FOX and Firefly, Dark Angel, Space Above & Beyond ..... by AllianceSoldier

GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

FOX and Firefly, Dark Angel, Space Above & Beyond .....

POSTED BY: ALLIANCESOLDIER
UPDATED: Thursday, December 26, 2002 22:41
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VIEWED: 3192
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Saturday, December 21, 2002 9:04 AM

Sigh ....

FOX, and Rupert Murdoch in particular, have only one thing in mind. Money. They're like Disney and ABC - just more blunt about it. Shiong mao niao shows like American Idol and brain dead comedies like Malcom in the Middle that don't require you to think draw the younger and stupider crowd in droves .... and advertisers want numbers. Firefly draws a smaller, yet more intelligent crowd. Networks and Advertisers don't like intelligent people. I have to laugh, the FOX NEWS syndicate in our area is ALWAYS 2 days late on news from the other networks - obviously quality is not job one at FOX or any of its affiliates. If FOX could have aired Jackass, they would have. (And that pathetic "We're Sorry" statement about the awards show and not filtering out the vulgar language - they did that to boost ratings so some idiot will watch the next awards show to see if bad words go over the airwaves.)

Firefly was probably the only good series this season aside from 24. I can't take another dull LAW & ORDER rehash; Enterprise suffers from boring plotlines and lackluster goody-two-shoes characters; John Doe is just bad acting period (it should have been canned too) with a decent premise but lousy blah plots; and they can take all those reality/survivor shows and shove them back up the TV Exec's rearends.

Oh well - you know the old saying .... if you're too stupid to work at McDonalds, you can be a Network Exec for FOX. And man, does FOX have some losers at their programming helm.

Anyway, aside from 24, I'm sick of FOX doing this. FOX and its advertisers can jolly well pucker up and rutt'in kiss my gorram rear. Even their weekend sports lineup usually blows.

Yes Virginia - FOX can destroy two perfectly good sci-fi shows in the space of a year. Some Christmas present .....

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Saturday, December 21, 2002 9:15 AM

ROBERTSPARLING

I completely agree with everything you just said.

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Saturday, December 21, 2002 9:19 AM

HOTARUANNE

yeah, many of these stations are just....agh, no words can express this. FOX has been doing this to a lot of sci-fi shows...it makes them look like they hate sci-fi shows or something like that altogether. i don't even watch FOX anymore. :: shrugs :: firefly, alias & MDs are pretty much the only shows i watch now...

http://glaivemaster.cjb.net/
Just another Firefly fan

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Saturday, December 21, 2002 11:00 AM

XED

Absolutely 100% right.
Ya gotta wonder... I mean, why does Fox keep bakrolling and starting up these science fiction shows if they're just gonna sabotage 'em?
It's crazy.
And I mean that literally.
In fact, I am so far in agreement with you that I would go frather -- we've seen 24 before, and as good as it is, in all honesty this second season of 24 just hasn't got the full jolt of electricty that made the first season of 24 sizzle.
So for my money,k Firefly was THE single best show this year. Period. Hands down. Even with all its flaws.
In fact, I would go so far as to aver that the 2-hr pilot of Firefly is one of the THE best pilots for ANY show, ever. Period.
So why does Fox keep bankrolling these shows, then deliberately killing 'em?
And can you think of a better way to desribe Fox's insane decision NOT to show the 2-hr pilot? That's a decision to kill the show. Pure and simple. It's nuts. Just nuts.
So, you know, when you point out Fox and Murdoch are only after money...I gotta wonder. If they were *really* after money and nothing but money -- wouldn't they avoid sabatoging themselves?
I mean, we have a precedent for a show like Firefly which succeeded and turned into a monster hit -- HIll Street Blues. A character-driven ensemble show that took a long time to gain ratings.
But Hill Street Blues became a big money-maker for NBC after the first couple of seasons.
Fox seems so crazily self-destructive in sabotging Firefly (as well as the other shows you've mentioned) that it's downright perverse. Think about it -Fox spent millions of the Firefly pilot. I mean, the money was SPENT.
So why shelve the pilot...?
Once they've _spent_ the money on it, why not just SHOW THE GORRAM THING?
It makes no sense to me. None at all.
More: you'd think that if FOX wanted to make money, they'd give a richly complex ensemble-cast character-driven show like Firefly some time to gain momentum, wouldn't you? Doesn't history show that the biggest money-makers on series TV (Trek TOS comes to mind) often take years to gain momentum? Trek got poor ratings first couple of years. Yet now Trek is the crown jewel of Paramount. Shouldn't that tell Fox something...?
I dunno.
It's baffling, just completely baffling. Observing Fox's self-sabatoging behavior with sci-fi shows is like watching an intelligent sensible person saw off his own hand. You see it, you recognize it's happening...but it's just incomprehensible.

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Saturday, December 21, 2002 5:53 PM

THELEFTHAND

Andy Richter Controls the Universe is also a show that FOX got right. Though with its mid-season replacement status, it might not be around for too long.

One thing to keep in mind with FOX is that the network suffers from an inferiority complex. Of course, its not a complex if its true. FOX tries very hard to call itself one of the 'Big Four.' Unfortunately, you can't get from nowhere to top of the heap, or near the heap, in such a short amount of time. Very rarely does a show break out to strong ratings. And remember this, if any of the 'Big Three' networks had gotten Firefly, it wouldn't have lasted past the second episode.

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Saturday, December 21, 2002 7:11 PM

XED

Sadly, you're probably exactly right that the big three wouldn't even have touched Firefly with a barge pole. Firefly was just too different -- it's big strength, IMHO. Someone posted that they explained to their friends that Firefly wasn't really like ANY other show on TV. Yup. That was it strength, but from the narrow viewpoint of the networks, also its wekaness -- 'cause the networks just didn't know how to sell Firefly to audiences.
They couldn't just say, "Oh, here's another Law and Order ripoff" or "here's another game show."

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Thursday, December 26, 2002 10:41 PM

ALLIANCESOLDIER

Why does FOX keep bankrolling new shows only to kill them off before they can actually generate interest if they want to make money? Easy enough to explain ..... FOX is out to make the *fast* buck. They want something that becomes a cash cow in a handful of episodes. And if they don't see a major return in say 3 episodes in advertising revenue where they have the Proctor & Gambles, Budweisers, Walmarts or Sears ad execs with deep pockets beating down their door to get ad spots .... they go for something else. They want an X-Files or Simpsons series imediately at Pilot time.

FOX seems to forget that X-Files took a season or so to catch on (remember, it almost got canned too in its first season).

I hope someone like UPN picks up Firefly - heck .... PAX would be fine by me.

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