More on Free TV

Just a few more thoughts. I recently missed a 60 Minutes piece (due to a football game running over) and went to the CBS.com site to see if I could catch up. In fact, it was easy to do. This is the great part of the Internet in that it acts as a back-up to television since we are not always home nor does our DVR always work (or at least, the network does not follow its own schedule). Of course, this convenience is the same for Rachel Maddow and Glenn Beck. Whatever your politics, it's out there. This is a great benefit for all you news junkies out there.

Other sites:

- Face the Nation
- Meet the Press
- This Week
- Washington Week

The End of Free TV on the Internet?

We have been hearing from a number of Chicken Little's about the end of TV on the Internet, or at least free TV. First, I do not think this is true. As more and more cable channels realize the need to grab larger shares of audiences (and Neilson learns how to count them), we shall see more free offers. Second, some changes may be in order to expand the selection of TV programs available to those of us who see the Internet as a good window onto all aspects of Hollywood. For instance, I see iTunes as a plus for Internet users and not a minus. The fact that you can get your favor program for $1.99 to $2.99 is not so horrible when you consider that in the past you would have had no real options for seeing these programs if you missed them on TV, unless you waited for reruns a few months later. Is it free? No. Is it damn convenient? Yes.

For instance, two shows I can easily pick up on the Internet as hosted by the cable channels are NBC's 30 Rock and Starz' Spartacus. Of course, you also have vehicles such as Fancast and Hulu, but this is where the angst comes in. Since Comcast bought NBC, the future of Hulu has been in doubt since it is partly owned by NBC and in direct competition with Comcast. In addition, Comcast lost about 233,000 subscribers in the last quarter of 2009 and its future is not so sunny. How much is due to Hulu and its imitators versus the monopolistic pricing of Comcast in a recession is anyone's guess, but I expect to see some blood in the water. Even so, the pricing strategies I am reading about are not absurd. For instance, Hulu is discussing providing the five most recent episodes for free and then you pay $4.99 per month to watch older episodes.

This said, some thought the DVD would lead to the end of movies, and yet what it did was bring back thousands of movies and television programs from the archives. The Old Guard always screams when change is marching down the avenue, and we are seeing it again. Of course, this is not to say the adjustment will be pretty. Just ask the record companies how they are adjusted to 99 cent songs on Amazon and iTunes. But again, these companies had a chance to be innovative and instead they simply sent lawyers after college kids. So much for embracing the future.

I am hopeful that free content will not only remain but grow as other parties find ways to enter the game. In addition, for a small fee, one will see new things they did not have access to before. The barriers to entry are low, and the skies the limit. So cheer up, kick back, and enjoy the show.

January Programs

January has been quite a month for new shows. And my hope has been restored concerning SciFi now that Caprica is up and running. It's a great show with a lot of potential. Here are just a few of the new shows:

- Caprica, SyFy, Fridays at 9pm ET/8pm CT
- The Deep End, ABC, Thursdays at 8pm ET/7pm CT
- The Inbetweeners, BBC America, Wednesdays at 9:30pm ET/8:30pm CT
- Life Unexpected, CW, Mondays at 9pm ET/ 8 pm CT
- Spartacus, Starz, Fridays at 10pm ET/9 pm CT

And Damages also returned in January for its third season. Yes, it has been a great TV month and staying on top of all these shows is not easy. However, I have already dropped The Deep End as too sophomoric to merit additional attention. Misbehaving lawyers? Nothing new here, folks. But the others have a lot of promise. Of course, The Inbetweeners is already in its third season over in the UK, so we are a bit behind the curve in this country (as is the case with Merlin and other shows). I am already surprised with the quality of acting as well as the decent storyline in Life Unexpected, and even Spartacus is full of heart (and blood, of course). While the acting and sets in Spartacus are not those of HBO's Rome, it has its own qualities (think 300) that may keep it around for awhile.

What Should We Remember?

This is a time of lists, and we all have our own set of special TV shows from the past. For my part, I want to highlight a few sci-fi shows that ended last year and will be missed. While there may be more, these are the ones that stuck with me. They include the following:

-- Battlestar Galactic (my earlier comments)
-- Kings (my earlier comments)
-- Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles
-- Kyle XY (my earlier comments)
-- Defying Gravity (my earlier comments)

I have mixed feelings about each of these, but I would have liked to see more of each. I tend to agree that Battlestar Galactic ended at a good time, and with spin-off series as well as movies it is not really gone. However, Kings was prematurely killed, Terminator lasted only two seasons but restarted itself in the last episode (so there may be hope), Kyle XY fell off a cliff, and Defying Gravity was never really given a change (except in Canada). And I did not even include Virtuality, a show that never went past the pilot stages. Very odd.

I cannot say the new shows V or Dollhouse gets me excited, but at least we have Fringe to keep all of us sci-fi fans interested. Not much else of this genre that is still alive and worth watching. And yet I remain hopeful (and still somewhat saddened by the treatment of sci-fi in 2009). As always, stay tuned.

Bright Spots in the New Season

I have to say that some of the new shows this season are weak or started strong only to disappoint. I quickly dropped Eastwick due to bad writing (come on - the first episode has a woman talking about vomit on her face) and its attempt to mimic a much better movie. And if you only have half an hour for a family situation comedy, go with Modern Family, an interesting multi-generational comedy, rather than The Middle, which is too much like Malcolm in the Middle (and not only reuses characters such as the youngest son but also the name of the show).

However, the returning Fringe is a treat. The show, brought to you by J.J.Abrams, remains lively and interesting with just enough twists and laughs to keep you coming back. While it has its darker moments, it also has the best qualities that the X-Files also provided by tossing in subtle comedy at a particularly dangerous intersection of events. Rolling Stone's Rob Sheffield had it right when he said

It's the most exciting drama around right now, too strange to fit into any stylistic box - too trippy for a cop show, too tough for sci-fi, with an unfailingly amazing cast and dialogue that dances from flippant bitchery to dazed-and-confused profundity. You don't have to follow the wide-scale conspiracy narrative to enjoy the individual episodes, but the deeper you dig into it, the more connections you find.

I wholeheartedly agree. It's more evidence that great TV is possible. I hope Fox knows what it has here.

What You Missed...

I am glad to read I am not the only person who will miss NBC's Kings. David Plotz in Slate magazine has a nice article titled The Death of Kings on why we will miss the program and why it is worth checking out the just released DVD. Here is a sampling of his story:

At times during its short run, Kings was essentially a high-concept soap opera. Yet it was always a soap opera with genuine intellectual ambition, and at its best, it was a provocative thought experiment: How would a religious monarchy work in a modern, pluralistic society? Could the values that Americans cherish survive in such a system? And would the actual presence of God solve or compound the problems of governing a nation? (When God gets angry at Silas, for example, Gilboa's windmill farms break down.)

I plan to pick up the DVD and rewatch the series. Maybe the interest in the DVD will wake up the studios and let them know that this brilliant show was something special that never really had a chance to win the hearts of America, but is worthy of another season. Stranger things have happened.

Catching Up on the New Season

Variety magazine reports that more than 43 new and returning shows will be broadcast between September 21 and 27. Thank the gods for the DVR, but is this really necessary? This is a bit like a buffet - you eat a bit of everything and basically remember nothing. And on top of all this, Ken Burn's finds it necessary to broadcast a 12-hour series on National Parks starting this Sunday and running each night thereafter. I am starting to get the impression that PBS really doesn't care if we find time to watch the program when it is broadcast. Just buy the DVD. P.S. PBS makes more money this way.

In addition to the DVR, we now have Fancast and Hulu. This allows you to catch up on what you missed and really put it all into context. For example, Hulu is currently showing this week's premiere of ABC's Flashforward (Thursdays 8pm ET/7pm CT), ABC's Modern Family (Wednesdays 9pm ET/8pm CT), the returning Fringe on Fox (Thursdays 9pm ET/8pm CT), and ABC's Eastwick (Wednesdays 10pm ET/9pm CT). Also, many of the network webpages offer free clips. So cheer up. You don't have to be glued to you couch all week. Instead, you can be glued to your computer for the next few weeks. Good luck.