Firefly 11/07 (1 Viewer)

[Amy Barnes]

"Nope, that was new Jossian prodigy Drew Goddard formerly of Six Feet Under"

Yummy--I'm delighted that Firefly lured over one of the Six Feet Under writers. From one great show to another!

 

[Dominik Droscher]

Actually Drew Goddard wrote the 5. Buffy episode, not Firefly.

 

[Amy Barnes]

My bad! Ah, heck, all great shows so all great writers!

Hope everyone here knows there's a rumor that this Friday's episode Ariel (Nov. 15th) will be the decision-maker for Fox. Make sure you and all your friends watch--especially if any of them have Nielsons boxes!

Anyone else as bummed as I was about how obviously out-of-order "Safe" felt? Until this episdoe the ordering hadn't bothered me too much, except that I thought it affected the pacing of the series a bit.

Where Simon says (no pun intended) that he hasn't seen any major injuries yet...so painful.

 

[Mark_Wilson]

a rumor that this Friday's episode Ariel (Nov. 15th) will be the decision-maker for Fox.

As in if it'll get renewed for another season? Any idea what numbers it'll have to hit for that?

 

[Jason Seaver]

Well, right now they're just talking "back nine" - new TV shows (and some returning shows) generally have a 13-episode (including the pilot) order, and if they do well, nine more are ordered for a "full"(*) 22-episode season.

It's probably not an issue of specific numbers, but an upward trend, positive demographics, how the half-hour splits compare (obviously, it's bad if 8:00-8:30 does significantly better than 8:30-9:00).

So far, Fox has picked up "Fastlane" and "John Doe" for the whole season, but mercy-killed "girls club" and "The Grubbs" early. Their pickups don't seem to bode well for "Firefly"; "John Doe" is doing significantly better (and likely costs significantly less) on the same night while "Fastlane" is surviving despite losing an entire month to baseball pre-emptions.


(*) I'm not sure when 22 became the standard for hourlong shows. Sitcoms often have 24, while Paramount produces 26 episodes of a "Star Trek" series a year, and star-based dramas may consider as few episodes as 18 a complete season. I'm convinced that the 22-episode season isn't long enough, though, especially on networks like UPN and WB that don't have much special programming to spread those episodes out.

 

[Patrick Sun]

Maybe it's from Fox producing X-Files (didn't it only have 22 episodes/year for quite a while now)? Also don't most hour-long shows require 8 shooting days (on average), vs. the half hour comedy requiring less days per episode.

 

[Jason Seaver]

Actually, I think the last few seasons of "The X-Files" actually had even fewer episodes (19-21), although it seems to have started about that time - "The Adventures Of Brisco County Junior" started the same year as "The X-Files" and had a two-hour pilot plus 26 hour-long episodes (and "The X-Files" had 24 episodes that first year), but I remember that being considered unusual.

Also, the "Law & Order" S1 boxset only has 22 episodes, so the practice must be >10 years old.

 

[Andrew Beacom]

I'll be watching and I've been spreading thw word to the Sci-Fi fans I know to take a look but I won't affect the ratings. I've never met or heard of anyone I know actually having a Nielsons box.

 

[Jeff Kleist]

Frankly, if some people on this forum didn't chime in that they were Nielsen families, I would still assume they were a myth

 

[Mark_Wilson]

I hope that ReplayTV sells their subscriber info to Neilson. Same for TiVo.

 

[Amy Barnes]

Some good news:
On the Firefly forum on Fox's official site, there are 2 people so far who have posted that they are Nielsen families. But one was only recently signed up (as in this week), so I don't know if the mysterious Nielsen system is up and running on his TV to help out tonight's episode.

As for the ratings goal, I haven't heard mention of a specific threshold Firefly will have to meet or of any percentage increase. Anyone heard anything like that?

 

[Jason Seaver]

That's because there isn't one. They'll evaluate the ratings after this weekend, maybe compare them to what next week's second-run movie gets, and decide what's best for their business.

 

[Robert Ringwald]

so I don't know if the mysterious Nielsen system is up and running on his TV to help out tonight's episode.

Tell him not to watch John Doe or the movie next week then. lol

Everyone get ready, this is our last chance to save Firefly. Unless however, the next 4 episodes score through the roof, but considering that probably wont happen...

 

[Mark_Wilson]

tonights Ep was good! Did anyone notice that there was no 'on next week's show' tonight?

 

[Robert Ringwald]

I think it's because there are 3 weeks of movies airing on Friday nights from now until Firefly and John Doe return in December.