Holy crap! NBC cancels 10pm! - Page 2

Leno's tenure has been The Tonight Show in name only since he first took the chair.

Okay, so let's figure this out. NBC really only has five nights of original programming. On Saturdays they show movies, and on Sundays they have football. (We'll ignore non-football Sundays because I'm pretty sure they just go all reality with those hours.) With Leno on at 10 p.m., that leaves them with only 10 hours to program.

One-hour dramas guaranteed to return are: LAW & ORDER; LAW & ORDER: SVU; and HEROES. You can also sadly count on at least one episode per week of DEAL OR NO DEAL and THE BIGGEST LOSER. There's half of your 10 hours right there.

The Thursday night comedy block will be back: EARL, THE OFFICE, 30 ROCK and either the upcoming comedy from THE OFFICE crew or something new to take its place. That's two more hours.

So, only three hours left. Do you keep LIFE and CHUCK and leave room for only one new show on the fall 2008 schedule? Highly doubtful, especially if any of their upcoming winter/spring shows fare better.

You have to assume that NBC will still want to launch a couple of new shows each fall to try to find something that could catch on with a large audience. That means there will be even less of a chance that ratings-challenged but creatively strong shows like FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS or CHUCK will ever be renewed by NBC.

I have a feeling they might try and co-opt some shows to USA similar to what they did with Law and Order:CI. If that happens I could see both Chuck and Life going there since USA seems to be the crime show network.

I wouldn't count EARL as a definite. I think its numbers are at an all-time low and still dropping. And while I'd wager it will be back, HEROES is probably a bubble show.

Is Kath and Kim doing well enough to come back? I find it pretty interminable, but they sell it like it's doing well.

HEROES still does extremely well in advertiser-friendly demographics. Season four is a given. (Hell, the network will probably even expect a creative rebound if Bryan Fuller is on board for the whole season. If anybody there really had balls they'd fire Kring and make Fuller showrunner.)

Here's a left-field thought -- what happens if Leno tanks? What if he doesn't translate to prime time, for whatever reason? Suddenly NBC has five hours of trouble every week.

I've heard from a couple of people I know who follow such things that Law and Order's ratings aren't that great this year either.

It'll be canceled. It draws less than five million viewers a week. (EARL is over six; THE OFFICE and 30 ROCK are over eight.) Plus, everyone knows KATH & KIM sucks.

Interesting thought. He will be going up against some heavy hitters.

Still though, as long as he's on it neuters Conan unless they won't allow Leno to book the big names.

I can't see that happening.

You have to also take into account a season is now Sept-June. They may streamline with zero reruns, enabling them to have a Fox-like schedule where you have one show end in December and another one picks up in January.

I could also see them pairing Chuck with Burn Notice on USA.

They already do this most nights. There are a few new shows premiering in January. KINGS is one of them. And NBC airs a whole bunch of first-run reality over the summer. But fall is still when the most promising new shows go.

If I remember correctly, both L&O and SVU premiered to low numbers. But they've picked up in the recent weeks.

NBC wants to beat Gunsmoke's record, which was on rival CBS. Dick Wolf knows how to create shows cheaply when he has to. It's for this reason that Law and Order will break 20 years.

Agreed. My guess is L&O hits 25 years.

Also, Chuck could very easily go to Sci-Fi as a BSG replacement.

Or USA Network like someone earlier suggested.

Actually, CHUCK and LIFE would both fit very nicely alongside BURN NOTICE, PSYCH, MONK and HOUSE reruns.

I could definitely see a third season of Life on USA.

I think Chuck would be a better fit for Sci-Fi, though. I can totally see Life (there's a show I need to watch on DVD) on the USA "Characters Welcome" network. I have a harder time seeing Chuck there.

The other thing is that FNL could easily stay on Direct TV exclusively, especially since their seasons are cable length now.

How have the ratings been so far for the DirecTV episodes?

Monk, Psych and Chuck would be a pretty solid lineup if Chuck did go to USA.

Then you could team up Law and Order:CI, Life and Burn Notice for a solid second night of programming.

Okay, I think. Not great, but it's a very limited audience.

If I'm not mistaken, this season is the last season for Monk.

Really. Where did you hear this?

I'm just glad Leno's going to be around for a long, long while.


LENO: Hey Kevin, what about these clowns in Congress huh? What's up with THOSE guys, huh?
EUBANKS: AW MAN DAT'S FUNNY JAY UH HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HAW HAW HUH HAW HUH HUH
LENO: Hey I hear Clinton's visiting town and you know what that means, dry cleaners dealing with loads of "stained dresses"? Am I right?
EUBANKS: (rolling around the floor and convulsing) AW HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HUH HAW HAW HUH HAH HAH HUH

Dave's having fun with this. They just announced that they were giving him an earlier time slot, too-- 4 A.M., right after the Slanket(TM) infomercial.

Heroes is coming back? Even after their shit third season buzz?

This statement made me laugh. "Creative rebound"? When did that hunk of crap ever bound in the first place?

This is Monk's final season. Here's the link. You'll be missed, OCD Matlock.

Jay has always appealed to the lowest common denominator, and him being located in Los Angeles definitely gives him more of the Hollywood feel. I think his ratings stay high because he does the obvious jokes that people expect and he gets bigtime guests who are hot right now and he panders to them just like all the "celebrity journalists" do during these press conferences.

I dont find the man funny at all, and cant stand his show. With that said, it is undeniable that his ratings are huge. NBC would be stupid to let him go to another network after supposedly forcing him out. Anyway, I think if this move doesn't work (which i dont think it will) they will have a big overhaul at the top of NBC TV and there will be a nice big reboot of the channel.

Also, I think Conan will be fine at the 11:30 slot. He was mentioning in yesterday's episode about moving to LA in the near future, so I am pretty sure he will be in Burbank by next summer, and frankly I think its time for a change for him. He needs new digs, he needs to shake things up.

I just wonder how much of the success he had with The Tonight Show was a factor of habit -- people watched because it was on after the news and it was what they'd always done. Will they want to watch the exact same thing at 10:00pm?

They should have done that quiet awhile back. The fact that Zucker is still around is nothing short of mind-boggling.

Im a huge dave apologist, and for years I tried to figure out why the hell Leno was trouncing Letterman in the ratings when Dave was putting on brilliant bits of non-sequitirs and my all time favorite "Biff Henderson at [insert place]" man on street sketches.

I came to the conclusion that Leno is just easier for joe six pack to get. He makes the jokes about how stupid politicians are, how expensive gas is, etc etc. While Dave does make those jokes too, i dont know when it happened probably about 2-3 years ago Dave's monologue has been drastically shortened compared to leno and conan. Now he does A WHOLE lot more behind the desk, which I appreciate more. I mean how many Bill Clinton is a horndog jokes can you make?

Anyway, good luck to Leno. I have come to respect his work ethic and have gotten the feeling that his heart is in the right place. He has said multiple times he still considers Dave Letterman a friend and owes a lot to him back when he had the 1230 show. unfortunately, leno's writing staff is made up of some of the worst writers this side of The simpsons (past 5-6 years)

Conan is all class. Seriously, that's a pretty nice thing for him to say, considering.

I really dislike Zucker. Along with Bush and Jon Peters, he's probably the best example I can think of how to fail upwards.

NBC just fired a boatload of their lower-level execs but kept Zucker and Silverman. Unbelievable.

Surely this doesn't mean we'll be seeing giant spiders and/or gay robots on Law & Order...

Not keeping Reilly was another boneheaded move. NBC is my favorite of the broadcast networks, because I'm the dork who has favorite networks, but 90 percent of that is due to their history rather than their current programming.

The thing about Leno is, yes, the man's work ethic is admirable, and he does a fine enough job. But who remembers what he said after 9/11? And how many times has Letterman's clip been played in retrospectives? I don't mean to bring up 9/11 into this discussion, but I think Letterman does a better job, a more memorable job, and has had more "watercooler" moments in the last five years than Leno's had in his entire career. And that's even discounting Conan's stuff, or Stewart, or Colbert, or even Kimmell in the last year with "fucking Matt Damon/Ben Affleck."

Leno does okay, but he's just "there." He's not the kind of talk-show host who is part of the culture like some of these other guys are.

Did you read that comedy-themed issue of Rolling Stone last month? Very interesting interview with Dave - I don't know if it's because of the bypass, Harry, or what, but he really seems to have buried the hatchet with Leno. Spoke respectfully of him and basically said that, yes, Leno probably just has more mass appeal. I disagree, or very reluctantly agree, but in any case, Letterman said he would invite Leno onto the show - as soon as he leaves NBC.

Not to be a total semantic prick, but you absolutely meant to bring 9/11 into the discussion - it's right there in your argument.

And while I appreciate that Letterman had a more memorable response to the event, I really do not see how their respective reactions have any bearing whatsoever on their abilities as late-night talk show hosts.

To my mind (and by all means, feel free to disagree), neither man has any responsibility to the people in making national sense of mass tragedy. That Letterman was arguably capable of doing so says something about who he is as a person and as an entertainer, but faulting Leno for not having clips that are played in retrospectives seems....I don't know....wrong somehow.

Nice to see Conan taking the highroad. I bet he's still pissed and rightly so.

What I was trying to say is that Leno may be popular, but that the other late night guys are more tapped into a cultural consciousness than he is. He's just there, every night, whereas the other guys seem to have a better handle on the pulse of the nation (or Conan/Stewart his demographics) than Leno does, especially in recent years. During the mid to late 90s, possibly, but now, it seems like again, he's been Tonight Show in Name Only. Dave's 9/11 response was the first one that sprung to mind, and it was probably the wrong one. I could have easily cited his smackdown of McCain, or his Paris Hilton interview, or his "feud" with Oprah.

Anyway, that's what I meant. Probably not the best analogy in retrospect.

They just scrolled down the "new 2009 NBC lineup," and it featured a full 24 hours of shows featuring Jay, Conan, Jimmy and Carson. Pretty funny stuff. Judge Jay airs in the afternoons.

The networks are built on an obsolete business model. Prepare for things to get a lot more extreme in the coming years.

Conan is too good for most of us. He truly is a class act. I washed my hands clean of Leno's antics years ago and I have no intention to go back.