Fox takes down the Dollhouse, not Ballard and Caroline
Posted in Rantastic on 11/20/2009 10:00 am by Elizabeth KayleneI started watching season one of Dollhouse with Lauren, my sister, and she is totally hooked. I’m hooked all over again, too. I’m dying for her to get caught up completely. DYING, I tell you. I so want her to see the latest episode, the one about Sierra.
I’m really pissed that Fox canned Dollhouse. For a while, I had a show that I could watch every week that I loved. I truly think that Fox doomed it from the beginning by scheduling it at 9:00 on a Friday night. Dollhouse’s core audience is twenty-somethings, who are — for the most part — OUT on a Friday night. So unless you’re a hardcore Whedon/Dushku fan, you’re probably not going to stay in for it or watch it online the next day. We live in a fast paced world now, and most people don’t think they have the time — and they definitely don’t have the patience — to follow a story.
This is why reality shows work so well, as stupid as they are; if you miss a week, you can jump right in next week and watch without having to know what happened last week.
The people who are home on Friday nights are a little older. They’re settled down. They might be housewives or couples who are past the going out stage. This is what I call the Lifetime crowd (and I don’t mean that in a derogatory way); they faithfully watch Ghost Whisperer (which sucks) because it’s geared toward them and they’re home anyway. This is why Ghost Whisperer (again, sucks) got more ratings than Dollhouse.
If Fox had just done a little more thinking and scheduled Dollhouse on, say, a Tuesday night, they wouldn’t be so disappointed by the low (two million) ratings. I mean, you can’t schedule a show at a time when its core audience is out drinking, eating, or watching a MLB game and then turn around and whine that the ratings are low. It’s pretty DUH, actually. The show is very intriguing and there is so much potential for it.
Of course, all of this ranting won’t undo what has been done: Dollhouse will finish out this second season two episodes at a time and then be gone completely from the network. I’d like to think that another network with more common sense will pick it up, but the fact that Whedon is writing to finish the series tells me that it probably won’t happen.
At least I get a double fix every week now.
11/20/2009 at 1:39 pm
The other thing, though, is that Friday night has been, for at least a decade, the designated slot for sci-fi and other geek stuff. Even Ghost Whisperer and Numbers fit that category– fantasy and math detectives. The networks figure that geeks and nerds and mouth breathers are the only ones who watch such stuff, and since they have no social lives, they can watch Friday prime time from their televisions in their mother’s basements.
The problem with such logic, however, is that a) mainstream tastes have, in the last five to ten years, gone MUCH geekier, and b) those who might actually fit the stereotype are FAR more likely to watch via HULU, torrents, iTunes, DVR, etc.
(Which relates to another gripe of mine– CBS has lost its old-folks demographic, but they still think like their audience is old. Seriously– The Big Bang Theory, one of the geekiest– and one of the best– sitcoms on television today, is unavailable in ANY legal digital form. Not on iTunes, not on Amazon, not via CBS.com. At that point, the show is losing numbers because real viewers can’t be counted, because they’re being forced to download illegally. DUMB.)
11/21/2009 at 9:19 am
yeah i don’t think it’ll be picked up by another network. when the news broke, syfy said they had no intentions of picking it up.
it was a pretty ok show, but week after week, it really did showcase that eliza dushku doesn’t have any range as an actor. i loved the episodes that focused more on other characters
11/20/2009 at 3:09 pm
I’m trying to figure out where I fit in here: true geek, or mainstream geek. I’m gonna go with the first, because I code websites by hand. And Topher is one of my favorite characters.
And I must be a basement geek, because I thought CBS still was an old folks station…
11/21/2009 at 9:48 am
I disagree. I thought she’s very versatile, and I love that this show is giving her the opportunity to play roles other than wayward Slayer and punk ass cheerleader.
01/15/2010 at 9:53 am
To the lame brain that said Eliza has no range… are you insane? She played so many different roles on Dollhouse, and she played many of them at once! She is one kick ass actress, and I almost wish Time Warner would drop Fox now that Dollhouse is gone… I mean what kind of network keeps a crap show like 24.. ooooh terrorists AGAIN! and kicks Dollhouse to the curb? Without Dollhouse, channel 5 is not in my line up. Silver lining.. at least they’re airing the finale.. unlike Tru Calling.. just when it’s getting good….slice goes the axe…
01/17/2010 at 7:36 pm
I completely agree with you that Eliza has a huge range, but please keep the namecalling out of this. sudobeer is my buddy. We’re all allowed to have our own opinions.
I hope that Time Warner does drop them. I love how they air those commercials saying, “Please help us,” yet ignore their viewers pleas to “please help” keep Dollhouse going. Fuckers. (Namecalling is cool if we’re mocking FOX.
)
01/17/2010 at 7:37 pm
oooh “lame brain” that hurts!! thats not name calling.