no surprises here:
via FOX press release:
FOX PICKS UP SECOND SEASON OF “FRINGE”
No. 1 New Series Among Adults 18-49 Renewed for Full Season
Season Finale Guest-Starring Leonard Nimoy Airs
Tuesday, May 12, on FOX
FOX has renewed FRINGE, the No. 1 new series among Adults 18-49, with a full second season, it was announced today by Kevin Reilly, President, Entertainment for Fox Broadcasting Company.
“FRINGE proved to be a notable addition to our schedule all season and it really has fans buzzing as it builds to a fantastic season finale,” said Reilly. “J.J. and the whole Bad Robot team have been phenomenal partners, and we look forward to years of making great television with them.”
“FRINGE continues to gain momentum, creatively and with viewers,” said J.J. Abrams, series co-creator and executive producer. “We couldn’t be more thrilled that FRINGE will continue to freak people out for at least another season!”
FRINGE has captivated audiences this season, winning its Tuesday time period weekly among key demographics and ranks as the No. 1 new series in primetime among Adults 18-49.
Questions will be answered when the first season of FRINGE wraps up with two all-new episodes. First, on Tuesday, May 5 (9:01-10:00 PM ET/PT), Olivia experiences “awake dreams,” Walter divulges key information about the Z.F.T. manifesto and Peter reveals a secret that yields unexpected results in a disturbing case. In the climactic finale airing Tuesday, May 12 (9:04-10:00 PM ET/PT), discoveries are made, loyalties are tested, otherworldly origins are discovered and guest star Leonard Nimoy debuts as a pivotal person of interest.
Created by J.J. Abrams & Alex Kurtzman & Roberto Orci, FRINGE stars Anna Torv, Joshua Jackson, John Noble, Lance Reddick, Kirk Acevedo, Blair Brown and Jasika Nicole. The series is produced by Bad Robot Productions in association with Warner Bros. Television. Abrams, Jeff Pinkner, Bryan Burk and J.H. Wyman serve as executive producers, while Kurtzman and Orci are consulting producers. Additionally, Pinkner and Wyman serve as the series’ showrunners.
No surprise there, even tough it’s not very good
Good for Fringe fans. Kind of makes you wonder what they’ll pair the show with though. It’s dark(ish) Sci-Fi right? I don’t see that going very well with House or Lie to Me.
I was watching Fringe on TiVo right now. Coincidence or not?
Anyway, this is good news, because Fringe is a show that I really enjoy.
Fringe is just the next X-files, so it may do well for a long time.
well 1 good news this year; and i m not even a so great fun
fan sorry
boring news.
Bummer.
Fox viewers deserve better.
Good news, I would like to see, although it will not happen, Mulder and Scully be involved with a case that takes them to Boston. Imagine Scully working with Walter, and Mulder working with Olivia. That would be interesting television.
Good News , i love this show , but is there any hope for dollhouse , i like it soo much too
If they can bring in Spock, why not Mulder and Scully?
Well, it’s a hit and very good show to begin with, so I’m not surprised with this announcement. Leonard Nimoy will also bring in many more new viewers.
It’s an 18-49 hit!
Garbage.
Excellent news, by far my favorite new show this year.
And yes, Fringe is another X Files with the exception of aliens. But, so what?
Kind of strange how they cut back the first season order by two episodes.
“Good for Fringe fans. Kind of makes you wonder what they’ll pair the show with though. It’s dark(ish) Sci-Fi right? I don’t see that going very well with House or Lie to Me.”
It was paired with House early this season and did fine.
I still think House/Fringe on Monday’s right now, at least until 24 returns midseason then Fringe probably ends up running after Idol again and the ‘its propped up by its lead-in’ complaints continue for another year. Having said that I’d like to House/Lie To Me paired up and see if Fringe can stand on its own. I’d suggest putting it on after Bones but I think Thursday at 9 might be asking too much at this point.
I enjoy Fringe, it just took me a bit before i convinced myself to look past all the made up/ exaggerated science explanations, plus I think they toned them down when they realized people were calling them out as much.
Well, not a surprise, but still, a full season order is good. Better than the usual 13 episodes order.
Yes, American Idol has been Fringe’s lead-in, but it’s ratings have been steady. Sometimes, having lead-ins don’t matter. For example, it didn’t matter that CSI was Harper’s Island’s lead-in, it’s viewer ship has been dropping from week to week. Fringe’s ratings hasn’t, they’ve gone up a little and then down a little and then up again. In fact, despite the CSI lead-in, Harper’s Island still lost out in the 18-49 demo. Whereas, Fringe has been consistently winning it’s time slot against CBS in the demo. You see, while lead-ins can help, it’s the responsibility to make sure that the audience doesn’t drop like flies from week to week. That’s what’s happened to Harper’s Island. However, it hasn’t happened to Fringe!
Will FOX keep AI as its Leadin? if they dont Fringe will go down very fast. This is JJ Abrams worst show in my opinion.
oh and the camparison to the Xfiles sickens me. The X files was a great show This is not.
Jack, you’re wrong. The show is clearly not bleeding viewers regardless of the lead-in. And the consensus is it’s unlikely that Idol is providing Fringe with up to six million viewers who are simply too lazy to hit the remote. Your opinion that Fringe will go down fast without Idol simply has no evidence behind it.
While I think X-Files can be said to be better than Fringe, Fringe is still a pretty good show.
Having it picked up for another season means two of the shows I watch are renewed – the other is Leverage. The other two, TSCC and Dollhouse, are doomed.
Well I havew been a fan of X-files for a long time, and I’m not afraid to say Fringe is better, in my opinion. The story is going constantly and forward. Not like x-files. Some of the strongest moments of television, and some were the worst. Fringe is just going, constructing, getting better and better. Has for you Fringe haters, or Chuck lovers who are jalous, well, I don’t care about you, keep predicting the end of the world. You’re juste gonna live in some kind of denial lie… who cares.
The interesting thing for me about Fringe is that, unlike the X-Files with its fairly conventional alien invasion theme, Fringe is dealing with an inter-dimensional war, which is out on the “fringe” of UFO theory, to coin a phrase.
Back in the early ’70’s, I used to hang with journalist John A. Keel, the model for the Richard Gere character in the movie “The Mothman Prophecies”, based on one of Keel’s books. Keel was discounting aliens as the answer for UFOs way back in the late ’60’s and through the ’70’s. So it’s nice to see TV finally catching up…thirty years later…with a fresh take on paranormal phenomena.
As long as Abrams doesn’t screw up in season two and beyond, and the overall story arc continues to make some sense, I think Fringe may end up better than the X-Files.
The difference between FRINGE and X-FILES (both good shows, though X-FILES was pretty bad once Duchovny started “phoning it in” and eventually both were replaced by the T1000 Terminator and that other woman) is X-FILES had mostly stand alone episodes then as the series progressed devoted more time to the vast alien-government conspiracy, while FRINGE works from within a framework of the coming war with the parallel universe and every episode ties into it in some way (though not always immediately obvious – some people still dont know what the little bald kid who lived underground is).
As for people who drone on inferring that much of FRINGES ratings are due to carryover of American Idol viewers, thats not likely. Idol is brain-dead TV – watch people sing…and sing.. and sing… watch Simon COW massage his nipples, Paula look drunk and those other judges… Boooooooooooring. FRINGE. Lead-in’s matter more if the two shows are similar such as if you had 2 crime dramas back to back. Are HEROES fans blaming their lower ratings the last 2 seasons on its lead in, the mediocre CHUCK? A few might, but most realize HEROES problems stem from the finale of Season 1 and the awful Season 2.
Fact remains, FRINGE has a season 2 and its a welcome relief it wont be replace with some inane Idol copy, a game show or boring reality show. FRINGE isnt perfect, but its improving as it fleshes out the details of the impending war.
I’m starting to like Fringe, though I still believe the lead character is weak and that the Walter & Peter Bishop characters carry the show.
Hah! This is pee-in-my-pants awesome news!
I am very picky about the scripted dramas that I watch. It’s rare that I ever enjoy procedural dramas because most standalone episodic series tend to lack depth. The only ones I consistently watch are Law and Order SVU and Criminal Intent. The rest are garbage.
X-Files is one of the shows that I loved. It’s up there in my all-time favorites, but even I admit that Fringe is the superior show. The X-Files spent a lot of time giving us meaningless monster-of-the-week episodes before finally developing a mythology–but the conspiracy element of the show was so vast and shapeless that when they began mixing procedure with mythology the show felt unstructured. That said, I still enjoyed it, but Fringe has much more direction and purpose behind it and it handles serial elements with respect and keeps the integrity of mythology.
I don’t understand why people hate Fringe so much. I’ve rarely seen anyone indifferent to the show–either they like Fringe or they HATE Fringe and think it’s garbage. What’s worse is all these predictions of failure should the show ever be stripped of its American Idol lead-in. I think most of that are haters projecting their contempt for the show. After a solid season, Fringe brings in consistent viewers and built an incredible fan base.
Face it: Nine-million people don’t watch Fringe every week because they forget to change the channel after American Idol. Here’s a news flash — when people dislike a show, THEY STOP WATCHING IT. For the haters out there, if Fringe were lead in by a show you loved and watched every week, but you don’t care for Fringe, would you still watch Fringe after your show ends? Seriously.
Fringe is a hit. Deal with it.
The show isn’t bad. I enjoy Walter. Having a leadin of AI, though, you could almost read the phone book and succeed. But the actress who plays Olivia is terrible. She’s so damn bland.
I will be interested to see what this gets paired with next season.
@thedemonhog, IIRC the cutback on the first season order was due to the same scheduling issues that have caused them to have to show two episodes of Bones some weeks. It makes sense that they would rather have a steady build towards the finale instead of having to potentially burn off two extra episodes in order to air the whole season.
And this is total speculation on my part, but I’m guessing they’ll put it behind House in the fall next year, with a possibility that they’ll put it back behind AI in the winter if they don’t think they’ve got a show strong enough to fill that slot (out of all the pilots I’ve read about, I think only Human Target sounds interesting). Of course, I think it could also do well after Bones on Wednesday.
Fox cut one episode from season one because they wanted to debut the premiere episode of Glee during the American Idol finale. Since they didn’t have many spots available because of 2 hour American Idol episodes, they will now run that episode of Fringe during season 2. So, that episode is now a s2 episode.
Do you think that they might try 24 after Bones and keep Fringe on Mondays after House? Why or why not?
I’m just thinking that Fox might want to move Fringe away from The Mentalist. Because each time The Mentalist is a repeat the ratings for Fringe go up. So, I actually think Fringe might have easier time competing on Mondays with House as the lead-in.
I don’t think they’ll put it after House again. I think they’ll put a new show behind it and see how Fringe performs on its own.
I’m betting that they will keep House as the lead in or at least Bones for awhile because of JJ Abrams.
Tomas said
“Face it: Nine-million people don’t watch Fringe every week because they forget to change the channel after American Idol. Here’s a news flash — when people dislike a show, THEY STOP WATCHING IT. For the haters out there, if Fringe were lead in by a show you loved and watched every week, but you don’t care for Fringe, would you still watch Fringe after your show ends? Seriously.
Fringe is a hit. Deal with it.”
Tomas is absolutely right. For example, Harper’s Island followed CSI and it still tanked. Losing 2 million viewers from week to week. Fringe has not done that.
where the hell are the ratings for sunday may 3rd?
Fringe is my favourite new show of the current season and I’m so happy it’s been renewed, even without the much spoiled appearance of Mr Leonard Nimoy in the finale and some season 2 episodes. I’m sure more people love Fringe than hate it though although I am hoping that in the Fall it doesn’t become more like Sliders than the X-Files, as some are speculating.
As for pairing it with something, I don’t see why Fox couldn’t allow Fringe to stand on it’s own? After all, House does, Bones does, Lie To Me has done – so why not see just how strong it is in the Fall schedule, given that it’s guaranteed a full season and there’s going to be a break over Xmas/New Year anyway. What have Fox got to lose? Fringe could very well be the “new” X-Files.
Also, what retention people don’t bother bringing up is the 18-49 demographic. Also, fact is it has kicking 24’s butt in the 18-49 demo.
24, House, Bones, these shows are dying, around too long and no where to go, they will fade next season. Fringe is new blood, its good, compelling and fresh on ideas and lots of room to grow it. Honestly American Idol viewers do not stick around to watch fringe, totally different type of people, they can’t understand the basic concept of a parallel universe or that crazy thing called science for that matter not to mention their already screwed sense of good taste. No Fringe definitely stands on its own, and XFiles was good in its day and I think so far Fringe has played out a compelling mystery mixed with a quirky paranormal procedural. I don’t understand the negativity towards the lead character, is she too pretty/spunky for you is that it, cause so was Gillian Anderson. And if you bash chuck while praising Fringe your really delusional, love them both, cherish them, otherwise be prepared for Dancing with your 5th Grade Teacher or Americas Biggest Farm Animals or lost of other ilk night a week. I actually think Chuck would be pulling the same numbers as Fringe is right now if it wasn’t on Mondays, but I digress yay for atleast one good bit of news today, and damn Fringe was good tonight too.
Next year is probably 24’s final season, according to its producers (and then a feature film).
Fringe pulling even greater number with House on Mondays because it wouldn’t be facing CBS The Mentalist.
Tonight’s episode was definitely a kicker! Loved seeing Harris get his butt blown away! That dude was becoming a serious PITA! I figured he was involved with the bad guys somehow but they took him out pretty fast once that was revealed. Since they seemed to be getting down to the serious stuff in the finale, they didn’t need him any more as a throwaway character.
Never expected Nina Sharp to go down, though. That was a surprise.
And Olivia Dunham is no more bland than Dana Scully. In fact, she’s considerably less so. She’s much spunkier and more rebellious than Scully, as tonight’s episode showed. Also, remember, Anderson didn’t have her acting chops at the start of X-Files, either. She grew into that role. And quite frankly, Anna Torv is significantly prettier than Gillian Anderson. She’s just not darkly mysterious like Anderson was in her role.
I just pray they don’t jump the shark with whatever season 2 brings to the table in terms of the overall mythology.
“… Olivia Dunham is no more bland than Dana Scully. In fact, she’s considerably less so…”
You’re funny.
Mike the Canadian:
I watch American Idol faithfuly and still “understand the basic concept of a parallel universe” and Fringe is my second favorite show after Bones, so please stop being such a conceded bigot and just let people watch the tv shows they like to watch. As for Bones, 24 and House, they are not “dying.” Bones, if in the right time slot (Wed. at
gets great numbers that are improving on previous seasons. House might be in a lull buts its definitely going nowhere, and 24, in its SEVENTH season, is doing great!
Wednseday at 8*
awesome
I don’t understand why so many people are negative towards Anna Torv when everyone knows the real star of the show is Walter Bishop (played by the excellent John Noble) because he’s an outstanding character and the last few weeks where his backstory regarding William Bell is slowly getting filled in has been compelling viewing. I’m sure that even an established actress of more years than Anna Torv would struggle to be remembered for their character compared to Dr Walter Bishop, who’s arguably the best new character on TV in years. Only Dr Cal Lightman on Fox’s sister show “Lie To Me” comes close, although Walter is the much better character.
@Richard Steven Hack re: Fringe “jumping the shark” next year… even if it goes the way of Sliders with that whole parallel universe concept, only darker, Sliders lasted 5 seasons (although they should have really stopped after the 4th) compared to the X-Files’ 9 seasons and 2 movies. So I’m sure Fringe has got a lot of life in it yet. I’m hopeful it’ll be on TV for another few years yet considering how long 24, House, Bones, etc. have been going for on the Fox network.
I am a huge fan of Fringe and love of the show. Watch it weekly. I am just glad it’s returning for a second season. I could care less about the other shows mentioned in the previous comments lol…..isn’t this article “JUST” mentioning the return of the show?? What’s with all this hoopla about Mulder and Scully ?
And haelohm….WTF does American Idol gotta do with parallel universes ? LMFAO. Where does that even come in when talkin about Fringe in the first place ?
Just stick with the subject on hand people.