Being two years into the TV blogging experience at this point, I completely accept that no matter what the show is, and no matter what the ratings, every scripted show finds its fans.
I also accept that there's no winning when it comes to trying to get anyone to agree on quality. No matter the show, somebody will like it.
Defying Gravity appears to be floating around in limbo as to what ABC will do with it. Though if it looks canceled, isn't on the schedule and ABC doesn't respond to requests... In the post discussing DG's status, someone chimed in with comments they read on IMDB (they didn't like to the forum thread but if someone posts the link, I'll add it here):
“They’ve already filmed 13 episodes – it isn’t owned by ABC which is the reason they don’t promote it. You’ll notice, Shark Tank, Flash Forward, Modern Family & Cougartown are owned by ABC, which is why they promote them soooooo much that most people are sick of them before they even start.
I recorded 3 weeks worth of ABC prime time programming just for a little experiment:
Shark Tank -Avg 4-6 promos an evening
Modern Family – Avg 8 to 10 promos an evening
Flash Forward – Avg 8 to 10 promos an evening
Cougartown – Avg 4 promos an evening
Defying Gravity – 0 promos for the entire 3 weeks”
The anecdotal survey results might well be correct, but otherwise there is a whole lot wrong with that. Starting with...
OF COURSE Networks DO promote shows they don't own
House isn't owned by FOX. It's owned by NBC Universal. FOX promotes the hell out of it. Fringe isn't owned by FOX, it's owned by Warner Brothers. FOX promotes the hell out it. Two and a Half Men isn't owned by CBS, it's owned by Warner Brothers. CBS promotes the hell out of it.
Even on cable, networks promote shows they don't own. Like Burn Notice which airs on the NBC Universal owned USA Network but is made by Fox Television Studios.
Networks absolutely promote products they don't own.
And yes, even ABC will promote shows that perform well, or that they hope will perform well, that they don't own. Want proof? ABC doesn't own Modern Family! That is produced by 20th Century Fox Television. And according to the person above's anecdotal research, it was tied for the most-heavily promoted program by ABC. Even though ABC doesn't own it!
Of COURSE networks promote the shows on their upcoming fall schedules!
Leaving aside the fact that ABC doesn't even own Modern Family, the sitcom it thinks has the best prospects for success in the new season, or for that matter, Shark Tank, of course ABC is promoting the shows on its fall schedule. Just like every other network will promote their fall shows.
It's fair to second-guess network executives when it comes to having opinions about whether they picked the right shows. But it's not fair to second-guess the notion that networks picked the shows they thought would perform the best. It's idiotic to second-guess the networks for promoting those shows prior to the fall season.
ABC might not have had high hopes for Defying Gravity, but it did promote it!
I know for a fact ABC promoted DG , and on air, on the network, because that's how I found out about that. Typically I'm a big fan of shows set in space so I was "Oooh, what's that!?" and went to log-in to ABC's media site to see if a screener of the pilot was available. I watched it. I thought it was OK. Not amazing, but not horrible either. I watched the second episode and it was losing steam for me. About 20 minutes into the third episode, I was like, "eh, I think I'll play some Tiger Woods Golf instead.
All that means is that it wasn't for me. No big deal. But at least in the first few weeks, even after the premiere, ABC did promote the show.
Defying Gravity's Ratings Stunk
Even with some promotion in the early going, DG's numbers stunk. They weren't borderline. They weren't merely mediocre. They were frakking awful. They just plain sucked. That's really unfortunate for the relative few fans of the show, but the relative few fans don't change the fact that the ratings absolutely stunk.
Even factoring in the live+7 DVR viewing numbers for the weeks where it is available, DG's season-to-date adults 18-49 rating is a 1.0. That's horrible.
For the first two or three weeks ABC even tried to find nice things to say about it in its press releases anyway. But it quickly got to the point of if there isn't anything nice to say, don't say anything at all.
With limited air time available to promote things, why promote something you've already given up on?
I can't fault ABC for not promoting Defying Gravity after the first few weeks. The results stunk and it was obvious the show wasn't going to perform at even modest levels. Why invest further in it? It's perfectly reasonable if ABC didn't promote something it had no hope for based on results. Even when ABC promoted the show, the numbers stunk and were getting worse.
The bigger wonder to me on that score is that ABC kept it on the schedule, at least through September 13, but don't be too surprised if that winds up changing.
I think the Fox Friday 8:00pm block will tank. Firstly, Brothers looks horrible. It looks worse than Do Not Disturb and that got cancelled before you could say Nielsen. Secondly, I’ve only scene a couple ads for it among the countless ads for Fox’s SYTYCD/Glee night. Coupled with poor ratings performer ‘Tl Death and that’s just asking for trouble. To top it all off, they’re using this mediocre comedy block to lead into Dollhouse…wtf?! They should try to optimize the synergy for its Friday night lineup – Human Target?
All this has been bugging me for sometime now :@
i don’t think abc ever promoted this outside of abc itself, i rarely watch abc during summer, nothing on but reality crap…everybody knew this was a dump so they stayed away
I live in Canada (I get CTV and ABC) and CTV would market it as Grey’s Anatomy in space and often promoted the hell out of the fact that one of Grey’s Anatomy’s former producers was involved. I feel like ABC fell for that fact.
Even in Canada it didn’t rate well and CTV moved it to the Friday ghetto,
Lets face it, Defying Gravity is boring as all hell. There are no real compelling characters and the Mars/Alien angle is weak at best, at least up to this point. I like a few of the actors and I have watched every episode but if this is any indication on how boring it is to be an astronaut then it’s no wonder Congress keeps cutting Nasa’s budget. I don’t blame ABC one bit for not spending any money to advertise the show. Actually I don’t see what they ever saw in this show to begin with.
“Defying Gravity is boring as hell” is not a fair comment. It isn’t just boring, it is plain bad. The premise is weak, but then the way the story is told is bad, the characters are bad, the dialog is bad, the acting is bad. No amount of promotion could ever save this from flopping.
Seriously Robert, everytime I read one of your post I realize you are close to perfection!
You have to stop it!
All jokes aside, the post you quoted is obviously one of a fan, and I’ve learnt on my own skin that they live in their own world and they will always be right.
finally, someone who can appreciate my brilliance!
I saw TONS of commercials for this show on ABC for weeks leading up to its premiere. Then it debuted and bombed out. I still saw a lot of ads, for about two more weeks. Nothing, or almost nothing, since then, but why in the world should ABC throw good money after bad? The ratings weren’t borderline, or even close to it. It’s obvious this one isn’t going to make it. ABC is far better off giving the ad time to shows that still have a chance. It’s the right business decision.
This may be my favorite post I’ve ever read here. It is brilliant. I am just as much a fan girl for certain shows as the next person, but I also posess logic and I know that the networks are a business and the goal is to be profitable. Nothing wrong with that. I won’t say that a show has never been cancelled due to a network, either from stupidity or intentionally sabotoge *coughfireflycough* but the majority of the time a show simply doesn’t perform and has to go despite any small but fiercely loyal it may have garnered. I tried DG, actually still watching mostly because of Ron Livingston and the lack of shows on right now (most summer are gone, and fall hasn’t really started yet) but honestly I’m surprised its still on the air. Its a goner and no amount of promotion is going to change that so why should ABC waste its promo time beating a dead horse.
That post was from an anonymous source Robert… I think it was you!
Whats the point of ABC promoting Defying Gravity if the ratings are terrible? Its better they promote shows that will actually do well like Flash Forward and Modern Family.
You said the ratings in Canada were bad. What were they?
Is Friday a worse night for TV than Sunday?
I’m watching DG only because I was expecting something a bit more. It continues to be flat and doesn’t seem to go anywhere. The episodes rely to heavily on back story, and even the stuff that would make it Fringe or Lost worthy are few and far in between and are never explained fully. the last couple of episodes could have been rolled into two maybe three tops and use back story to explain things later, but certainly not now.
JustTunedIn, I forget what the ratings were, someone posted some of them somewhere…we don’t track ratings for Canada here. In the USA Friday is definitely a worse night than Sunday. I imagine the same holds true for Canada.
Just adding to the point that Networks do promote shows they don’t own. I comment on EW.com website and as a commenter I got the chance to screen Modern Family early. It was funny and I could see why they would push it by giving free screenings.
Also in Canada Friday is horrible for tv just like in the US. Saturday is the only night that is worse
Defying Gravity is to many shades of bad. Its slow. Dull. Consisting mostly of flashbacks. No amount of promotion could have saved this stinker. If it was more of an action oriented 2001: A Space Odyssey series along the lines of the sequel 2010, it could have worked. The acting and dialog leave alot to be desired as well. It was a show I wanted to like, but couldnt.
Robert, If you want to know the weekly ratings in Canada this website posts the weekly top 30. http://www.bbm.ca/en/home.html … You might notice that the channels on the list are all Canadian (CTV, Global, A Channel) but that is because when the show is on both a Canadian Channel and an American (like Big Brother on CBS and Global) the Global feed overrides the CBS feed for the hour so all ratings would show as Global.
The problem with the DG’s promotional ad’s is it did not promote the actual content of the show.
I thought it was going to be something it was not. And by the 3rd episode, I was like….. I was dooped.
The ad’s made it sound like a space exploration drama, where it was actually a suspense/thriller type with the whole ship being the bad character.
The reason they didn’t get good ratings is their target market with the promo’s would have been star trek fans, but I don’t think star trek fans would have liked the concept of the “bad computer ship”
When shows promo, they have to promo the actual content.
Another example, promo’s of Jericho focused on the nucleur bomb exploding, and that appealed to a certain crowd. When the show turned ubber drama on us, (story lines of divorces and relationships) , it lost a lot of it’s appeal with the people who were turned on by the promotional pieces.
A good promotion is Flash Forward, who has a promotional piece with a lot of disaster in the first scenes, but quickly squashes that it is about disaster, and is about relationships!
(on a side note: Bill- is there a way of getting a picture everytime I post like some people, I post everyday almost and don’t know how to register a picture)