal Quantifier.
RJ, since when did the networks care about overall numbers and not demos?
Again, I do not see anyone thinking that terminator could be picked up by Sci Fi where it would be perfect to air it with caprica a similar themed show. Also, the numbers for the US are great but was in Terminator doing overseas. If those numbers are high it could mean that it could be picked up by sci fi or tnt.
Boris: Simple is the word.
Ed: No, overseas can’t save a US show.
For those who tout the performance of T:SCC in overseas markets, such viewing shares a problem with other forms of non-live viewing: Nobody is watching the US advertisements. Even if they were, people from other countries do not shop in the United States. The only way to keep the success of T:SCC from being completely dependent on US viewers is for overseas TV stations to buy the show directly from WB.
Jim H says: “The fact that most of the posts on here are about [TSCC] goes to show it has a rabid fan base.”
Rabid does not equal large (or demographically attractive) enough to be renewed.
If that were true, “Moonlight” viewers beat anyone else in recent memory in the rabid, frothing at the mouth category, and “Moonlight” is just as dead as “TSCC” will be.
I don’t think it’s impossible that SciFi will pick up “TSCC” to temporarily fill an empty timeslot – BUT NOT NEW EPISODES OF IT. “Dollhouse” would be a much more likely candidate, since it only has 12 aired episodes. It wouldn’t make a lot of sense to pick up a two-season show for a temporary fill, but it’s not impossible.
I love the talk of the Terminator movie saving the show. I would bet large sums of money that 60-70% of the people that will go see the Terminator movie don’t know that there’s a Terminator TV show. And a lot of the ones that are aware there’s a tv show clearly don’t care.
I wish people understood that mathematics:kung fu :: statistics:slap fight
Nielsen Ratings do not gather a true data set, for the people that accept the responsibility for a Nielsen family show a behavior that is already response bias. If they could pull data from satellite/internet/cable companies, keeping viewers private, and integrated the new data into the standard Nielsen family grouping, it would be one step closer to an accurate system. This coupled with the reasoning ‘give people what they need, not what they want, they don’t know what they want’ should be kept in mind to the networks looking to the next year.
If you think something is wrong with american television , just watch the opening scene of the canceled show Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.
Sci-Fi picked up Sliders back in the day since both were owned by Universal (network and show). Sliders had 44 episodes, was made realtively cheap, sci-fi cut the budget but gained the reruns for the network(44 at the time plus 22 new for season 1 so after one year they would have enouth to strip it). Could it happen, sure if WB wants it, it is a Sci-Fi with a than base, hopefully they will shop it or try first run syndication, (they have 31 in the can + 22 full season, (51 episodes) would be closer to a strip run but it needs at least 2 seasons to strip it).
If I was WB and Fox doesn’t renew it I would force my CW to take the show and place it on their network. It is an established show and would work well with their current success (Smallville, Supernatural, Reeper)…no matter what CW wants to be they have to follow their success… remeber WB was in a different direction as well(ethnic comedies/little Fox ripp-off)before 7th Heaven and Buffy took off and moved them in another direction….same thing w/NBC and comedies in the 90’s.
I thought the season finale of TSCC was terrific. This show is one of the best action series EVER MADE…great writing, continuity, plot, acting, casting…EVERYTHING…
this an “Smallville” are my two favorite shows. I also liked Journeyman and Roswell.
The problem is MEDIOCRITY … I look in occasionally at shows like “Idol” and CRINGE…yeah, occasionally you get to see an “up and coming Carrie Underwood,” but watching the “rest of the chaff” who WOULDN’T MAKE IT IN MY LOCAL BAR… is just too much like watching 15min of good entertainment and 45min of commercials in a “one hour show.”
It’s why “public radio and tv” NEED PAID SUBSCRIBERS …the dummies and morons OUTVOTE AND OUTWATCH us people who aren’t “SIMPLETONS!”
I just hope HBO or Showtime, picks up series like TSCC so we don’t have another “Journeyman” with
people with “more than half a brain” continually outvoted by the “simpletons” – to put it politely.
flashrob
Dollhouse is an interesting show or idea, but the problem is still that their are not in identifiable characters that you can root for, Look at the Shield or Sapranoes, both shows were about a moraly objectional characters, but they worked because they were likable characters with normal problems (family issues) and everything they did was to cover up something else that was going on.
If dollhouse had taken the route of an undercover cop that knows the risk (maybe if last nights episode was episode #1, showing the penalty for what happens, then showing that undercover guy the rest of the season as a brain dead doll) then he is to far involoved to turn them in but at the same time is trying to figure out how to stop it from w/in….then maybe it would work.
I don’t know I have to give Fox credit I can’t believe that they are sticking w/ the show and airing them in order, got to say prety cool
Uh,Richard,Sierra was kidnapped and enslaved into this.And Echo only agreed after being held against her will for 2 days.
RE: TSCC, why does nobody notice the very end of the epsiode where Sarah’s voice goes “I love you too” and there’s the sight and sound of the time-travel sphere? If there is a third season, I highly doubt it’d have anything to do with Sarah sticking around in the past while John romances Allison in the future.
i think if TSCC had another season the would have 1 episode set in the future then have john and cameron go back to where sarah is and continue with there mission.
i say too fox ..”ah the heck with it”. just renew it for season 3 and change its time slot. terminator lost around 35 percent of it audience when it moved to friday.
Fox really cant compete with CBS or NBC anyway right now.
Most of the shows on fox are bad so they dont really have that much to lose. Why risk making another terd like some of Fox’s other programs when you have a franchise market and a small fan base already with John connor and his hot robots.
the show isnt coming back, the actors have moved on.
kmoney… you are hilarious.
Flashrob says:
The problem is MEDIOCRITY … I look in occasionally at shows like “Idol” and CRINGE…yeah, occasionally you get to see an “up and coming Carrie Underwood,” but watching the “rest of the chaff” who WOULDN’T MAKE IT IN MY LOCAL BAR… is just too much like watching 15min of good entertainment and 45min of commercials in a “one hour show.”
American Idol might be mediocre this season, but Adam Lambert happens to be the best singer in Idol history. He has more talent than Underwood. More talent than Hudson. More talent than all of the others.
As far as Fringe goes, it started out badly, but is now getting really interesting. Last few episodes have been spectacular. Even the X Files had shortcomings in the beginning. It’s 1st season was very weak. It took 12- 13 episodes to find it’s groove. Same thing here with Fringe. And now that Leonard Nimoy is guest starring for 4 episodes, it will probably get a lot better!
“Uh,Richard,Sierra was kidnapped and enslaved into this.And Echo only agreed after being held against her will for 2 days.”
I wasn’t aware of the Sierra case – I must have missed that if it’s true. Echo was held because she got caught doing her “free the animals” schtick. That’s not much reason to sign away your life. Caroline didn’t strike me as being much smarter than Echo – in fact, when Echo has a personality imprint, she seems a lot more interesting than Caroline does in the flashbacks. That’s probably deliberate.
I think CHUCK would pull 7 million viewers on Friday.I know Robert and others think that’s wishful thinking.But here is my reasons.
1. Loyal Fans base
2. People are going to stay at home more than anytime than the last 20 years.
3. Recession is going to last 3 or more years and family’s that do have decent incomes are going to be the target of Auto advertisers.
4. Lack of competition, GHOST WHISPER is getting Grey
5. GREAT SHOW
Families that have decent incomes are still going out on Fridays. The ones staying at home are the ones that lost that status, and fell out of the important income demo, stopping to matter to the advertisers, and certainly cannot afford a new car.
How can TTSCC continue to lose out to all three of these crap shows? – Ghost Whisperer, Wife Swap, Howie Do It ??? Either Nielsen’s numbers are cooked from network bribes, or their sampling methods are seriously flawed, or America is populated almost completely by morons. Does any actually know anyone who watches these other shows? I don’t believe these numbers.
No wonder TV is slowly losing out to other forms of entertainment and activities (especially Internet): well-written creative programs are routinely cancelled and crap drivel is allowed to endure.
Latest nonsense from the Terminator wiki on Fox – apparently Zack Stentz (the writer who put my name in the show) has indicated that Fox is examining the DVR NUMBERS of the last episode before deciding the show’s fate. This comes from someone’s podcast who apparently knows Stentz.
Also it’s suggested that Fox has moved up its decision from end of April to the next couple days.
This makes absolutely no sense to me. Why would an uptrend in the DVR numbers for the finale make any difference since those numbers have been trending upwards for weeks now?
Damn, this forum is long…
You people are crazy.
Anyways, what I cannot understand for the life of me is how some dumbass show like Ghost Whisperer can beat out Terminator. What is this? Ghost Whisperer is just so fruitless and wishes it was half as good as Terminator…yet pulls in triple the ratings. A REPEAT of Wife Swap beat out T:SCC. Don’t get me wrong, I love Terminator — I think it’s awesome — but this is just really sad.
I’d like to say it’s the time slot that’s killing it, but let’s get real. I will openly admit that I’m probably the dorkiest girl this world has ever seen and I really have nothing better to do on my Friday nights than watch the Tube, but that’s exactly my point. The Sci-Fi addicts that actually LIKE Terminator are watching it because that have nothing better to do on a Friday night. The ratings that Terminator has now are the best that they’re ever going to get; the geeks are already in…that is, of course, if it ever returns.
Dollhouse. Yes, Fox is my man for Friday night: Terminator then Dollhouse. Personally, I like the show and it’s definately getting better as it goes — darker, Dushku in that leather get-up, DeWitt and her crazy fantasies, Ballard and his insanity (now we know why a hot guy like him can only get the lonely girl next door) — it’s just getting better and better. The low ratings are what I don’t understand. Sure, the universal concept that same as any other show, but the plot is totally original and addictive.
Again, it’s sci-fi night for the people that don’t get out enough.
Is there hope? Well, nobody knows that for sure, all I do know is that it’s a shame a reality repeat beats out one of the best shows out there and some ludicrous show like Ghost Whisperer even gets ratings at all. I suppose that this shows where America’s priorities are.
Oh, and as Kmoney says: Don’t even tell me that FOX has something out there better than Terminator and Dollhouse. Heh, they wish. There best hope is to spit out another sorry show that nobody cares about; the lest they can do is keep the suckiness instead of getting worse.
Richard, Caroline saw some information on illegal experiments conducted by the Dollhouse’s parent company. I think Caroline was worried that they would have her killed instead of letting it go to trial.
“America is populated almost completely by morons. Does any actually know anyone who watches these other shows? I don’t believe these numbers.”
Yeah.
Fox will respond in kind by placing crap reality shows on Friday nights. Not unlike the mythical hydra, when one reality show dies, two take its place.
American broadcast TV of the future will consist of formulaic dramas, sitcoms, and reality shows.
If Fox really picks up the rumored “Someone’s gotta Go”, and it becomes a hit, I’ll lose what faith I have in humanity.
Faith in humanity tied to a sense of entitlement over free entertainment choices.
Strange.
Is it time now for more scare tactics? Did you not read the synopsis either for the proposed show?
Sure what I said was over-the-top, and should be obvious to anyone paying attention. But the idea of people delighting in the misery of others is sick. Especially when it involves (apparently) real people and real jobs.
The same kind of people who rile up fans with doom and gloom… critics.
I am not delighting in the misery of others. We believe in the numbers here (duh!) and the numbers have been telling the tale for quite some time (in the case of TSCC,at least since October).
There are real jobs at stake for the cast and crew and I feel for them more than I feel for the fans, but, realistically, it is the line of work they have chosen (and that was their choice!), and they know how the world works.
Dollhouse has a really disturbing concept- women’s bodies being used for sex without their permission. So I’m kind of glad people aren’t watching it.
I’m sad about TSCC though.
Chad says:
“If Fox really picks up the rumored ‘Someone’s gotta Go’, and it becomes a hit, I’ll lose what faith I have in humanity.”
Jack Bailey on line 2.
Ghost Whisperer was a great show until talentless Jamie Kennedy came on and ruined it with his nonexistent acting skills. A lot of people here criticize Ghost Whisperer, but I bet they haven’t even watched it. The first three seasons were amazing, great writing, fascinating story arc, fantastic acting from Jennifer, Jay Mohr, Camryn Manheim, Aisha Tyler. Since Ghost Whisperer was nominated for several Emmys in addition to getting high ratings, then that really says something doesn’t it. I’ve never criticized a show that I’ve never watched it, because that’s what sensible people try to do.
Sorry, I meant to say “I’ve never criticized a show that I’ve never watched”.
Dollhouse has finally hit it’s stride this past Friday by the way. It took WAY too long. If only it was like that from the beginning…
Disappointed though not surprised by Terminator’s numbers. I’m really praying for a renewal, but I’m 99% sure it’s not going to happen. I would much rather see Terminator come back than Dollhouse. Last night’s season finale was top notch and could really take the show in an exciting new direction. They just need to give it a solid lead in and they can make it work. Pair it up with 24 in January. Just give Terminator one more chance!
“I think Caroline was worried that they would have her killed instead of letting it go to trial.”
Still makes no sense. I’m not signing over my brain just to avoid being murdered! Anybody who’d murder you won’t honor the frickin’ contract! You’d have to be a moron to believe that. Which is why I say Caroline was no rocket scientist. And that’s how she was played by Eliza, too, in my opinion.
I’d have to watch that negotiation again, but the impression I have is that she was being threatened with prosecution if she didn’t agree to the contract. Which would be reasonable from her point of view – corporation has me dead to rights, corporation is offering me an out by helping some “experiment” they’re doing. My life is ruined, so what have I got to lose?
Still dumb, but I could see an idiot agreeing to that. Criminals agree to ridiculous plea bargains all the time because they have no confidence they can beat the case and the prosecutors are telling them they’ll get fifty years if they go to court and “only” ten if they plea bargain. That’s how the Feds get their 98% conviction rate…
I suspect DeWitt uses the same methods on the “recruits” and properly regards them as morons when they agree, so she has little compunction about doing so. Still wrong, but not so different from a Federal prosecutor – except what she’s asking them to do is illegal.
Spenda: As for Dollhouse being used for prostitution, I’d say you should be more concerned when the Dolls are used for things like robbery, assassination, etc. Prostitutes are a dime a dozen. At least the Dolls are HIGH-CLASS escorts! Not to mention that erasing someone’s brain is a bit beyond being “used for sex”!
Just dropped by Berman and saw the half hour breakout for TSCC and Dollhouse:
Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles
8:00 p.m. V: 3.76 m, A18-49: 1.4/ 5
8:30 p.m. V: 3.37 m, A18-49: 1.2/ 4
Not good for a finale when four hundred thousand people bail by the half hour mark…
Dollhouse
9:00 p.m. V: 3.63 m, A18-49: 1.4/ 5
9:30 p.m. V: 3.49 m, A18-49: 1.3/ 4
A little better – only a hundred forty thousand or so. And it wasn’t a finale.
Heh, now as opposed to the above, the Ghost Whisperer half hour breakdown:
GW
8:00 p.m. V: 9.64 m, A18-49: 2.3/ 9
8:30 p.m. V: 10.83 m, A18-49: 2.7/ 9
Now THAT’S how you do it! UP over a MILLION for the last half hour – all the people who switched over from TSCC!
Sorry- TSCC viewers are not the ones tuning in to catch GW- more likely it is people tuning in to catch the show that missed the first half. The only folks I know who watch GW are over 50…maybe they came home from Good Friday services and turned it on? Running new epis on major holidays is inane. Last week was Passover and this week Good Friday….don’t the programming execs look at a calendar once in a while?
Kate,at least according to Nielsen there were more than twice as many people under 50 (or at least 18-49) watching Ghost Whisperer in the second half hour than there were watching TSCC. So while there are certainly more people over 50 watching GW than TSCC, there were a whole lot more younger people watching it than TSCC, too.
GW didn’t seem to suffer too much by running on a holiday versus its last original non-holiday airing, and neither really did TSCC.
Kate says:
“Last week was Passover and this week Good Friday….don’t the programming execs look at a calendar once in a while?”
You might want to try one yourself.
TSCC is dead. Though it was ok and better than 90% of the junk on TV, I dont care much that it wont be back (though I probably would have continued watching it). In the end, the show was a confused mess with too much time travel (the number of temporal paradoxes created boggles the mind), too many pointless subplots (Jessie/Allison were the worst) and a Sarah Conner that resembled a soccer Mom on sedatives, at least they could have died her hair blond to make her look like Sarah Conner!
Even if T4 does well (promos look good) I dont expect that to help a show with 3.5 million viewers.
Dollhouse – kill it off already. If it does this bad in Season 1, Season 2 would be lucky to bag 2.5 million viewers. That might be ok for CW, but not for any real network.
Caught first 15 minutes of Harpers Island, got bored after the guy got his head chopped off by the boat propeller after he was tied to the shaft. Im sure Joel McHale will be showing this on THE SOUP this week. The show was boring and annoying at time and I really didnt feel like I cared who got killed and who the sole survivor would be. Both Southland and Harpers lost viewers in the 2nd half hour. Dont know if either will last. Southland has a better chance since its on NBC – the 4th place network. Im suprised NBC didnt announce an ER spinoff. Its also why Chuck may also survive – if they were on ABC or CBS they would get the axe.
“Since Ghost Whisperer was nominated for several Emmys”
Isabel, you have quite a liberal definition of the word “several.” It’s been nominated for 2 Emmys. I don’t know where you come from, but in my country, 2 means “a couple.”
Not that I have anything against the number 2. 2 is the number of assets Jennifer Love Hewitt has. 2 is also the number of reasons to watch. And what a lovely pair those couple of reasons are.
I also can’t stand DOLLHOUSE and like TSSC. DOLLHOUSE has that horribly self-conscious lead actress, and by comparison, TSSC has an excellent ensemble of actors. The problem with TSSC is the writing. The SSC writers blew it big-time mid-season, committing the unpardobale sin of being boring.
re: GHOST WHISPERER. If Emmys are being given out for physical characteristics then that is surely a sign of the apocalypse. C’mon, people. It’s a horrible show. It’s treacle. It’s bathos. It’s fodder.
Just like Firefly – great show not given a chance
TSCC – Not given a chance to grow
They were going to cancel X-Files as well, look where it ended up.
Sighhhhh.. sad sad sad…….
That’s why I watch Old Mission Impossible DVD’s, can’t get dissapointed by massive cancellations of a great show.
Terminator live on…
These ratings are so inaccurate. They really need to take into account the people who are unable to watch at the set date and time and watch episodes at the networks websites within a week of the original airing of the episode. Also do they take into account Tivo and DVR? I finally find a show I thoroughly enjoy in over 4 years and because of an inadequate rating system could get cancelled.
“I also can’t stand DOLLHOUSE and like TSSC. DOLLHOUSE has that horribly self-conscious lead actress, and by comparison, TSSC has an excellent ensemble of actors. The problem with TSSC is the writing. The SSC writers blew it big-time mid-season, committing the unpardobale sin of being boring”
Dee, Have you any sense of creativity and talent? Its the only program in several years that have both! I have watched nothing but reruns of tv and movies the past few years because of the lack of creativity in television. Dollhouse is the reason I find tv good again. People just don’t know how to follow something unfamiliar and new. Hey another cop show, why not a tv show from a movie? I know lets just rewrite old shows with new faces and titles! BORING!!! Its time for new ideas and creativity. I say WTG Joss Whedon and Eliza Dushku for allowing themselves to be different and stay away from the sad norm of todays television
Most of the first half of the season for TSCC was bad writing and after that it wasn’t recoverable.
another thing about this that ticks me off is that “millions” of people willl have nothing good to watch and will be forced back into reruns or just turning the tv off. its not as though only 100 people are enjoying it. grrrrr!!!
Riff:
I’m American, I’m of Irish, French, and Italian descent, but I was born in upstate New York, and even if I weren’t American, that would be rather racist of you to imply that just because someone wasn’t American or British or from an English-speaking country that their analysis of words would be not as good.
And if you look at the Webster’s dictionary here:
http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/several
2 a: more than one
So I was right, anyway I refuse to talk to you anymore. I can sense subtle racism when it’s there, and I don’t associate with racists, so any replies you write will be ignored and not read by me, because I won’t waste my time with you, haha.
Riff:
And I have to add, it’s really pathetic of you to have to come here and insult a woman just to make you feel better about yourself and your obviously pathetic life, real men don’t have to insult women to make themselves feel better, nor do they have to degrade others to boost their lacking self-esteem, or should I say, your lack of self-esteem. You’re so pathetic, you make me laugh, hahaha.
Your replies will not be read by me, you’re not a real man because real men don’t act like imbeciles, which is exactly what you are, haha.
Spenda says:
April 12th, 2009 at 10:11 pm
Dollhouse has a really disturbing concept- women’s bodies being used for sex without their permission. So I’m kind of glad people aren’t watching it.
I’m sad about TSCC though.
Actually its men and women and they did give permission when they signed the contract.
I have a feeling that we’re now getting into particularities…
What I find truly amusing is how this is not a blog dedicated soley to T:SCC or Dollhouse — so why has this whole thread of 4/10 ratings all about those two shows?
Exactly.
We don’t want them to go away.
Oh, and who in the hell cares what a word means? You’re both idiots.
yeah it brings back the argument …..
do ratings really mean anything anymore and what do they truly mean for the networks? I work (manage) a comic book store part time and alot of my customers (about 75 percent ) watch terminator. None of them watch it live. I mean NONE! …apparently even us geeks have lives and find it hard to watch tv on fridays at 8.
But also us geeks are tecnologically advanced and know about FOX’s website(witch invites us to watch this show at our convinence), Hulu, TeeVO, etc etc. And us teconologically advance geeks guess what… like sci fi shows. But networks lack the balls to air them it seems these days let alone with a full season…or a consistant time slot.
Now i know…us geeks are a apparently small numbers( a minority if you will) and fox is after the american idol target audiance and the reality tv addicts. And it makes sense, those shows are cheap and people eat them up. Its like the differance between a gourmet cheesburger and the mc donalds $1 double…why sell the quality when people will just eat ..excuess my words here but SHIT.
Terminator was the only show on fox i watched …i guess now its back to HBO and showtime …enjoy your shit burgers america:-P
Kmoney
I like your style
Except I’d substitute terminator with Dollhouse and though I dont work in a comic book store (though its close, I do taxes lol) I am a self proclaimed ‘geek’ I love my sci-fi and my horror and anything as seperated from reality as I can get because we already live real life why the hell would I want to watch real life. Calgon (Or Whedon) take me away!!!!
I don’t see where you think that the Dolls were recruited. They were essentially forced to sign an agreement and not given any real choice. If they hadn’t have signed, they would have been killed or memory wiped which is mental death. And since the agreement they signed was illegal in what it entailed, that wasn’t valid. One of the major problems with Dollhouse for me is that it appears to be nothing more than a poorly reworked La Femme Nikita. However, La Femme Nikita made sense and to me Dollhouse doesn’t. I don’t see that many people willingly working for a private organization doing gross illegal activities like murder and rape continually. I don’t believe that they’re getting paid that much. They’re not doing it to protect the world like on La Femme Nikita but supposedly just for money. And whereas on La Femme Nikita you could sort of root for some of the agents since in order not to be killed themselves they were forced to do actions that they wouldn’t have chosen for themselves, since the Dolls are imprinted with memories, they don’t have a problem having sex with strangers or anything else that they are told to do. Even the last episode of Dollhouse consisted of the person in charge raping one of the dolls to satisfy her own needs.
I’m not a big Joss Whedon fan. His creative sensibilities bother me at a cellular level. But hey, some people don’t like Masterpiece Theater. Some people don’t like South Park. Some people don’t like 24 or In Treatment or Lost. I like those things. You may not. There’s just no accounting for taste. The Nielson ratings are a joke. The old business model for television broadcasting is dying. As far as I’m concerned, it can’t die fast enough.
Three letters D.V.R. Me like most of my friends who watch terminator have jobs so where forced to record the show instead of watching it on friday night. Or sometimes i just watch on fox.com And thats another thing, why would they condemn the show to friday when it used to be on earlier in the week. People go on dates on friday night.
If fox decides not to continue with terminator theyll be making a big mistake. The movie looks like its going to be great. And that will def energize the franchise.
Carol, that’s the problem with the premise – you’d have to be a moron to sign the contract. And you’re right, since it’s illegal anyway, the contract is invalid. Which makes it even more moronic to sign the contract.
My point was precisely that the Dolls were morons to begin with, so DeWitt doesn’t see any problem with taking advantage of them. So she isn’t quite the monster she would be if she knew the Dolls were being directly kidnapped and enslaved into this against their will. The problem is the coercion used doesn’t make any sense.
However, calling the Doll sleeping with her rape is really stretching it. He’s imprinted with a gigolo personality which definitely didn’t mind sleeping with her. And that was contrasted with Echo’s imprint of a dominatrix, which really confuses the issue of who’s raping who.
My other point was that sex isn’t the main issue here – free will and brainwashing is. And that’s considerably worse than the prostitution uses the Dolls are put to, since the Dolls are also sent out to do worse crimes like assassination and robbery. I could imagine the Dollhouse being hired to provide an assassin to kill the President of the US, although I imagine the heat that would bring down might be too excessive for the Dollhouse to accept the engagement.
Your comparison of Le Femme Nikita and the Dollhouse is flawed precisely because I presume the Dolls are not informed of what sorts of engagements they’ll be sent on, whereas the agents of the organization Nikita belongs to definitely do know. So the Dolls aren’t actually agreeing to do anything but allow their bodies and brains to be used for missions unknown to them. So they really aren’t agreeing to do murder and rape per se.
The Nikita agents are basically morons, too. Once you had the skills of one of those agents, the proper approach is to take down the whole operation in concert with your fellow agents. Which is why that approach is never actually used in real life, despite the various movies like “XXX”. Nobody’s going to hire a psychopath to do bad things because psychopaths are utterly unreliable and will immediately turn on their handlers at the first opportunity. That’s why many terrorist groups eventually break up – because the organization becomes more about psychopathic crime than whatever cause they were originally fighting for. The Italian Red Brigades had this problem back in the ’70’s.
Curt: While the Terminator franchise might be energized by T-4 being a hit, it’s unlikely to do much for TSCC unless the series is totally rebooted – meaning it’s nothing like the way Friedman ran it. You could theoretically reboot the show with the same actors, since they were all excellent, but you’d have to act like the first two seasons never happened, since season two is precisely why it died.
Also, just having a certain influx of new Terminator fans from the movie won’t necessarily mean they’ll like the TSCC show which was completely unconnected to either T-3 or T-4, and in fact the problem was precisely that – it wasn’t Terminator the way the movies – and T-4 presumably – will be.
But the real problem is: will Warner Brothers and any network risk $20 million or more for a new series when there is no evidence 1) that there will BE an influx of new viewers from the movie when the show won’t be back until nine months later at the earliest, or 2) that such an influx would enable the show to be profitable, given the poor ratings of the first version?
At the very least, it would take a LOT of promo to convince the viewers who walked away from the first version of TSCC to come back and check out the rebooted version.
I say no chance. But studio heads do stupid stuff all the time, so anything’s possible, I suppose.
Robert Seidman says: “There are real jobs at stake for the cast and crew and I feel for them more than I feel for the fans, but, realistically, it is the line of work they have chosen (and that was their choice!), and they know how the world works.”
I only feel for the crews. Regularly reoccurring cast members (not just the “stars”) easily earn more for one week’s episode than most people do for an entire year. Most TV staff writers are firmly within the L.A. middle class, but it’s a middle class that most middle class members elsewhere would envy.
Television work for crew has always been about hustle, but it was a whole lot easier for them ten years ago and has deteriorated significantly within the last three years, beginning before the WGA strike or the recession. The gravy train of TV jobs that a robust pilot season used to provide has also been sharply reduced.
Now, your show being canceled or your pilot not getting picked up is a lot more serious than it used to be. Reruns are almost non-existent, so the accompanying residuals to individuals and pension & health care plans are as well.
A series being canceled before reaching 100 episodes almost always removes syndication as an additional revenue option. You have to have 100 or more episodes if the series is going to be stripped. Serials are hard to syndicate in any case because the episodes have to be run in order, so there is an obvious bias towards creating something self-contained like a sitcom or procedural that will be much more attractive to buyers. Of course, if serials are popular, they will be made, but they clearly have been falling out of favor with the viewing public, despite the claims of their fans.
Online and DVR are changing the rules, but not yet. Despite all the claims that “everyone” is DVRing a fan’s favorite show, DVR penetration is only around 30%. The overwhelming number of people are going to be watching live, if at all. Online continues to grow, but let’s be realistic. A family is not gathering around a laptop or computer’s LCD monitor to watch an episode online. It’s still only for solo viewing, and the revenue and audience just isn’t there.
I would have to look for the report, but I had read that the largest number of episode views take place during weekday working hours and employers have begun to block access to Hulu and the network sites as they begin to notice. That will obviously reduce viewers, since employer blocking has already had a noticeable effect on social networking sites and video sites like YouTube.
I enjoy Whedons work because it does give that uncomfortable feeling. That gut feeling of “Thats so wrong” He touches on sensitive topics in a not so subtle manner and that takes balls. Who cares if the contracts on the show are illegal? Its a tv show and not meant to be realistic. It shows corruption and controversy and it is done in a world of fantasy. In man on the street Joss gave us the arguements people would have with the Dollhouse if it were real, just as we are having here. Its wrong, its exploitation or its a good way for people to do things they could only dream of, if life has been so miserable and you could just forget it all and be someone else…wouldnt you? etc… its supposed to cause debate, disgust and anger as well as confusion, interest and curiosity. Get the audience out of thier comfortable zone and in that he’s obviously succeeded. I like a show that has this kind of bite. Is the Dollhouse the bad guys? Is it the govt? Who is this Alpha and why did he become a rougue doll, is he good or bad? If the dolls volunteered, what did the contract actually say? How many dolls didnt actually agree to be there? I like it, quite a lot. So it doesnt matter if the contracts are legal or not. Its an underground operation that is global and the government agencies and politicians use it when they feel they need it.
Then again…Halloweens my favorite day of the year because you can be anyone, like a doll.
“And I have to add, it’s really pathetic of you to have to come here and insult a woman just to make you feel better about yourself and your obviously pathetic life, real men don’t have to insult women to make themselves feel better, nor do they have to degrade others to boost their lacking self-esteem, or should I say, your lack of self-esteem. You’re so pathetic, you make me laugh, hahaha.
Your replies will not be read by me, you’re not a real man because real men don’t act like imbeciles, which is exactly what you are, haha.”
Is this what I’ll turn into if I become a “Ghost Whisperer” viewer? If so, where can I sign up?
P.S. “Breast Whisperer” is the poster child for braindead television. But I doubt I have to tell the non-mouth breathers on the board that. I also doubt anyone has to watch more than 5 seconds of it to know how braindead it is, either. I think Jamie Kennedy is great, though. So I won’t be really pathetic and come here and insult a man to make me feel better about myself and my obviously pathetic life.
Richard:
“Carol, that’s the problem with the premise – you’d have to be a moron to sign the contract. And you’re right, since it’s illegal anyway, the contract is invalid. Which makes it even more moronic to sign the contract.”
I disagree with them being morons. At least with all of them being morons. Giving up a few years of thier lives to achieve finacial stability for themselves or thier families, change the jaded paths they were currently on etc.. as a parent I know Id give up just about anything to make life better for my family, does that make me a moron? Wanting more for them than I can offer on my own?
Also with the contracts being illegal, this happens, often. So-called illegal documents are common. Its illegal to torture prisoners of war…but we do it. The governments never cared too much about legalities when it works in thier favor and when they are caught doing something illegal, they pass the buck.
Im sure there are many objections and counter-arguements to this but everyone views things differently.
Either way whether or not the contracts are legal, they were signed prior to any mind erasure. Being morons isnt the real argument because whether they chose to have thier minds erased, take drugs, join a cult, become a nun or run for president, its a choice they made. They were given a choice, continue on the path you are on or give us 5 years of your life and get paid for it.
The Dolls that there against thier will are the only ones with an arguement to rape and murder.(however it was obvious that sex with a doll in thier inactive state was a big no-no) Obviously theres a reason behind them being part of the story and will unfold if the show is given a chance.