On Monday Michael Ausiello posted a story that TNT might expand the existing episodes of Southland:
More good news on the Southland front: On the heels of this morning’s confirmation that TNT will run all 13 Southland episodes (including the six season 2 episodes that NBC never aired), comes word that the cable net may pad the seven season 1 eppys with never-before-seen bonus footage.
According to my go-to guy at Southland, Michael Cudlitz, “It’s my understanding that the actual episodes will have more airtime on TNT, so I believe they will be going back in and [adding] content. They’ll have the opportunity, and, in my opinion the need, to open up the [initial seven] episodes a little bit.”
It’s not clear to me where Mr. Cudlitz got his understanding that there would be more airtime on TNT.
Southland episodes are about as long as recent episodes of The Closer, Saving Grace, Dark Blue and Leverage
I did the unthinkable! I actually looked up the run times for some TNT shows and for Southland minus any commercials and promos. Just opening and closing themes/credits and show content. You can head to iTunes and do it yourself if you don’t trust me.
I looked at the run times for season five of The Closer. I also looked at Saving Grace. It looks like the episodes used to be a bit longer but that both The Closer and Saving Grace now strive to come in at 43 minutes and 10 seconds. Most of Leverage’s episodes came in at exactly 43:14. Dark Blue liked to hover around 43 minutes, too. Outside of the pilot, all the episodes in season one of Dark Blue were 43:10 or less.
Five out of the last six episodes of Saving Grace were exactly 43:10 and four out of the five last episodes of Season Five of The Closer were 43:10, with the other 43:11.
Four out of the seven episodes of Southland from last spring were either greater than 43:10 or within 7 seconds of it. Two of the remaining three episodes 42:19, and the other one was 42:39.
Would it even be worth adding edited out content back in?
So it mostly looks like TNT would have to give up ad time to expand Southland. Perhaps there is some bang for adding in some “never before seen footage” but between what looks like would be less advertising and the cost to do it, I can’t see them doing that. Unless TNT perceives a much bigger bang for “39 seconds or so of never before seen footage of Southland per episode!” than I do. And, that’s always possible…
I think this should have been an Extra Super Terrific Scoop!
Runtime-wise sure, but… for the first 7 episodes TNT needs to draw in the people who watched them the first time around. Extra scenes would be a nice hook.
They could always replace non-essential scenes with new ones so they can tout “never before seen footage” without sacraficing ad time.
I could see them doing something like FX does with its DVD on TV, where they show deleted scenes during a commercial break.
Additional scenes would likely push the runtime to a mere 44-45 minutes, at best.
Often the missing bits amount to very little. I would imagine if this was done it would be a stunt to get people to resample season 1. I could see them doing that.
Well, it was an idea :shrug:
Since the don’t need the extra time, if they do film more scenes, I’m going with my second explanation from the previous post: The real reason NBC delayed and then dropped Southland is because of problems with the new episodes and they need extra filming to fix them.
Yeah, I think I’ll trust the person who actually works on the show over the guys who have consistently put a negative spin on every bit of good news regarding Southland.
@Sara, Considering Brooke Sheilds probably still thinks Lipstick Jungle could be coming back, actors who work on shows aren’t always the most accurate sources of information.
@Sara, I agree. I dunno what Bill and Robert have against this show. I see nothing in this to mock, but of course, they have to find something.
@Fans without perspective, the mocking is of Ausiello.
“Southland” fans: I have never watched your show! I have no intention of ever watching your show! Unless Eliza Dushku shows up guest starring as a super-cool, super-sexy police officer who’s actually a doll, I will never, ever watch your show!
But I will say this: Robert and Bill are nice guys, but they are often wrong, wrong, wrong! I don’t keep track of which guy says what, and mostly I just think of them as “Billbert”, so I’m not going to bother looking up who said what exactly! But they said again and again and again and again and again that DOllhouse wouldn’t come back, and they were wrong! They were wrong like communism! Wrong like murder! Wrong like doing anything that Joss doesn’t like, ever!
Again, I’ve never seen this “Southland” show! But I have skimmed a lot of the articles about it, in the mistaken impression that perhaps “Southland” was in some way relevant to my life!
So I saw when Billbert said that no cable network would ever want the show! And I saw when Billbert said that TNT might not even air the episodes til spring! And I saw, just a week ago, when Billbert was convinced that the contracts were null and void! “Southland” fans, did you happen to read the Ausiello article linked to above, where it says they’re actually on contract til January?! Yes, this is an another example of their wrongness!
Dollhouse! Dollhouse! Dollhouse! Dollhouse rules! A-certain-show-just-picked-up-by-TNT-that-I-won’t-mention-by-name-because-I-want-their-fans-on-my-side drools! Dollhouse!
People, if you hate Bill or Robert’s analysis so much, start your own site and the rest of us can pick you apart.
Tonight’s “Nip/Tuck” runs 61 minutes, “Sunny” runs 31 minutes, “The League” runs 35 minutes. Why couldn’t TNT do the same thing? (I’d expect reruns to be normal length.)
J.R Herbaugh, they don’t necessarily do that with more show. Mad Men added two minutes of commercials versus cutting content, to take it up to a 1:02 run time, but its episodes are 47-48 minutes in length already and Weiner didn’t want to cut them so they expanded with 2 extra minutes (of commercials) rather than cut them down.
TNT could do the same thing, just like ABC can do the same thing (it always steals a minute of Private Practice to get an extra minute of commercials in Grey’s). But for all you and I know The Closer already sometimes does run 1:01 but that wasn’t done by expanding the content, but rather the commercials.
Holly, why would they even think about filming more scenes if they don’t need the time?
LOL, JBF. But the unaired episodes won’t air until February. It might not be spring in terms of the earth’s orbit around
the sunJoss Whedon, but it is the “spring TV” season. We never predicted a cable network wouldn’t air the already made episodes of Dollhouse — that was expected. We merely predicted getting NEW episodes of Southland made would be an uphill climb. So far, no new episodes of the show have been ordered.We did get that Dollhouse thing wrong though. Once.
(Sorry, it’s not tonight, but Wednesday overnight.)
I think “The League” has extra content. Cable channels aren’t constrained. They can add content and commercials.
Wouldn’t it just take an editor and a director to insert cut footage?
why would you pay someone to do that?
I’ve never quite understood FX’s scheduling, considering that ‘It’s Always Sunny’ consistently runs under 22 minutes (or slightly above), which seems to be under even broadcast norms for 30 minute sitcoms. Based on a quick look (using the same idea as Robert) Nip/Tuck seems to run about a minute longer than the TNT shows. I guess it’s worth it for them to squeeze in a few more commercials – they’re getting around 10 minutes with some of the shorter episodes of ‘It’s Always Sunny!”
It’s also worth noting that I never noticed FX’s slightly odd scheduling until I got a DVR and started seeing weird times pop up.
JBF says they’re under contract. (Couldn’t there have been a director’s cut already, for DVDs perhaps?)
Patrick, FX did the same thing with “The Shield.” Like some of the current series, many episodes would run beyond their hour time slot, but for “The Shield” it was usually several minutes. FX would run an episode at 9 p.m. Central and then immediately re-run the episode. That second airing would frequently start at around 10:08 or 10:10 p.m. However, it was never consistent. Since I always caught the second airing, I had to be careful not to tune in too early or I would inadvertently catch the ending from the 9 p.m. showing.
J.R., there is zero info on a DVD in Amazon (no date for release set, can’t be preordered) so I doubt much has happened on that basis. Typically, with TV shows while there are “deleted scene” extras, there are usually no “directors cuts”.
But you guys are all missing the point of my post
TNT can do whatever it thinks is best, but the central notion of longer airtimes on TNT is just plain wrong.
I meant a director’s cut was made as SL was in production. Of course there are deleted scenes.
Longer airtimes on TNT aren’t unprecedented.
Yes, the statement “actual episodes will have more airtime on TNT” could be the result of a misinterpretation of “it will be aired more times on TNT.”
But I do think TNT has to do something to draw viewers to watch reruns for the first 7 weeks.
I could see a “director’s cut” version of the first episode happening that would be shown in a “limited commercial interruptions” style, but I agree – what’s the point? TNT should just advertise the hell out of the show and try to grab new viewers and then hope that the old fans jump on board when the S2 episodes start airing. Given TNT’s success with their own shows, I’d guess that marketing it like it never aired on NBC is the best way to go.
(forgot to credit SonicAD above)
We’ll see what happens. I can wait 60 days.
@Joss’s Biggest Fan,
Why are talking about Dollhouse when this topic is “ALL” about Southland, —–.
BTW,(By the way) —– <—you figure it out. Hint: this has five letters.
>:)
Well I doubt the third year, but why not add extra content in if its airing on cable?
because the episodes are ALREADY as long as the average TNT shows? Why doesn’t TNT add time to The Closer and Leverage and Dark Blue and Saving Grace?
Where is the outcry for expanded THE CLOSER episodes?
LOL
Robert, why didn’t you just cite the 7:42 am Monday story at Variety which says: “Turner won’t make many changes to the existing episodes — but Wright confirmed that TNT will indeed likely allow some expletives to remain unbleeped. “