According to Nikki Finke, NBC is going to pick up "Friday Night Lights" for a third season:I'm told that Jeff Zucker, Marc Graboff and Ben Silverman had been searching for a way to renew the critically acclaimed but low-rated Friday Night Lights for a 3rd season in a way that would still make financial sense. The answer came in a deal with DirecTV, now owned by John Malone's Liberty Media. Clearly Malone is looking to offer exclusive content to his satellite subscribers to distinguish DirecTV from its rivals on a content as well as price basis. "It's an innovative deal where NBC found a partner who will share costs and exhibition windows," an insider explained to me.If this is all true, "exclusive content" would suggest to me that DirectTV gets to air the episodes first (ala USA getting the first-runs of "Criminal Intent" before they were on NBC). As I don't have a dish, it'll be frustrating to wait (unless it gets Hulu'ed early as well), but if the show can come back -- and if it can rebound from the mess that was most of season two, then I'm happy.
Say it with me: Clear eyes, full hearts...
CAN'T LOSE!!!!
ReplyDeleteIf Direct TV gets to show it early, I will get Direct TV. Even though I live in a country where Direct TV dishes are illegal...damn Canada.
ReplyDeleteYour, ahem, friend Michael Ausiello is reporting this:
ReplyDeleteFriday Night Lights Rumor Patrol: "There's No Deal"
There's no deal... yet.
That's what my sources over at the Peacock are telling me in response to a Deadline Hollywood Daily story claiming NBC has picked up Friday Night Lights after partnering with DirecTV. A spokesperson for NBC Universal declined comment.
One thing is certain: FNL and DirecTV are in active negotiations to share the costs of a potential third season of FNL, and everyone's hopeful that a deal will be reached.
Developing...
About time satellite subscribers got something. After all you cable-junkies have been getting on-Demand pre-episodes of The Wire, I need me some orbital love. Unfortunately, as much as I adored the first season of FNL, and the second season had a couple of decent episodes towards the end, FNL is a show that should probably be put to rest.
ReplyDeleteGreat news. With The Wire done, new episodes of my other favorite shows cant get here soon enough.
ReplyDeleteI hate to say it, but when a show gets sent to a different network (or, in this case, a whole different distribution system) it's usually done for anyway. ("Criminal Intent" has been awful this year.) And didn't DirecTV already cancel the soap opera it took over from NBC?
ReplyDeletePersonally, I don't see why even a great show has to go on forever. What's wrong with having one or two good seasons, especially now that you can keep the whole thing around on DVD? If DirecTV can coproduce a great third season, terrific -- but if it's just going to be a halfhearted effort that ends up getting canceled anyway, they can forget it.
Here's my question - it's always said that the best cable show is making only a fraction of what the worst network show is making. So how is it that a show like, say, Battlestar Galactica, which must be HUGELY expensive, can survive on cable with the lower cable revenues, but what I would assume is a cheaper to produce show in FNL can't survive on a network with network reveues?
ReplyDeleteBobman, I've often wondered that myself. What about this theory...the Sci-Fi channel does not have a lot of 'regular' programming. They mostly show re-runs of old shows and b-movies, which keeps their overall costs down.
ReplyDeleteI could be completely wrong.
I have a DirecTV. You can come over and watch Alan.
ReplyDeletePuff
Expectations and cost-benefit analysis weigh heavily in the comparison. SciFi can present certain numbers to its advertisers because it's a niche cable channel with a show that has a very positive critical following (not exactly something "Mansquito" can boast) and a loyal (if small) fan base. The show is expensive, but SciFi can argue that it brings them some income and tons more prestige.
ReplyDeleteNBC's a 60-year-old Major Broadcast Network. Ratings expectations are much higher, especially in the past few years when NBC can't seem to make a massive hit to save its life. The cost/benefit analysis saved FNL last season, because it's cheap and brought prestige. But prestige isn't going very far these days with NBC and its advertisers, so things get a lot more complicated for FNL.
Well, it figures. We just changed from DirecTV to Dish. Damn.
ReplyDeleteWho gives a crap where it airs ... as long as it airs.
ReplyDeleteKudos for whomever convinced the corporate bean counters at the network that this deal would see red for Lights and subsequently the network honchos gave it (will be giving it?) a 3rd season "OK!".
I still wonder if this is Silverman's doing or someone else's ... must have been Graboff's ... Silverman was so anti-FNL just a month ago....
Hmmmm.....
At a time when it seems I am the only one on the planet without my own reality TV series, this is excellent news!
ReplyDeleteI have a great idea for a reality series: "Bloggers Named Jim Who Are The Last People On Earth Without Their Own Reality Series."
ReplyDelete4th and goal. Seconds to go. (3rd) Season on the line... The snap. A pass. Touchdown!!!
ReplyDeleteCould the FNL writers have scripted it any better?
Woohoo!
ReplyDeleteNow here's hoping they decide to pass off Season 2 as a long dream sequence (whose dream? Hmmm, either Landry or Saracen?) and we reset back to the end of Season 1.