"TERMINATOR: The Sarah Connor Chronicles" Season 2 Thread (1 Viewer)

[Jeff Cooper]

I say this as a huge sci-fi fan, and a Heroes fan; Heroes viewership dropped like crazy after the first season, because the show started really sucking after the first season. Being sci-fi had nothing to do with it.

 

[Will_B]

Just reality.

 

[Jeffery_H]

Couldn't agree more about your statement on why Heroes is so bad. It all comes down to the writing and you either have the talent or you don't. Heroes season one is really pretty good. But like you said, being sci-fi had nothing to do with it at all. It's another show I wouldn't care if it returned or not.

 

[MikeyWeitz]

I saw it in the theater too (1st 3 actually) and do not recall getting picked on or beat up for it.

 

[Inspector Hammer!]

I take comfort in the fact that American Idol is the only reality competition where when you lose, you don't lose.

Adam will have a much more successful carreer than Kris, watch and see.

 

[Josh Dial]

:p

 

[Josh Steinberg]

We're probably gonna have to agree to disagree about that.... I don't think the later seasons were as consistently high quality as the first season, but I don't think the drop in quality was proportionate to the drop in ratings. I can only speak to anecdotal evidence from things like keeping up with the Heroes threads on the forum here during the broadcast, what co-workers and colleagues say, etc. And maybe this doesn't represent the whole reason why the ratings have dropped, but I've seen a lot of people complain that they don't like the show anymore because, well, of things that it's always been about. Having a comic book sensibility. "End of the world" scenarios with the future in peril. Characters with questionable motivations whose loyalty is never certain. Etc. There are probably plenty of people that no longer watch Heroes because they feel the quality dropped off, but I can't tell you how many people feel the drop in quality was because the show did things that a comic book show would/should do. They loved the extended "origin story" nature of the first season, showing ordinary people discovering these strange powers, but when the show tried to move beyond origin story territory and actually show that these are no longer ordinary people and have missions to go on and villains to stop and plots to uncover, they checked out. For me, I'm watching the first season and thinking it's great, and then being excited that now that everything's set up, let's see where they go.

Probably not the best example, though, I'll give you that.

Whoever posted that someone needs to overhaul how ratings are measured is absolutely right. The way we watch television has changed drastically within the past five to ten years, and yet we still have a system that decides what lives and what dies based on thirty year old standards. Broadcast ratings are still the holy grail, and while I don't deny their importance... something has to change because right now, DVR viewership, iTunes downloads, people streaming the show on Hulu or similar websites, DVD sales... those things barely count for anything, and that business model has to shift. As I said earlier, if Terminator had about three or four million "live" viewers each week, plus a couple million more from DVR watchers and web views, how does no one find a way to translate that into some kind of success? Nowadays, when a feature film is greenlit, or when deciding whether or not to make a sequel to a film, the movie studios are looking at the big picture, not only what the film will gross theatrically, but what they can get selling cable and broadcast rights, what the DVDs will sell, the shelf life of the film in the home video world... TV needs to find a way to do the same.

I know I'm going off on a total tangent here, but I just have one last thought to throw out for it... if I'm working at a network, I know I'd rather have a show that had a set number of loyal viewers that could always be counted on rather than just trying to chase successes and catch lightning in a bottle over and over with no real concern about the actual content. Reality TV and the like has its place, but shows with audiences that stay loyal should be able to find homes. I'm reminded of a recent experience I had with the show Fringe.. when it originally premiered, it looked like the kind of concept that might be interesting to me, but I ended up not checking it out, in part because I figured it was sure to be a goner, and I had no desire to get hooked on an all-new show only to see it canceled shortly after. But when they announced they were getting a second season, I felt compelled to go back and watch the show from the beginning, and I loved it. So there's that experience. I also think of the Dollhouse experience, where there was a great concept for a show in there, but it seemed like the network and the producers had a hard time figuring out the best way to get the viewer up to speed with the concept... as if they had to do a few "throwaway" episodes to try to explain the thing to people or whatever. The pilot aired was dull, the first few episodes were dull. As a viewer, I'd be a lot more receptive to a new show if it wasn't as pilot-oriented as it is now... give shows a six or a twelve episode story arc to begin with, make a commitment to air all of those shows, one a week without interruption, and make sure the viewer knows this. And instead of trying to fill every single minute of the day with television programs, how about taking a play from HBO's book and showing episodes a few times during the week? Have the premiere night in primetime, but then rerun the episode a couple times later in the week during dead zones, Friday or Saturday night, Sunday afternoon, whatever.

I dunno, the whole thing is frustrating... not just with Terminator but it feels that way with almost every show I'm watching these days is on the verge of cancelation, and I'd like broadcast television to continue to be more than reality TV, sitcoms, and police procedurals.

 

[Mikah Cerucco]

Why do people who know better continue to focus on viewing methods that do nothing for the advertisers paying for these shows? If folks are recording on DVR, then using those DVR's to skip commercials, what good does it do the advertiser? Those people, put simply, don't count. Thus, they're not counted. Let's try to remember the point behind ratings isn't to find out how many people like a show. The point behind ratings is to determine how many people will see advertisements associated with the show.

One advertising case where I think the overall ratings are really important is for product placement. If John and Sarah drink Red Bull to stay alert, just about everyone watching the show will see that, whether iTunes, Hula, DVR, or whatever. Someone mentioned in the Chuck thread about Subway. I really like this form of advertising if it fits the show.

 

[Diallo B]

put me in the camp that believes a show based in sci-fi is rarely a hit on network television. keep in mind i said network television not syndication....

there are few exceptions.

i am a sci-fi fan first and foremost. and i have learned that it is better to let a show get a season in and then me catch up vs. latching on to a show early and getting disappointed. now if it is something that i am really interested in like terminator i will watch. most recently i was really interested in my own worst enemy and got burned there too....

i am also in the time shifting camp as well. even if i have the time i don't sit down in front of a television and watch something live. that is what my htpc is for. i watch at my convenience. i can't even think of the last time i watched something live. oooops, my bad i can and i regret it. it was that awful 24: Redemption crap. and the only reason then was because a female friend of mine was over and wanted to watch it.

anyway, advertisers and networks need to wake up and smell the coffee or they will soon go the way of the newspapers. nbc is already on its way. there is a new medium that a new generation is taking adavantage of. either put some r and d into its development or go the way of the dodo. and although nbc is backing hulu call me unimpressed.

 

[ShwetaPrakash]

This one is also mostly great.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

And I'm saying, that needs to change. Maybe not completely, but the current system as it stands now is broken. Commercials interrupting the show at regular intervals might not be the best model for the future - the viewers don't like them, the cable companies themselves are giving out the technology to easily record shows and skip over commercials, and there's a whole segment of people that won't even bother with shows like "24" or "Lost" on broadcast TV and will simply wait for the DVD to avoid the hassle of watching something on TV.

So when I say, for a show that got three million people to watch it on a weekly basis plus another million or more by another method, I'm not saying that they should be counted by the current Neilson system or whatever. I'm saying, if there are five million people who are fans of a show, there should be a way for that show to survive. I'm not arguing that DVR viewership, for instance, doesn't do much for sponsors. I'm saying when the sheer number of people who want to watch a program is in the millions, TV stations need to figure out a way to make that workable, otherwise they're going to continue to lose viewers. They can continue to make low-cost, high-return programming like American Idol and Survivor and all of those crappy reality shows, but there's going to come a point where people just turn away from that stuff, and it goes back to occupying a niche, where yes, people are interested, but not in the "five nights a week on every network" way they are now.

I think television is at its best when it tries to do something that can't be done as well in another medium. And in my opinion, it's at its best when it takes advantage of the fact that a show has multiple episodes over the course of a season, wherein story arcs can be developed and played out with much greater detail than one can do in a two-hour movie. I'm not much for the procedurals or shows that are mainly stand-alone "monster/villain of the week" type programs. They're fun when they start out, but after a while, how many different ways can you murder someone and how many times can the detectives solve the crime in an exciting new way? The leads exist to move the plot along, but don't have much character in and of themselves. Gets pretty dull for me. I like a show like Terminator where it can take us into this world of the characters, where they can build something more in-depth than what a movie can give us in two hours. That's where television excels, and that's what people remember. And if five million people want to watch something on a weekly basis, there should be a way to make that happen. I don't care if that's achieved by experimenting with single sponsors or charging less for advertising or announcing a set number of episodes in advance to encourage people to stay tuned or by using technology so the sponsorship that keeps a show on the air stays attached through online venues or what... I don't really care, and frankly it's not my job to figure it out. But something has to change or TV viewership in general is going to continue to erode, and I'd hate to live in a world where the only choices I have with new programming are either reality shows or procedurals.

 

[Mikah Cerucco]

It's more complex than that (we have to include the cost of the show into the equation) but I essentially buy what you're saying. The thing is... I have to be at least somewhat accepting of the current model because I haven't really seen a better one presented.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Oh I know, I work in television, it's plenty complicated, but I'm glad we more or less see eye to eye on that. I'm honestly not sure what the solution is, but I have a feeling what I personally would enjoy would probably upset quite a few network execs.

I think the main issue is that as a culture, we've changed the way we receive information -- it used to be provider based, in that a television station or movie studio would put out a show or a film, and you'd have to go see it right when they did it, or that would be it. Maybe you could catch a rerun later on, or they might re-release the film if it was a success, but you had no expectation of being able to see it on your own terms. Watching television or going to see a film was more akin to attending a live performance in that the date and time is set in stone, and you either watch it, or you don't.

VCRs introduced time shifting which certainly changed things, but in a more limited way -- you could hold onto a program, tape it to watch it later, but twenty years after the introduction of the VCR, some people still had problems setting the darn thing to record on a timer. And the show still would air once, and if you missed it and didn't tape it, that was that. Some shows were released on VHS, but not to the point where anyone would say, "I'll just wait for the video."

Meanwhile, as all of this is happening, the running time of an hour-long drama slowly creeped from 51 minutes (60s and 70s) to 48 mins (80s), then to 45 minutes (90s), down to the pathetically low 41 minutes of most shows today. It's a double-edged sword because not only are you losing time in which to tell a story (which could be a benefit or a negative depending on the series), but there are suddenly a lot more commercial interruptions, both in terms of length and frequency.

DVDs came out and the concept of the affordable, complete season set was introduced and was very successful. People started saying, hey, if it's coming out on DVD anyway, I might as well wait and watch it all at once without commercials. And before and after this time, pay channels like HBO started producing first-rate programming, which demonstrated that customers would pay a premium to watch a show they enjoyed without interruptions.

DVR boxes, as we all know, are kinda like VCRs on crack... in a good way! It's so easy to record things, and whereas in the past it might not be worth the effort to time-shift something to skip commercials, on the DVR it's easy, and you don't even need to wait for the program to finish recording to be able to watch it. That the cable companies sell you on the idea of DVR by telling you to say goodbye to commercials really says all you need to know about how viewers feel about them.

A necessary evil that increasingly has become unnecessary to endure given the advances in distribution channels and technology.

Now, the day after almost any show airs, I have so many different options for watching it. If I've DVR'd it, I can watch it that way. A lot of shows are offered "ON Demand", usually commercial free or with far more limited interruptions than the original broadcast. I can wait for the DVD. I can purchase it for download from iTunes or Amazon.com or any number of other services. I can stream it for free from the network's home page, again without commercials or with very few. Or (in theory) I could illegally download it off the internet, which right or wrong is widespread and gets easier all the time.

The point I'm trying to make here is, the viewer has an unprecedented number of choices for how to view a show that interests them, almost all of them as convenient or more than simply watching the original broadcast live without any kind of time-shifting. But the entire model for whether a show will live or die is based on how many people watch it when it first airs, and what the past few years have shown us is that people are becoming less and less interested in watching television on a network's terms. People don't have the kind of loyalty to a network or movie studio that they might once have; with content coming at you from all angles, you care about watching something you enjoy, and what channel it happens to be on really doesn't count for anything. (I watched "Terminator" because it was interesting to me, that it was on Fox had nothing to do with my decision to watch it.)

This is just the beginning. Look how quickly DVR boxes took off once cable companies began offering them, rather than being some sort of TIVO thing you had to buy separately and at great personal cost. I think it's fair to say that no one really knows what's going to happen a few years down the road, the technology changes too fast for me to feel comfortable making any kind of guess. But I think as technology continues to evolve, making it easier than ever for viewers to watch the shows they want on their schedule and not the networks, the more trouble the networks are going to be in -- particularly if they make no effort to evolve with the times. People in general are moving away from the "appointment television" way of watching TV and are transitioning to watching programs on their terms, on their time. This can be good for television in so many ways -- people who seek out shows on their own time will probably pay closer attention and be more dedicated followers, and people will continue to sample things that they might have missed completely before because, say, the timeslot was inconvenient. But the time of the network, not you, deciding when you would watch something is coming to an end... and it simply makes no sense for a program's success or failure to be determined by a system that still acts as if the VCR, the DVR and the internet haven't been invented.

Sorry for the long rant... this would make for an interesting topic in its own right, I think.

 

[Joseph Bolus]

Josh,

That was an extremely interesting post!

Another point that needs to be made (since this *is* the TSCC thread) is that science fiction shows in general gravitate to a younger (and smarter) demographic group than your regular sitcom, reality, and crime drama shows might normally appeal to. As such, that demographic will be more prone to seek out alternative means of viewing the show (such as DVR and HULU) which, in turn, further erodes the "traditional" way of rating such shows. To be fair, Nielsen now does account for DVR (in both a DVR+7 and DVR+3 package); but currently *doesn't* account for internet viewing on HULU and such. Plus, even though Nielsen accounts for DVR activity, the networks don't seem to value the DVR viewership as much as they possibly should. For example, it's fairly well known that TSCC practically doubled their numbers when DVR viewership was factored in. But I suppose that since the networks feel as though the DVR viewership is mostly skipping the commercials, that demographic doesn't mean as much. But they *should* pay attention to those numbers since huge DVR numbers -- especially for a genre show --almost always equates into larger than normal ancillary income for the show (from DVD sales and marketing). And with today's DVR viewing the commercial is at least obliquely seen (not just totally skipped); and in many cases a viewer actually will stop and view a commercial if he/she is interested in what is being pitched. And let's face it: If the viewer isn't interested in the product it's a "no sale" anyway. So this is still an effective way to get your message across to the people that will be interested in purchasing the product.

As we go forward from here, the networks really need to start factoring this stuff in when making a decision to cancel a show.

 

[Mikah Cerucco]

But to what degree? I'm sure Fox is aware of how S1 of TSCC did on DVD. I'm sure they have expectations for how S2 will do. Given that many people actually didn't enjoy S2, are we really sure it'll sell well enough that the show should have been given a reprieve based on anticipated DVD sales?

 

[Jason Seaver]

And why should Fox care about Terminator's DVD sales? That money goes to Warner Brothers - and even in the case of Twentieth Television-produced shows like Bones or Dollhouse, the various divisions of News Corp are relatively autonomous.

 

[Will_B]

Hey all, I want to mention that in order to get my Lena Headey fix, I just watched the low-budget horror film "The Broken" on dvd. It was not that bad! Yes, it is a direct-to-dvd movie, but, the film manages to avoid revealing itself as not-well-produced by having minimal dialogue. Though what there is, is fine. (Lena speaks in her natural British accent by the way). You'll still need to forgive the occasional musical crescendo that is meant to convey scariness, but aside from that, it was nice.

It co-stars the older gentleman who played the health club owner in Burn After Reading. He plays an American, but the film is set in England.

If you liked some of the slower-paced horror films based on paranoia, like, say, the various earlier Invader of the Body Snatcher films (like the 1978 one), you'll probably accept The Broken as middling entertainment. If you're a Lena fan, it makes it a bit more than that (just for the opportunity to see her in something other than Terminator).

Worth a Netflix rent, or a 2-for-1 day rent. Not worth a solo rent if you have to pay full price, but, yes it is worth a cheap rent.

Not fast paced enough to be a date movie or anything. Slow paced, meant to scare you when you're alone I think.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Thanks man, I appreciate the kind words. I've seen some different examples over the year. I thought the "remote free television" that Fox tried with Fringe and Dollhouse was a good idea, but apparently they didn't make enough money to justify continuing it. I don't know what part of it I enjoyed more, that we ended up with episodes that were almost ten minutes longer than regular broadcast shows, or that the interruptions were fewer and shorter in length. Both were big pluses, I thought.

Product placement has definitely been around for a long time, and it's always tricky to balance being clever about getting money and not turning the show itself into a commercial. I have some fun stories about product placement; I remember when I was working on "The Sopranos", one of the producers wanted an espresso machine for the office. So, they decided Tony should have one in house, and of course some company was more than happy to get the product placement... Tony got an espresso machine for his fictional kitchen, and we got a second one for our non-fictional crew kitchen.

I remember a few years ago David Letterman tried an experiment where they would announce the advertising live as part of the show instead of cutting away to commercial. It wasn't very successful -- Dave not being able to keep a straight face during the ad portions may have had something to do with that -- but it's not the worst idea ever. But I think it needs to be modified. As Joseph pointed out, commercials are pretty useless among people who aren't interested in the product -- if we're not interested in something, no amount of happy people seen running in slow motion through beautiful green fields is going to change our mind. So maybe the thirty second spot, which seems to annoy more people than not, isn't the way to go in the future. Perhaps something where a company buys the right to put their logo in the bottom corner of the screen instead of the network's logo might work. The company's name would be visible to the viewer for the entire program or for a large portion of the program, but it wouldn't be any more obtrusive than the "FOX" logo you're used to seeing in the corner.

The other thing is DVD sales... as Jason pointed out, Terminator was produced by Warner but aired on Fox, and even when a show is produced by the same company that airs it, it's done by different divisions so it's not on the same balance sheet anyway. Nowadays, when a feature is greenlit, the DVD revenue is definitely a factor. There are plenty of examples of this... though it's not the best one, I'm just thinking about how the Watchmen filmmakers were allowed to shoot extra footage that was never intended to be in the theatrical release. Same for Lord Of The Rings. But they knew there would be an audience that would be willing to pay a premium on DVD to get an extended version, and obviously there was enough money in that for them to spend the money to shoot those extra scenes.

Maybe television stations and studios need to have more of a shared relationship in terms of DVD releases. Maybe the initial television broadcasting should be thought of as a sneak preview or an advertisement for the DVDs, I don't know. But DVD sales should factor into whether or not a show stays on the air, especially if the DVD sales are pretty good. I read that one of the factors with Dollhouse getting renewed was that the studio was willing to pay a larger percentage of the costs than usual so the network would pay less for the show. With the network paying less, they don't need to make as much in advertising for it to be worthwhile to them. And Fox Home Video is taking the gamble that there will be a significant aftermarket for the show with DVD releases and eventual syndication rights, enough to make up for the smaller payment they're taking for broadcast rights. I think it's a smart idea.

The one other thing I wanted to mention briefly was the original Star Trek series, which was canceled after three years on NBC. Based on their ratings systems of the time, the show was a flop. However, in the years after the show went off the air, networks started interpreting data differently, and realized that Star Trek had exactly the audience NBC wanted: young, hip, with disposable income. Their old data didn't measure demographics, so they didn't realize that they had the audience every sponsor wants, because at the time number of viewers was more important than who those viewers was. Perhaps it's time for a similar shift in how the viewing audience is measured, how that data is valued, and how shows are financed and by who.

 

[Jason Seaver]

Where did you read that, just out of curiosity? I'd speculated that might be the case, but figured it would be hard to find any actual public talk about it.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Variety, perhaps? There are usually a stack of industry trades waiting for me when I get to my desk in the morning, so I don't remember exactly where I picked that up. It wasn't from, like, Joe Schmo's Blog (or Entertainment Weekly for that matter, haha).