Culture Wins One Over Commerce

So let me explain something. I'm not a musical person. I couldn't tell the difference between Nellie Furtado and Nellie McClung. Okay, that's wrong. I can tell you the differences between Nellie Furtado and Nellie McClung, but only because I know a little about Nellie McClung. When it comes to Nellie Furtado I'm a blank slate. So you can tell that the Juno Awards – Canada's answer to the Grammys and named for Pierre Juneau who as head of the CRTC introduced stringent Canadian Content regulations for TV and Radio – don't exactly turn my world upside down even though they're in my home town of Saskatoon. In fact if I got on my bike and used a short cut I know about I could reach TCU Place – formerly Saskatchewan Place – temporary home of the Junos and normally home of the mighty, mighty (pitiful) Saskatoon Blades in about 20 minutes. But I wouldn't because quite frankly I could care less. I mean right now I'm listening to CBC's Radio 2 right now and they don't play the sort of thing that gets honoured at awards shows, at least not on the TV broadcast. Face it, when was the last time you saw the Grammy for best Classical Album awarded during the television broadcast? Yeah that's right, never.

But I am all about the TV and that's where the Junos suddenly became interesting. You see the Junos were scheduled to start at 7 p.m. on Sunday night. That's 7 p.m. Saskatoon time, which is Central Standard Time which really means it's Mountain Daylight Time (but just try explaining that to people around here). The problem is that we as Canadians live in a country that spans five and a half time zones, and if you'll recall the list of the most popular shows I ran last Monday, most Canadians watch The Amazing Race on Sundays. That includes me, as I`m sure you all know by now.

So the folks at CTV faced a conundrum: do they show the Junos live and move The Amazing Race out of its normal timeslot in most of the country, or run The Amazing Race at its usual time which coincides with the time that CBS shows it in the United States and cable systems across Canada (except of course for Saskatchewan which is too odd and unimportant for them to adjust the schedule so that US shows are seen at the same time that the American stations in Detroit show them). Really it was a no-brainer – they decided to do the right thing... and tape delay the Junos in most of the country, including Saskatchewan.

Apparently there was outrage. I`m not entirely sure from whom but there was outrage felt. When I first found out about this decision, I contacted Diane Kristine, who not only does the fine blog Unified Theory of Nothing Much but also created the website TV Eh! What`s Up in Canadian TV. Her reaction was admittedly a bit more musically interested than mine but still similar. Essentially she felt that the Juno show would receive better ratings with The Amazing Race as a lead in than going head to head with the American feed of the show. She did preface her statement with a "sadly", which I probably wouldn't have done. Actually I do know where a lot of the outrage came from – the Canadian music industry. According to a statement from CTV and the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, there was an "overwhelming feedback" from artists, managers and record labels. "They were feeling that . . . it really looked as though we were treating Canadian music in a way that made it look like second-class citizens," said CARAS chairman Stephen Stohn. "We reacted immediately to that and said, 'No, the important thing is: Canadian music comes number 1.' " Both CARAS and CTV had initially agreed to scheduling the Junos after The Amazing Race, which usually draws an audience of over 2 million viewers, as a way to increase viewership of the awards show. It's not without precedent – two years ago the Junos were tape delayed because it conflicted with Desperate Housewives. Initially the Junos were to air live in the Atlantic provinces (at 10 p.m.) and Alberta (at 7 p.m. – they get their American channels from Spokane in the Pacific time zone) and by tape delay in the rest of Canada including Saskatoon. The current plan has the show starting at 5 p.m. CST rather than as originally scheduled at 7 p.m. and airing live in Atlantic Canada, Ontario, Quebec, Saskatchewan and Alberta. It will still be tape delayed in Manitoba and British Columbia, and will be reaired in Saskatchewan at 9 p.m.

Writer Denis McGrath who is a staunch defender of Canadian TV production was very much opposed to CTV's decision. In a post on his blog Dead Things ON Sticks he wrote "that pesky culture vs. commerce thing keeps rearing its ugly head, too, all because of the peculiarity of broadcasting in Canada: private broadcasters make their money by aping and piggybacking on U.S. nets, NOT by developing and broadcasting their own programs." He follows this up with an interesting observation "I've said this before, but it bears repeating: the very same arguments made against continuing subsidies and support for the domestic TV industry were made against Cancon in music. Yet Cancon rules for radio allowed the Canadian industry to mature, grow, and eventually become popular; popular enough that a Canadian private network would face a difficult choice between two properties.... If Canadian TV hasn't reached a popularity point with audiences yet that rivals the Junos, it's a problem of implementation – NOT basic philosophy." Frankly I think he's right to a point, although music – and a home-grown self-sufficient music industry – is a lot easier and less expensive to develop than television shows or a home-grown and self sufficient television industry. But that's a subject for another day. Suffice it to say that the current model, which not only allows Canadian stations and networks to buy American product but encourages them to do so through the mechanism of simultaneous substitution (which puts the Canadian signal – and advertising – over the top of the same American signal on cable systems) is not one that will encourage quality Canadian production or the development of a domestic industry. That's a crutch that private radio never had and may explain why the Canadian Content regulations for radio spawned a viable and vibrant recording industry in Canada.

Short Takes – March 25, 2007

Okay, I made the transition to the New Blogger and for the most part it was painless. All I had to do was create a new Google account and even that wasn't overly painful. Who knew? Apparently not the people who set up this transition process in the first place but that, of course, is a whole other story. Changes are coming; you may have noticed the addition of labels below the posts – and because I'm an anal sort I'll eventually get every post (over 500 of them) appropriately labelled – and then there's the long desired (by me) redefinition of my template. But that's for the future.

ABC renews shows for next year: I think this makes them the first network to do so. Among the shows renewed are new series Men in Trees, Ugly Betty, and Brothers & Sisters, and returning series Lost, Desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy, Dancing With The Stars, The Bachelor, Boston Legal, Extreme Makeover Home Edition, and Jimmy Kimmel Live. Significantly there is no word about Six Degrees (one of those rare shows that has returned from an early relegation to the status of "indefinite hiatus", but which has had a significant retooling by the network), nor is there any mention of the network's conventional comedy series including According to Jim and George Lopez as well as new shows Knights of Prosperity and In Case of Emergency.

Ratings show Canadians love US shows: In my last post I mentioned that of the Canadian broadcast networks CBC was the one I was most likely to watch because I chose to watch the other networks' offerings on the original American network. Here are the top 10 shows on Canadian TV courtesy of the BBM – essentially Canada's answer to the Nielsen Ratings:

1. American Idol (Tuesday) - CTV
   
2. Grey's Anatomy - CTV
   
3. American Idol (Wednesday) - CTV
   
4. Corner Gas - CTV
   
5. CSI: Miami - CTV
   
6. Amazing Race All Stars - CTV
   
7. Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader? - Global
   
8. Criminal Minds - CTV
   
9. Hockey Night In Canada – Game 1 - CBC
   
10. CTV Evening News - CTV
    

Of the ten shows, only three are made in Canada – Corner Gas, Hockey Night In Canada, and CTV Evening News – and only Corner Gas is a scripted, non-news program. And we can see which network bought the most popular American programming.

Guidance and common sense: Patricia Harrison, the Republican appointed president of the Corporation For Public Broadcasting, recently made some wide ranging statements about the organization she heads. The principal thrust of her speech at a Media Institute lunch was primarily about seeking guidance from journalism schools to "define journalistic objectivity and balance on public broadcasting." According to Harrison, "public media consumers already believe noncommercial TV is nonpartisan and unbiased."

Harrison had opinions about other aspects of public broadcasting. She stated that she was shocked when the FCC fined a non-commercial station for airing profanities when it showed the Martin Scorsese Blues documentary. According to Harrison, "common sense could dictate that there is a world of difference between the casual, gratuitous profanity in a run-of-the-mill sitcom as opposed to its contextual use in a documentary like The Blues." She also worried about the effect that this sort of "censorship before the fact" will have a chilling effect on other stations and producers. She's a bit behind the times on this one. We know from the private sector that is has exactly that sort of effect. The decision by a large number of commercial stations not to air the movie because of profanity despite the fact that it had aired previously and had not been subject to FCC action is exactly the sort of chilling effect that Harrison is talking about. It is an action that says that it is better to be safe than sorry and it has become more pervasive in these days of increased FCC fines and advocacy groups mounting massive mailing campaigns with pre-printed form letters of complaint for people who are "outraged" even if they never saw the show in question.

Who does the PTC hate this week?: Well they're still hating on the same episode of The Black Donellys as they were last week. And they are continuing their assault on the V-Chip. In an address to the Association of National Advertisers' Forum on March 20, as reported in Advertising Age, PTC President Tim Winter alleged that 80% of the V-Chip ratings assigned to shows were wrong as determined by a study undertaken by the PTC. According to Winter, this represented "fraud by many of the broadcasters and the networks. ... They rate [the programs] inaccurately and that way the V-chip doesn't block the programming. You're duped. Families are duped. And if the rating system is wrong, the V-chip can't work." However, it seems to me that a study by the PTC on the V-Chip is on the lines of a self-fulfilling prophecy; the ratings are determined to be wrong by the PTC but it is in the interest of the PTC for the ratings to be wrong. If all you see a statement that "80% of the V-Chip ratings assigned to shows are wrong" aren't you being duped if you aren't told that the organization that is making that statement is vehemently opposed to the very idea of the V-Chip?

Who hates the PTC this week?: As a matter of fact it's the very organization that Tim Winter was addressing, the Association of National Advertisers. Winter repeated the usual PTC line; the V-Chip doesn't work, that there needs to be a la carte pricing for cable so people aren't forced to subsidise shows that have graphic content, and that the PTC wants to work with advertisers so that they don't fund "evil" shows. Among Winter's statements: "I believe there is a cartel … a fraud that the cable industry … has perpetrated on consumers," and "Our goal is to have collaborative efforts to help you reach your demographic market. We want you to win. We want to do it a way that hopefully does not encourage or sponsor graphic anti-family programming."

Winter was in enemy territory on this one though as reported by Variety's Multi Channel News. Dan Jaffe, the ANA's executive vice president of government relations stated that "What we have always said is that we don't want to have censorship in this society, where some group becomes a surrogate parent, for a surrogate person to decide what should come into the home. Parents should have that power." At least one delegate suggested that companies who are targeted by PTC letter and email campaigns should be able to sue for restraint of trade. One attendee wanted his money back because he felt that the forum was a waste of time: "This conversation is ridiculous as an advertiser. You have a television. You have a remote control. Turn it off tell your daughter to leave the room." In a poll taken during the ANA panel, a significant minority – 41% – felt threatened by advocacy groups like the PTC, but not one felt that advocacy groups like the PTC should be given the responsibility of shielding children from what they watch on TV.

Winters reportedly appreciated the difference in opinion but "I think it's unfortunate that it has to be so venomous." Perhaps he should ask himself and his group who made it so venomous - I don't think it was the advertisers. Certainly through its Family Friendly Programming Forum and the Forum's Script Development Fund, the ANA has done more that is positive in terms of getting family friendly programming on the air than anyone at the PTC ever has.

My Top 15 TV Channels – At The Moment

The guys over at TVSquad.com have taken note of a report from the New York Daily News (one of the great newspapers in my opinion) which says that while the average American household gets over 100 TV channels (104.92 to be precise) thanks to cable and/or satellite, most of them only watch about 15 of them on any sort of regular basis. Which is interesting and may explain the cable industry's reluctance – to say the least – to the idea of a la carte pricing, but that's a whole different story. The Daily News article doesn't give any listing of which 15 channels are the most popular amongst the viewers surveyed. I suspect that it would reveal that the mass of religious channels collectively are on the list of fewer people than any one of the shopping channels which are in turn dwarfed as a group by the stations that serve up that diet of violent and sexual content that the PTC rails against.

As I never get tired of reminding you gentle readers, I am Canadian. This means that most of my pop culture is American but the delivery mechanism is usually from Canadian channels. Some of them are tied to an American partner, like HGTV or Food Network Canada, while others are independent and only linked to American channels by buying their product. The History Channel in Canada is one really big example. All it shares with the History Channel in the USA is the name. The point is that while there are apparent similarities between any list that I can produce and an American viewer's list, there are big differences. And as I implied in the title for this post what stations are on my top 15 list can change – often quite quickly. Right now for example I`m beginning to become interested in the W Network (formerly The Women`s Network) in part because they`re showing The Closer.

Before I reveal my list, I should present a few statistics. My cable service provider is Shaw Cable and I subscribe to their digital cable package. I have access to 157 channels – not counting listings channels, text channels, Pay Per View channels, and HD channels – of which I take 89. This includes time shifting stations for ABC, NBC, CBS, Fox, and PBS as well as three CW stations (now that Shaw gives us the Chicago feed of WGN rather than the national feed). And my top 15 channels (in approximate order of popularity) are:

1. CBS
   
2. NBC
   
3. ABC
   
4. FOX
   
5. TSN (sports)
   
6. Sportsnet
   
7. Space: The Imagination Station (science fiction)
   
8. The History Channel
   
9. G4-TechTV
   
10. BBC Canada
    
11. Canadian Learning Television
    
12. Food Network
    
13. CBC
    
14. The Score (sports)
    
15. The Weather Network
    

There's only one Canadian broadcast station on that list – the CBC – and there's a good reason for that. CTV and Global, the two private networks available in this area, are primarily in the business of rebroadcasting American shows and normally I tune to the US stations to see those programs. And the Canadian stations know that which is why they schedule most of their American shows at the same time as they air in the US market and simultaneously substitute (simsub or as most people prefer simulcast) their signal over what is coming from the American source. There are no all-news channels on that list since I tend to browse for that sort of thing. If there were the list would have CBC Newsworld and BBC World far ahead of CNN and Headline News (particularly since Headline News abandoned its original premise and has become the Glenn Beck-Nancy Grace Network). And despite three CW feeds there's really only one show that I watch on that network, Smallville.

So those are my 15 networks. What are yours?

The New Computer Is Here!

It arrived Friday, just after noon, which is odd since I got a phone call the day before from Dell that it had been shipped. Of course that was a week after the Dell website told me that it had been shipped. I'm confessed that I'm very excited but I'm sure that will wear off. No trouble setting it up except for getting the speakers to work – turns out I forgot to plug them in. You're going to have to indulge me on this for a minute or two and then I promise not to write anything more about it – yeah right.

Instant observations:

• This thing is fast. On the computer that I was using since my old E Machine died I would sometimes type faster than the computer was ready to accept characters. Not happening here. In performance terms the difference is like between a Ferrari and a Lada or a Trabant.
  
• The other big thing that I've noticed is just how quiet this machine is compared with every other computer that I've owned, with the possible exception of my first computer, an XT clone. Compared this with either the E Machine or the PII that I've been using is like the difference between a hybrid cars, like a Prius, and a 747.
  
• As far as Vista goes, I haven't had any problems with it. There are some nice gimmicks, but I don't know that it is a huge jump up from XP. If I didn't need a new computer I wouldn't have upgraded (not that the E Machine would have been up for it) but since I did have to get a new machine I am glad that I waited for Vista.
  
• I'm also enjoying using Office 2007. The ribbon bar looks like it could take some getting used to but it seems reasonably intuitive. One thing I like is the ability to write blog entries and post them directly to Blogger with no intermediary.
  
• The one problem so far is really outmoded technology on my part – not only does the machine not have a floppy drive (by my choice – they actually do offer one) but there`s no parallel port for my printer. I can`t get to the back of the printer right now but hopefully it has a USB port or I`ll have to figure something else out.
  

All in all I`m very happy. We`ll have to see how long that feeling lasts.

Update: No problem with the computer, but when I tried logging into Blogger I had a problem, namely that I can't log into Blogger! At least not the version that I use, and I can't change to the new one, so I have to post this using Word and hope that it posts properly. In the immortal words of Chester A. Riley (who was played on TV by both William Bendix – who created the role on radio – and Jackie Gleason) "What a revoltin' development!"

Update to the Update: Problem resolved. I don't know how but it's fixed!

The Dead Do Tell Tales

Like Allison Dubois, Detective Michael Raines sees dead people. But at least he knows he’s nuts.

A few years ago television took a dip into the supernatural or the otherworldly. Maybe it started with Touched By An Angel or even earlier with Highway To Heaven. The trend continued with Joan of Arcadia where Amber Tamblyn’s character talked with God although God tended to take on different faces from episode to episode. Things turned a bit more secular with Ghost Whisperer starring Jennifer Love Hewitt where an antique dealer helps the spirits of the dead “cross over”, Medium where Patricia Arquette gets psychic visions. Then there was the short-lived Tru Calling where Eliza Dushku tried to prevent the deaths of people she encountered in her job at the morgue. Famously, when Les Moonves cancelled Joan Of Arcadia he made a comment about ghosts being more relevant to younger audiences than God.

The thing that sets these shows apart is belief. Patricia Arquette’s character Allison Dubois (based on a real-life psychic of the same name) believes in her visions in the same way that Jennifer Love Hewitt’s character (who has some qualities in common with “medium” James van Pragh) believes in her ghosts or Joan of Arcadia believed in her discussions with God. A lot of people would look at these characters and their beliefs and claim that they are crazy. Indeed I am aware of people who won’t watch Medium because of the connection with the real life Allison Dubois because of what they believe is her insanity. Personally I fund such an attitude unfortunate since it isn’t a bad show even with the premise. Raines is a show that takes the premise in a different direction.

Michael Raines is psychologically troubled, following the shooting of his former partner during an encounter with a drug dealer. He seems to have been under psychiatric care and we know that his Captain (played by Matt Craven) is concerned enough that when he hears that Raines has been talking to himself he worries that Michael might not be capable of doing the job. When Raines goes to the apartment of murder victim Sandy Boudreau he encounters a woman who is a dead ringer for the young woman. Dead is the operative word – she is Sandy Boudreau, or at least Michael’s vision of her. He has hallucinations about her but the hallucinations are based on what he knows about her at the time and what he sees changes. He discovers in the course of his investigation that Sandy wasn’t just a college student but was in fact a high-class escort and this changes her somewhat. When it seems that she is involved in a blackmail scheme, his vision of Sandy briefly changes into a version of Kathleen Turner in Body Heat – complete with cigarette – and just as quickly turns back when Raines calls her on it.

The mystery in the pilot episode of Raines was relatively straightforward with the usual sort of twists and turns that one finds in this sort of detective show. The first person arrested for the crime quite obviously didn’t do it, and while the victim’s ex-boyfriend initially seems to be an obvious suspect he is also cleared, although he provides an important clue in solving the mystery. What makes this show tick is Raines himself and his ability to identify with the victim and give them a personality based on what he knows about them. As his ex-partner Charlie (played in the pilot by Malik Yoba and in later episodes by Luis Guzman) reminds him, with Raines it’s all about the victims. (There’s a revelation about Charlie at the end of the episode that I won’t reveal here but which should have been patently obvious to anyone with half a brain.)

The supporting cast of Raines is reasonably good although in truth they haven’t been given too much to do so far. Besides Matt Craven, the cast includes Nicole Sullivan as civilian employee Carolyn Crumley, and Dov Davidoff and Linda Park as a couple of uniformed cops. On the whole though the supporting characters didn’t have that much to do in the pilot episode. It was all about Raines, which means that Jeff Goldblum is front and center for virtually the entire episode. Goldblum is an actor that I have always enjoyed going back to his first series, 1980’s Tenspeed and Brown Shoe with Ben Vereen. Goldblum isn’t breaking new ground here in terms of expanding his range; he is playing his standard brilliant but eccentric character which he does very well. He’s a good fit for the character and that’s a good thing considering how much of the show revolves around him. I can’t say that there aren’t others who could play this role and do a very good job with it, but there are none that could do it better than Jeff Goldblum.

Writer and producer Graham Yost has given us a show that isn’t overly challenging in the way that his previous effort Boomtown was. Raines is a fun show and if one were to offer comparisons – as TV critics inevitably do – it would be to a show like Monk or Psych rather than to heavier, more serious fare like the Law & Order franchise, or even to a show like Crossing Jordan. In fact the comparison with Monk may be the most accurate of all in that both Adrian Monk and Michael Raines are psychologically damaged goods, due in part at least to a traumatic and violent experience in their recent past. What I liked about the show and what impressed me most about it is the way it took the fascination with the paranormal and reversed it. Michael Raines doesn’t believe that he’s seeing real ghosts or that he has somehow been gifted with some sort of great power. He knows that he is psychologically troubled but he also comes to realise that his hallucinations and delusions are his way of organizing his thoughts about the cases that he is dealing with. I like this show well enough to recommend it for what it is, a light entertainment with a first rate actor and one which takes a different, more rational, approach to this whole business of communing with the dead. NBC cut their order for Raines from thirteen to seven episodes but I for one wouldn’t mind seeing more.

Short Takes - March 12, 2007

A short one this time around. I've got a list of reasons for not writing much, mainly things I did today. We had a lot of snow over the winter and it is starting to melt. Which is good. On the other hand if the snow is packed around your basement windows then when it melts the water on the outside can very easily end up on the inside - of my basement. That's a bad thing. I also had to dig some channels to get melting water away from the part of my garage where most of my brother's stuff is stored, and also open the storm drain which the city so kindly covered with about four feet of snow. And then after that I assembled a flat pack desk for my mother. The door on the desk wouldn't open properly so screw it. So basically not much time to aggregate news about TV today.

Sitcom Wars: From my friend Teletoby over at Inner Toob comes word of a March Madness style survey from the Florida Times-Union in Jacksonville to "Pick the greatest character in Television history!" At least that's what they say at the top of the survey although what they actually mean is the greatest sitcom character. And actually it is the greatest American sitcom character - no foreigners need apply. (Toby actually apologized to me for the lack of international representation but when it comes to Canada pickings are slim; Red Green and his nephew Harold, and Brent Leroy from Corner Gas leap to mind but there isn't much else - no one associated with Pardon My French or The Trouble With Tracy would ever be confused with great sitcom characters). Actually the big scandal isn't the lack of international representation but who isn't on the list. Only 64 characters were on the list but over 300 were considered and I'm still trying to figure out how you miss some of these people. Among the absent are:

• Dr. Johnny Fever, WKRP in Cincinnati
• Granny Moses (listed as Granny Clampett by the paper, but she was a Jed's mother-in-law), The Beverly Hillbillies
• Oscar Madison, The Odd Couple
• Maynard G. Krebs, The Affairs of Dobie Gillis
• Chandler Bing, Friends
• Fran Fein, The Nanny
• Niles the Butler, The Nanny
• Wilhelm Klink, Hogan's Heroes
• Bert Campbell, Soap
• Jessica Tait, Soap
  

and a host of others. The newspaper has it's reasons but frankly some of them seem kind of weak. But anyway go there and make your voice heard, and I'll respect you ... even if you do prefer Norm Peterson to Sergeant Schultz.

Who does the PTC hate this week?: And the winner is CSI:Miami. The episode in question is the February 26 episode, described by the PTC as "a horrific display of sexual violence, murder, and political scandal." The episode is difficult to explain but apparently the PTC disliked the fact that one of the victims was a stripper/prostitute who was accidentally killed giving a blowjob (not of course the word the PTC used) to a guy who was sitting on her chest. Things are further complicated by the deliberate murder of the prostitute's bodyguard. Or maybe it was that Horatio discovers that - horror of horrors - a politician was patronizing the same service that provided prostitute who was killed. The PTC says that "Graphic dramatizations of strippers, murder and the dead bodies that result, earn C.S.I. Miami our pick for Worst of the Week." This is followed by the concluding statement "Graphic murders and prostitutes being raped are simply not appropriate for family entertainment. Such themes should be troubling to all who are exposed them, yet shows like this champion the effort to make them appear normal and even acceptable." Sorry but even for the PTC this is weak. For one thing I'm not entirely sure what they're objecting to. For heavens sake this is a cop show and more over it is a cop show that airs in the third hour not in the first or second. There wasn't that much about the episode that was particularly graphic. Let's face it, the PTC is grasping at straws in calling this their worst of the week and not doing a very good job of holding onto them.

New computer watch: Expected delivery date is March 19 (seven days!) but my mother's friend Mary (the one who persuaded me to buy a Dell) figures I should get it by the end of the week. Which means I have some files to transfer before it gets here.

Dudes I'm Gettin' a Dell

I just ordered my new computer from Dell. It's a Dimension E351 with the AMD Athlon 64 X2 Dual Core 4200+ processor, 2 Gigs of memory, NVIDIA GeForce 7300LE with TurboCache video card, 250 Gig hard drive, a 2.1 Speaker system, DVD ROM and DVD +/- RW drives, Vista Premium, Office Home Student edition. Oh yeah, and a three year subscription to McAfee Security Center. No monitor - I have a very good low mileage CRT. It's probably not the best system I could have set up for my needs, but it's a damn sight better than what I'm currently using and a lot better than my old (and now dead) E Machine.

The whole ordering process was quite frankly a nightmare. Any time I clicked on a link for information it opened a pop-up and then the whole thing refused to let me go any further with a handy "page not found" error message. Had me half-way to ripping out my hair even if I can't afford to lose any more.

By the way (to steer this peripherally back to TV for a moment) have you noticed that Dell computers are increasingly more visible on TV shows? As everyone knows, the Mac used to dominate on TV shows. The heroes would use a gleaming white Mac while the Evil Bad Guys - and this extended down to their well intentioned but misguided dupes - would be toiling away on a generic beige PC box. Increasingly you are seeing more and more Dells - or at least Dell monitors with that big DELL logo discretely embossed on the back - being used by the heroes of various TV shows. That's not why I bought one of course.

Feel free to forward words of congratulation, condolence, or advice. Offers of financial aid wouldn't be rejected either.

Is This The Medium For This Message?

Monday night I wasn't feeling well. Actually I was feeling like crap, spelled with and "s" and a "t", so with great reluctance I decided not to go bowling. So what do you do when you're too sick to really do much of anything. Well being a good child of TV it decided to veg out in front of the Tube and be entertained. Well strictly speaking I fell asleep in front of the TV and woke up part way through Heroes. I did however watch the second episode of The Black Donnellys.

Maybe it's because I wasn't feeling good or maybe just because I hadn't seen the first episode, but the truth is I wasn't impressed. The series focuses on the four Donnelly brothers - Jimmy, Kevin, Sean and Tommy - and Jenny Reilly, who is described as being "attached at the hip." The story is told by "Joey Ice Cream" an associate of the Donnellys who, while he isn't a major character in the show may be one of the most interesting parts of the concept. The Donnelly brothers are, to use an extremely appropriate British expression, "bent." Even Tommy Donnelly (Jonathon Tucker), the family's only honest man, is really only honest in relative to his brothers. Tommy believes he owes a debt to his brother Jimmy (Tom Guiry) who was crippled in a childhood accident that Tommy caused and which led Jimmy into drug addiction. Things are set in motion when Jimmy kidnaps and then kills Louis, his brother Kevin's (Billy Lush) bookie. The trouble is that Louis is the nephew of Sal the head of the local Italian mob. The Italians pay a ransom Things escalated further out of control when youngest brother Sean was nearly beaten to death by the local Italian mob, and the deal that Huey, local Irish mob fixer negotiates means that Jimmy will be killed. Tommy came up with a "brilliant" plan that included killing both the Italian and Irish bosses, and getting his brother Jimmy arrested so that he can get rehab for his drug problem.

That much I figured out about the first episode from watching the second. For me the second episode was a problem. It involves cleaning up the mess that the events of the previous day had left. Tommy Kevin had to replace the clothes they were wearing when they killed Sal Huey which meant some shoplifting (aluminum foil - who knew!) but the biggest mess was the body of Louis the Bookie which Jimmy "hid" in the dumpster behind the bar he owns. The need a place to dump the body and it's sort of a dark comedy of errors (the Jersey swamp where Kevin suggests dumping it has been turned into a shopping mall) but at least half of the episode's 57 minutes (with commercials) is given over to getting rid of the body. I thought it was a bit too much. But then I was sick at the time so maybe my patience with the episode was less than it could have been.

I mentioned earlier that one of the most interesting concepts in the show might be the use of "Joey Ice Cream" as the narrator. Joey, played by Kevin Nobbs, is telling the story of the Donnelly Brothers while he is in jail - to two cops in the first episode, to his lawyer in the second. While there are other shows that use narrators to tell their stories, they are for the most part both omniscient and trustworthy. Mary Alice Young (and in the most recent episode Rex Van De Kamp) on Desperate Housewives and Meredith on Grey's Anatomy come to mind. "Joey Ice Cream" isn't trustworthy which leads us to question whether he's actually omniscient. We know that he inserts himself into the story to elevate his status. At various times he tells us that the Donnelly's don't make a move without him, but we know that he inserts himself into scenes where he wasn't originally present. On at least two occasions in the second episode when his lawyer asks how he knows certain things he says that he was there, which comes as a surprise to the characters in the story he's narrating. Which of course leads to a question of trust. If we can't believe that Joey witnessed these events how can we be sure that they actually happened or that they happened in exactly the way that Joey says they did. How much of the story that Joey is telling is real and how much of it is fiction?

The Black Donnellys has a lot of the things that a show needs to have to succeed. The performance from Tucker and Lush, who were the two main characters that we saw were quite strong, and many of the lesser characters were well acted as well. Of particular interest was Kate Mulgrew as the flinty matriarch of the Donnelly family. She didn't have many lines but her actions - as when she adjusted Kevin's jacket to hide a blood stain indicated that she knew her boys had done something bad but she was standing behind them without question. The writing was also quite good in that for the most part we believe in the characters and the character who we are least able to accept is the one who by definition we aren't supposed to find acceptable, "Joey Ice Cream."

Still, on the whole the thing doesn't work, at least not on network television. And it's not as if the show's creator, Paul Haggis, doesn't know how to do network TV. Before he wrote Crash and entered a creative relationship with Clint Eastwood that created things like Million Dollar Baby and Letters from Iwo Jima he did a lot of TV including thirtysomething, Family Law, Due South, and even Facts of Life. He's even credited with creating Walker, Texas Ranger. But The Black Donnellys doesn't work. For one thing it's continuity-heavy in a television environment that right now at least doesn't have much patience with continuity-heavy television. For another thing I'm not entirely certain that the show works well with the commercial interruptions that are a requisite of TV's "big tent". The biggest thing though is that for me at least there was always the feeling that "real" small time Irish hoods - and their Italian counterparts for that matter - would be using language that is far stronger than what the FCC will allow to assault the pristine ears, let alone show scenes of sex and (in particular for a show like this) violence that a network executive wouldn't allow on the air even if the FCC didn't exist. I think that The Black Donnellys would be earning far more acclaim (not to mention higher ratings) if it were allow to show what these people would be like on one of the higher end cable stations. Because as it stands I don't think the show works and most of the problems could be solved if the show weren't restricted by laws and network presidents.

But then again I had a raging headache that got progressively worse on Monday night, so what do I know?

I Return From Hiatus - Unlike A Lot Of TV Shows

Wow!

I really didn't intend to go that long without posting or without hoisting the old Campbell's soup can, the internationally recognised symbol of an extended period of not posting. Thing is that we've been so focused on getting the last of Greg's stuff out of his old house and transferring the property to the new owners that it took up most of the time when I'd be doing the stuff I'd normally do, like writing (or even reading) and playing Poker online. I started a couple of posts but just haven't had time to wrap them up.

Fortunately the new owner of my brother's place took possession on Thursday - actually we gave him the keys on Wednesday so my brother - who had already moved to the Vancouver area at the start of February which was why our mother and I had had to deal with so much of the property situation - can get on with his life (or more likely worry about other stuff) and I can get back to doing the stuff I enjoy. At least I can after I rest up for a couple of days.

Short Takes - February 12, 2007

I haven't been writing much lately: I know I haven't written much, and I've got a lot of shows that I should be writing about, including Heroes, Little Mosque On The Prairie,and Studio 60 before it goes on hiatus, and probably a whole bunch of other shows, but I haven't been doing it. I meant to write about the return of Robson Arms but I lay down for a nap and the $500 alarm clock (aka my TV) wasn't loud enough to wake me up (my ears plug up sometimes). There are several reasons but the big one is just how annoying I find it to write blog entries on this old computer. Then too there's been all the drama surrounding my brother moving to British Columbia and my mother and I having to finishing the packing here while he works at his new job in Langley. These things will pass: Greg's stuff has to be out of his old house by the end of the month and I hope to have a new computer by the end of the month as well (at the risk of reviving an old commercial pitch man, "Dudes, I'm probably getting a Dell"). Now if someone could just tell me what the best security set up for Vista is.

Actually there is something else I've been doing lately: And it has been impinging on my writing time. A little over a year ago I started playing on the Hollywood Stock Exchange, and after a year I'm starting to get the hang of it. In fact I've got a spreadsheet and started a second portfolio to test out a couple of ideas. I'm having fun, but it is taking time.

I am not the father of Anna Nicole's daughter: In fact, not only did I not have sex with that woman, there wasn't enough money on earth for me to have been interested in having sex with her.

That said I suppose that it's only fitting that her death played itself out on cable TV and the entertainment "news" shows because so much of her life played out in those venues. Sure, she was in Playboy first but most of the other aspects of her life played out on cable TV and shows like Entertainment Tonight. Her marriage to J. Howard Marshall was a fixture of the tabloids - both the print and TV type - and her court battles over Marshall's estate was a fixture on Court TV, the cable news networks, and the entertainment "news" shows. She starred in her own Osbourne style reality TV show for a time. Her daughter's birth and her son's death just three days later were in the media results of her son's second autopsy - paid for by Smith herself - was announced on CNN's Larry King Show. So it isn't surprising that Anna Nichole's own death was given blanket coverage by cable TV.

There is something disturbing about the way that much of the dealt with Smith's death. The American cable news outlets - CNN, Fox News, and MSNBC - all offered hours of blanket coverage of Smith's death, to the point where Lou Dobbs stated at the beginning of his program on the day of her death that he would not mention Anna Nichole Smith in the hour of his show. Meanwhile, although all of the network news shows aired a mention of Smith's death none of them led with the story. NBC led with NBC broadcaster Tim Russert's testimony at the trial of Lewis "Scooter" Libby, while ABC and CBS both ran stories about a new study on the increased number of children suffering from autism. The nightly network news broadcast - at least according to a lot of people, many of whom are associated with the cable news industry - is supposedly a dying form, but in this case they did a better job of delivering actual news in a half hour package than their competitors in the cable industry did.

It was such a divergence in content that during the NBC newscast anchor Brian Williams stated "This may say a lot about our current culture of celebrity and media these days when all the major cable news networks switched over to nonstop live coverage this afternoon when word arrived that Anna Nicole Smith had died." In MediaBistro's report on the coverage, a viewer stated that "Much TV coverage was extended when Gerald Ford died; I, like many people, was not alive when Ford was president, and sadly, I know Anna Nicole better than Ford. Cable news shouldn't feel guilty for covering something that is news." It is a sad commentary on so many levels that people thought they "knew" Anna Nichole Smith. What they "knew" was an image filtered through the sleazier parts of the media. Anna Nichole Smith didn't have the sort of impact on anyone that a president, or even an actress like Marilyn Monroe had. Anna Nichole Smith was a media creation (because in the end she did little to deserve the attention she received) and her death was deemed to be news - and got far greater attention than it deserved - because the media convinced people that she was more important than the real issues of the day.

Who does the PTC hate this week?: The PTC site was down for a while and I noticed that something was taken off (I believe it was a complaint about an "F"-bomb dropped on Don Imus's MSNBC show). But there is something else. It seems as though there are certain shows that just irritate the PTC. One of these is Las Vegas but another is Two and a Half Men. The latter show is the one that currently has the PTC's "knickers in a twist" as at least some Brits would say. According to the PTC's current "worst of the week", the episode in question is a "careless discussion of promiscuous sex, masturbation, and infidelity in front of a young boy is evidence of the network’s (CBS) complete disregard for family viewers at 9:00 p.m. (8:00 in the Central and Mountain time zones)." The set up for the show was that 12-year-old Jake has overheard his mother and her boyfriend having sex night after night. In the words of the PTC, "Instead of displaying responsible parenting and helping Jake to understand complexities of what he has heard, Jake’s father (Alan), uncle (Charlie), and housekeeper begin a dialogue rich in kinky sexual innuendo that carries on for the entirety of the show." Later in the episode "Charlie discovers repressed memories of watching his mother having sex with several different men and one woman. He agonizes over the trauma the memories have caused him. When he tries to confront his mother about the memories he once again catches his mother in the act of promiscuous sex with a strange man." In summation the PTC states that "The irony of the episode it that it carelessly documents the trauma a young boy experienced and the developmental problems he faces after being exposed to reckless sex, while at the same time broadcasting the content for millions of young viewers to digest."

The PTC didn't just label Two and a Half Men as their worst show of the week though. They also sent out one of their usual press releases in which they demand that "unwitting sponsors" of this filth should demand a refund of their money. Of course if they did know the content the advertisers should "seriously evaluate how their customers will feel when they learn of the sponsor’s decision to underwrite references to bestiality, masturbation with fresh produce, and other graphic sexual dialog. Is this truly the kind of content they want to associate with their hard-earned corporate brands? We certainly intend to inform the public as to which sponsors knew what they were underwriting." And then they throw in this one just to seal the outrage: “Not only was the dialogue inappropriate for children watching during that early prime time hour, but the actor playing Jake who was involved in just about every scene is 13-year-old Angus Jones. It vexing that CBS would pay a child to say such things.” True. When I was that age we'd say such things for free and think we were sophisticated.

Okay, here's a couple my comments on this whole thing. First I would be surprised if anyone doesn't know the sort of content that is seen on Two and a Half Men if for no other reason than the fact that the PTC keeps harping on it. I've never watched the show but I've got a pretty good idea of what's going on. As far as why the show didn't engage in a display of "responsible parenting" by "helping Jake to understand complexities of what he has heard" well let's remember that this is a comedy in the 21st century rather than the 1980s when the "very special episode" was a dominant feature (it seemed like every episode of Blossom was labelled a "very special episode, but maybe it was just me) and what the PTC wanted the show to do was not only not in keeping with the nature of the show but dare I say it not funny - although the prospect of Charlie Sheen helping any kid to "understand complexities of what he has heard" has considerable comedic potential. In the end it comes down to the PTC, in the guise of protecting children, wanting to decide what everyone is allowed to watch rather than giving actual parents credit for knowing what is suitable for their own children.

Poll Results - Which of these series is the best new show so far this season?

Fandom. You gotta love it. Well actually you don't. I can imagine that there are a ton of executives at various networks and studios who dearly wish that fans of a show or a movie would just give them their money and then go docilely home like the little sheep they imagine them to be once the thing - whether it's a TV series or a movie - is over and not bother them about it again. Of course the people who run movie studios and TV networks don't understand Fandom. I once heard a story - which may or may not be true - about the preparations for the original Star Trek movie. It seems that the execs at Paramount were ready to start production when a little movie called Star Wars came out. Paramount immediately shelved the Star Trek movie on the grounds that the science fiction fans had spent all their money on Star Wars (and all the licensed stuff associated with it that made George Lucas wealthy beyond the dreams of avarice). I don't know if it's true but it makes a good story.

I've been a Fan - I was a Dueser (Due South), a Browncoat (Firefly) and enough of a Trekker that I watched all six series, including the animated one from Filmation that made Hanna-Barbera animation look like Disney at its best. Fans can save shows - I doubt that Arrested Development would have lasted as long as it did without a devoted cohort of fans (a cohort, by the way, is a Roman military unit smaller than a legion - if Arrested Development had a legion of fans it might still be on). I sometimes wonder why Fans gravitate to the shows they do. Beauty and the Beast with Linda Hamilton and Ron Perlman was a Fan Favourite with a lot of the fans being women who found the character of Vincent "romantic". Which was true, but if you looked at the series a bit harder you realized that Vincent was a character who solved his problems (usually a threat to Catherine) by eviscerating his enemies. I'm just saying.

All of which brings me to the most recent poll. I got hit by "Kidnappers" - fans of the series Kidnapped - in a big way. More votes were cast than in any of my previous polls ever! Interestingly enough if you took out the votes for Kidnapped it was still one of the highest number of votes cast in one of these. And most of these were votes by individuals; despite a rather flawed execution on my part I was able to blog multiple voters for most of the polling period. I know because I tested it with a vote of my own.

So anyway, the results. Seventy-six votes were case. Tied for tenth place with no votes were Standoff, The Game, 'Til Death, Men In Trees, Big Day, and Justice. In a tie for seventh place with one vote (1%) each were Jericho, Shark, and The Class. In a tie for fifth place with two votes each (2%) were 30 Rock and Ugly Betty. In fourth place with three votes (3%) was Friday Night Lights while Studio 60 finished third with four votes (5%). The second place finisher was Heroes with eight votes (10%). However the overwhelming winner, with fifty-four votes, 71% of those cast was Kidnapped. As just about everyone should have expected.

For the record, the show I voted for as a test was Friday Night Lights but the reason I cast my vote for that show is because I think that it is a criminally overlooked gem of a show, and I am so glad that the powers that be at NBC are supporting it even while I agree with the "Kidnappers" that the network thoroughly mishandled Kidnapped almost from the moment it was announced in the network's first variation of their schedule. Here's the interesting thing in my opinion anyway: of the nine shows that got votes in this poll, five are on NBC and all of them got more than one vote. Only one other show - ABC's Ugly Betty - managed to do that. That's all of the NBC shows on the list. Of those five only one is secure in terms of ratings and that's Heroes. It seems then that in the opinion of the readers of this blog, NBC has produced the best shows of the season, Nielson ratings be damned. Very interesting stuff indeed.

I have an idea for a new poll which will be up shortly, after I look for a better polling client.

It's National Gorilla Suit Day!

Sorry I'm late in posting this but I spent a little too much time celebrating Gorilla Suit Eve - you know how it is.

It's been a relatively quiet Gorilla Suit Day around here. The weather prevents the traditional throwing of banana peels. They tend to freeze and by the time they thaw out it is, well rather disgusting. Another problem around here because of the weather is that you can't always tell when people are wearing their Gorilla Suits until they get to a party. There is nothing more pathetic than wearing a Gorilla Suit under a parka. I am going to a party tonight - we even have Fester Bestertester pinata.

Anyway, while surfing the web for an appropriate picture to put here, I found the mother lode at this site and its attendant gallery page. But I still haven't found a picture of the infamous Wayne Shuster Gorilla Suit.

And now the traditional National Gorilla Suit Day music, courtesy of the Nairobi Trio.

Why Microsoft Released Vista Today

Because Bill Gates knew that if he released it on National Gorilla Suit Day no one would pay attention.

(Including him!)

For Sam And Ivan

Since two of my favourite blogging buddies, Sam Johnson and Ivan Shreve are both from Savannah Georgia, I immediately thought of them when I came upon this bit of YouTubery the TVSquad site. Admittedly the the local anchorman treats the subject like a caveman introducing a new invention called "the wheel" and at the end seems astonished that there are so many people who would come to such an event, but remember how local news all over the place covered Star Trek conventions and Comics Conventions in the past. Actually, come to think of it they still cover them the same way. Local news anchors - names and faces may change from place to place but never the qualities that keeps them in local markets.

Not Quite Short Takes

Normally on Saturday or Sunday I have been running a series of posts that I call "Short Takes" where I discuss bits of TV business. I've missed a few posts since Christmas and really I don't have my usual resources to do one today. However, I can't possibly let the opportunity provided by the influx of Kidnapped fandom pass without a mention of my nemesis, the Parents Television Council and some of their recent antics.

Who does the PTC like this week?: They actually do like some TV shows, but unfortunately they tend to be the most innocuous sort of show possible. Quality is not an issue. Take for example this week's "Best Show Of The Week" - none other than Grease: You're The One That I Want! According to the PTC the show is "clean, fun entertainment for the whole family." That's not what I called it. Among other things I wrote "I just can't see this having anything but abysmal ratings and as far as I'm concerned that's no less than it deserves." The PTC does not have similar fears. They say "While it may not become the juggernaut that is American Idol, it appeals to audiences of all ages and celebrates some of the best of American culture." I fear for American culture of Grease is the best of it just as I fear for anyone who ignores the lack of quality represented by Grease: You're The One That I Want! in the name of supposedly family friendly programming.

Who does the PTC hate this week?: As usual they hate Las Vegas, which is a fun guilty pleasure show of mine. This time it was the fact that the show supposedly "featured" a sex toy called the "Frisky Ferret" - presumably a vibrator, since I don't recall it ever actually being shown just mentioned - and because the episode in question featured naked older women. According to the PTC "The women are shown on several occasions topless, barely covering themselves with magazines or fruit." This is of course a common practice in movies and TV shows to imply nudity without showing nudity. But of course to the PTC implying nudity or any sort of sexuality (or indeed, as in the case of Studio 60, the possibility that people might possibly have sex even if there's no indication that the show is going in that direction) is evil evil evil.

But of course that's not all the PTC currently has a hate on for. There's the Fox Network. It seems that during the Philadelphia-New Orleans football game a couple of weeks ago a Fox Sports camera man lingered on a young woman wearing a shirt that said "F*ck da Eagles" with the * being exactly the letter U thought it was. By lingered I mean spent all of three seconds on her (based on a YouTube clip of the incident) of which the offensive word was visible for a total of about one second. Most of the rest of the three second shot she was jumping up and down. To the PTC this translated into "The shot stayed focused on the woman and her shirt for several seconds. There can be no doubt that this was an intentional airing of patently offensive language on the public airwaves." For their part Fox apologized for the incident, which it described as unintentional and inadvertent. The apology was publicized three days after the game aired. This wasn't good enough for the PTC who in a later press release claimed that the Fox apology was hypocritical: "How can families take the Fox apology seriously when (1) they are suing in Federal Court demanding the ‘right’ to air the F-word when children are in the audience, (2) they could have taken simple steps to ensure such material does not air but they refuse to do so.” This is in reference to an appeal by Fox against an FCC fine being heard before the Second Circuit Court in New York. In the case in question Fox was fined after Bono used the same word the woman had on her shirt during a live awards ceremony. It seems to me that the PTC wants everything their way - they get the right to decide what is and isn't acceptable on the "public" airwaves through the medium of computer generated protest letters, but anyone else - in particular the TV networks and the industry as a whole - attempting to avail themselves of their constitutional right of appeal is evil, and that anything being said by them should be dismissed as hypocrisy.

Charles Lane Is 102 Years Young

There are certain traditions that I like to observe in this blog and I nearly forgot one this year, in part because for the last time I am dog sitting for my brother at his place. But really, how could I forget to remember Charles Lane's birthday. The man, who by some accounts is America's (or at least Hollywood's) oldest living actor) is 102 years young today. Why Ernest Borgnine, who turned 90 this week, is a mere infant by comparison. So is Paul Newman (82) who shares his birthday.

While Charles Lane is old enough to have been in silent movies, his first screen credit actually dates to 1933 in something called Blondie Johnson, although he had uncredited work for a couple of years before that. Charles Lane's film career is probably best known for his collaboration with Frank Capra. Lane appeared in nine Capra films: Broadway Bill (1934), Mr. Deeds Goes To Town (1936), You Can't Take It With You (1938), Mr. Smith Goes To Washington (1939), Arsenic & Old Lace (1944), It's A Wonderful Life (1946), Riding High (1950), and Here Comes The Groom (1951). What's probably less well known is just how far back his relationship with Lucille Ball went back. They first movie they are both credited with appearing was a 1933 Wallace Beery-George Raft film called The Bowery - neither was credited and they probably never met during the filming. They appeared in six other films together before working in television on I Love Lucy and The Lucy Show.

Aftre 1953 the vast majority of Charles Lane's roles were in television where he usually played a crusty curmudgeon, or just a mean old man at odds with the lead players. Nowhere is this more true than in what is arguably his most famous TV role, Petticoat Junction's Homer Bedloe - a man who would make Mr. Potter in It's A Wonderful Life seem like an old softie - the cost cutting railway man who made it his personal mission to eliminate the Hooteville Cannonball and the Shady Rest Hotel from the face of the earth despite orders from his boss Norman Curtis. Of course he was always bested by Kate Bradley (or Aunt Helen or Dr. Janet Craig), but like Wile E. Coyote you always knew he'd be back with another devious scheme. Although at one point Homer got frustrated and went to work for Milburn Drysdale at the Commerce Bank of Beverly Hills where he ran into Jed Clampett. (In the photo above he's seen with the Bea Benaderet, Linda Kaye Henning, and what looks to be the original Billie Jo and Bobbie Jo, Jeannine Riley and Pat Woodell.)

Charles Lane is one of the few remaining survivors of the San Francisco Earthquake of 1906, one of thefounding members of the founding members of the Screen Actors Guild, and one of the founders of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences. Happy Birthday, Mr. Lane!

Because It's The Right Thing To Do

We interrupt the current stream of nothing much to remind you of the bestest holiday of all.

Because you know it's what naked Lucy would do.

Poll Update - I Screwed Up

If you voted in the current poll before 1 a.m. on Tuesday January 23, please vote again based on the question that is posted.

Apparently I forgot to change the poll question, thereby causing some possible confusion among readers as to what I wanted. In fact there was a question about that in the comments -Savannah expressed some confusion and I'm sure others did as well - so what I've done is reset the stats back to zero and done a couple of other things that will hopeful allow people who have voted to cast votes again. This should allow one vote per person for the entire week, I hope. One of the reasons why I'm looking for a different polling service is that the one I'm using makes some things I want to do difficult to carry out.

In the post that announced the poll I said there was something fishy about the results of the "which show should have been cancelled" poll that seemed a little fishy. In a nut shell here it is, and I hope no one takes offense. No poll that I have run in this blog has ever attracted more than maybe 25 voters - most attracted far fewer - and this one attracted 47 or 48. While the difference may be perfectly innocent, there was enough of a seed of doubt planted that I decided to err on the side of caution. I hope this explanation is acceptable - I certainly meant no offense to anyone.

New Poll - Which of these series is the best new show so far this season?

I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to set this poll up the way I wanted it but also in a way that would satisfy some of the people who are reading the blog. My original intention was to list just the shows that managed to make it to the beginning fo January without being cancelled. But of course there were some shows that the public didn't warm to that were superior to some of the shows that made it this far. And yet I didn't want to add all of the cancelled shows. So what I've decided is to add the two shows that I missed in the "shows that should have been cancelled" poll, plus the top vote getter in the "shows that shouldn't have been cancelled" poll, plus a certain show which had people demanding a revote, and drop 1 vs. 100. Also, because of some of the things that happened in the previous poll I will be activating "cookie checking" function which will prevent multiple votes from a single user. It's not that I don't trust the people who voted but given the history of previous polls here this result seemed somewhat fishy. And then I think I might go looking for a different polling service.

Please feel free to comment on this poll.

A Review Of Poll Comments

I knew 'Big Day' was basically going to be allowed to wrap things up, although probably sooner than they expected. And among most of the shows that I don't watch on that list, I had nothing really against them to merit giving them the thumb's down.

But there were two,for the most part equally balanced - 'Til Death' and '1 vs 100'.

However, I'll always go with a scripted show (no matter how bad) over a game show. So the Saget show goes. - Tele-Toby

I understand the sentiment, although I have reservations because it strikes at one of my favourite of any type (you know it - The Amazing Race) which when it comes down to it is a game show.

Well....I have seen at least one or two episodes of most of these shows....except for basically anything on ABC at this point.

Wow ABC is terrible.....I have minutes worth of most of their recent shows if that.....They got really lucky with Lost because the rest of their programming is trash....and NBC seems to be following.

Fox and CBS are really starting to take over with prime time shows I'd say.

So anyway....I went with 30 Rock. The only real bright spot to that show is that Alec Baldwin(though I can not stand the man himself) is truly AMAZING. He has gotten better and better over the years as a comedic actor and he is just hysterical in everything he has been a part of recently. Why Tracy Morgan is still on TV at all is beyond me.....He should only appear on such shows as the Surreal Life or Armed and Famous because he is just completely unintelligent and unfunny. The fact that NBC axes a show like Kidnapped and yet 30 Rock is still on T.V. is pretty sad. - William

I'll probably disagree with you to a degree on NBC. Several of there shows are among my favourites, while I think that FOX made an absolute hash of their new line up, a problem which was compounded by the need to accommodate the Baseball playoffs. From the episodes I've seen of 30 Rock I can't say that I'm a huge Tracy Morgan fan but my problem its the actor or the way the character is written.

Thanks for putting this up and sorry that I missed your last poll (I would have totally voted for Kidnapped)! Wow, most of the shows on here deserve to be cancelled, I just don't see many that are really that worthy of television (especially since Kidnapped was cancelled)...so I voted for Heroes because it is being told that it is the best new show and everything like that, and I watch Heroes, but it lost all of the respect that I had towards it when NBC just started caring about that show instead of all their other shows (especially Kidnapped)...so I had to vote for Heroes!! - KMcMurray

Hazard of the business I'm afraid. Kidnapped wasn't cancelled due to a lack of quality but rather a lack of viewers. I put the blame for this squarely on NBC's programming chief Kevin Reilly for making a massive shift in the schedule in late May after ABC announced their schedule. I am convinced that if Kidnapped had debuted on Tuesday night opposite Boston Legal and Smith it would still be around, or at least would have been allowed to show 13 episodes.

I vote Heroes to go down! I watch the first 3-episodes and forced myself to sit through them; for me, so childish!
Now give me Kidnapped as a rerun or as a revived second series, then you've got me hooked all over again! Kidnapped Rocks!!!

It's not going to happen. The best that anyone can hope for is that NBC and the production company will release the show as it exists on DVD. Considering some of the lesser material that gets released these days it is not beyond the realm of possibility.