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Showing posts with the label Scheduling Changes

Sci Fi Blasts "Battlestar" to a New Night

The crew of the Galactica is headed to a new destination: Sunday nights. Sci Fi has announced that it is relocating the third season of critically acclaimed drama Battlestar Galactica to Sunday evenings at 10 pm, beginning January 21st, coinciding with the second half of Battlestar Galactica 's third season and the launch of Sci Fi's newest drama, The Dresden Files . The latter series stars Paul Blackthorne ( 24 ) as Harry Dresden, a wizard turned private investigator. It's the first time that Sci Fi has tried launching a night of original programming on Sundays, which traditionally have been a mix of low-budget movies and acquired programs. But the success of this past summer's Eureka , which aired on Tuesdays evening, showed the network that it could launch a night of originals on another night than Friday. Not that Sundays are going to be a cake walk, either. Battlestar Galactica , which lost about .2 million viewers from last season, will now have to go head-to-hea

So Long, "Six Degrees"; ABC Replants "Trees"

Looks like maybe you can launch a series on Fridays, after all. That is, if you intend to move it to a better timeslot once one opens up. ABC has announced that it will move drama Men in Trees from its Friday night timeslot (one of the very worst berths in all of Television Land) to the plum post- Grey's Anatomy timeslot on Thursdays at 10 pm, beginning November 30th. And a further vote of confidence in the drama, ABC has ordered the back nine episodes of Men in Trees , bumping the series to a full 22-episode season in the process. It's the first full season pickup for a freshman series for Warner Bros. TV, the studio behind Men in Trees, and the third pickup for ABC , which previously announced it had ordered full seasons of Ugly Betty and Brothers & Sisters . (ABC is still weighing pickups on fellow freshman series The Nine and Help Me Help You .) So what does that mean for the current holder of the post- Grey's Anatomy timeslot, the struggling drama Six Degree

ABC Somewhat Confident in "Help," "Nine," and "Trees" While Cutting Trip Short for "Traveler"

Several series got some spirit-lifting today as NBC and ABC made some announcements regarding script orders, while one midseason entry has been dramatically cut back. ABC ordered additional four scripts of Ted Danson therapy comedy Help Me Help You, Anne Heche-led romantic drama Men in Trees , and struggling bank hostage drama The Nine . While it has not committed to ordering any more additional episodes, it at least means that the network is curious enough to see where the storylines are going before investing more money into producing fresh installments. It's a positive sign for the three series but I'd be curious to see how Help Me would do without Dancing with the Stars as a lead-in. As for the The Nine, with its dwindling retention out of Lost (and Lost disappearing off the schedule in less than two weeks now ), I don't see how ABC will commit to ordering a full season of the drama, unless Lost 's temporary replacement, Day Break , becomes a sleeper hit. That

NBC Revamps Thursday Nights with Single-Camera Comedy Block

I can't even tell you how thrilled I was yesterday to learn that NBC was going to revamp its Thursday night lineup, mere days after the Peacock announced that it was effectively going to destroy its 8 pm timeslot by filling it with cheap-to-produce reality fare like Deal or No Deal . Fortunately, Kevin Reilly didn't budge on keeping single-cam comedies My Name is Earl and The Office right where they are and shifting Tina Fey's 30 Rock to Thursdays and (finally!) bringing Scrubs back the schedule. Combined, these four series display the possibilities of the single camera format and I've been pleading with the networks to combine them into one single night of fantastic comedic TV. While CBS has its Monday night comedy lineup and CW its urban-themed laughers on the same night, there hasn't been one-stop shopping for single cam mirth until now. Sadly, I've been calling for this arrangement since the days of the dearly departed Arrested Development , but I'll

ABC Announces Return of "Lost" and Gives Primetime Schedule a "Makeover"

Looks like we have a return date for our trip to that creepy island, after all. ABC has announced that drama Lost will return from its (soon-to-be excruciatingly painful) hiatus on February 7th, a week earlier than originally expected. The series will wrap up the first half of its third season on November 8th (with a doozy of a cliffhanger, from what I hear) before disappearing for 13 weeks to make room for the Taye Diggs-led thriller Day Break . When Lost returns in February (mark your calendars now), it is expected to run through the rest of the season with brand-new episodes before wrapping up the season in May. Meanwhile, in a surprise move, ABC has pulled the plug on Extreme Makeover 's return to the airwaves after just one airing. (Yes, one airing!) The plastic surgery makeover series returned to ABC's primetime lineup last Friday, replacing repeats of Grey's Anatomy , but the network announced today that it was shelving Extreme Makeover due to the low, low, low