I just bought the Firefly boxed set, and every time I watch an episode I shake my fist of fury at Fox. How could they cancel that show? How could *anyone* display the fundamental lack of decency necessary to cancel such a rare and beautiful thing as a good television show? A good Sci-Fi series, even! A funny one! With good actors! Great writing!
Grrrrr......
Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on :
Because... They're Fox. Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
I wonder if the lawyers of Fox executives ever use that reason in court?
"Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, my client could hardly have been expected to do anything that *isn't* purely and fundamentally evil. He is, after all, a Fox executive."
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Fox is just another branch of Wolfram & Hart. Think about it... Wolves, Rams, and Harts are animals... so are Foxes...
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm....
Posted by jeniwren (Member # 2002) on :
I'm savoring the series. I've watched the first three episodes. I'll watch the next two tomorrow night.
And I agree 10,000,000%. As I watched the episodes, I kept thinking, if this had been on any other network, they'd have hyped it, promo'd it, etc. etc. and it would still be on air.
Stupid, stupid, STUPID Fox.
Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
quote: Fox is just another branch of Wolfram & Hart. Think about it... Wolves, Rams, and Harts are animals... so are Foxes...
Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm....
Is that why they canceled Joss Whedon's show? Angry about his exposé on them in Angel?
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Seems pretty clear to me.
Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
And all this time I just thought they had a vendetta against people who like good TV.
Posted by Aerto (Member # 8810) on :
quote:Originally posted by jeniwren: I'm savoring the series. I've watched the first three episodes. I'll watch the next two tomorrow night.
And I agree 10,000,000%. As I watched the episodes, I kept thinking, if this had been on any other network, they'd have hyped it, promo'd it, etc. etc. and it would still be on air.
Stupid, stupid, STUPID Fox.
No other network would have ever aired this series at the time. Sci-Fi and western weren't exactly popular genres and combining the two didn't make the show any more likely to be a hit. Did FOX screw up the marketing and mess up the show by forcing them to make a new pilot and then airing the episodes out of order? Absolutely, but at least they took a chance on a very iffy premise (in terms of pulling in an audience).
I loved the show and love the movie, but the simple fact of the matter is that this material was not going to appeal to very large audience, no matter what network it was on. Joss Whedon simply does not translate to a mass audience, never did with Buffy/Angel, and there was no way he was going to with Firefly/Serenity.
Blame FOX all you want, but also blame the TV audience who prefer to watch shows that don't take creative risks and that fit easily into a mold (i.e. CSI and Law and Order et al.).
In today's post-Lost TV landscape, Firefly may have had a better chance at surviving.
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Aerto, I think you're dead wrong. Look at Lost. It took plenty of creative risks and actually makes the audience think--trying to figure things out as it goes. And it certainly doesn't easily fit into a mold. Is it a mystery? A sci-fi? A fantasy? A drama? Certainly not a comedy..but it is funny sometimes. So far, it's all of those things.
The problem is that FOX keeps on trying to duplicate the success of the X-Files which gained a massive following on Friday nights. Show after show has been placed in that time-slot, and show after show has failed. (Wonderfalls is another example.)
The Friday-night timeslot is a killer. People will follow shows they already know to Friday night sometimes (although it is still a risk), but rarely will any try out a new show that night.
They failed to promote the show properly. They showed the show OUT OF ORDER. They gave it only a few episodes before they pulled the plug.
Basically, they didn't give it a chance.
So thanks for the permission. I'll blame FOX completely. Because that's where the blame BELONGS.
Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
I think it's the executives *belief* that it wouldn't appeal to an audience that killed it, not the *fact*. Before Star Wars, no one would have thought that sort of sci-fi fantasy could have the enormous success it did. And anyway, if there's no market for sci-fi, why did Star Trek enjoy the bjillion incarnations it did? And Star Trek is very third-rate in quality compared to Firefly. Firefly failed because Fox acted as though they *expected* it to fail. The old adage that if you think you're going to fail, you already have is very true here.
Besides, Firefly is decidedly NOT about the sci-fi or the Western aspect. It never focuses on cool gadgets, french-pastry-forehead aliens, or faux philosophy. Firefly is about the *characters*, first and foremost, and I think that's something most people can appreciate. It was also as much a comedy as anything else. It's rarely completely serious.
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
quote:french-pastry-forehead aliens
That's just great. Posted by Aerto (Member # 8810) on :
Star Trek is a different animal because its successful incarnations (TNG, Deepspace) were syndicated shows. There are different measures for success for syndicated shows then for network shows.
I agree with you that FOX did not show much faith in the series, by forcing Whedon to essentially make a second-pilot (Train Job) and then not showing the real pilot until the end of the run, and did not know what to do with it. They botched the beginning of the show, without a doubt. Did that lead to decreased ratings? Probably. But it is a fact that the show got incredibly low ratings. (If I remember right, lower than John Doe and Fastlane, two terrible shows that premiered the same year). And it was very expenisve to produce (large cast, complex set, special effects). Combining these two together, the show was canceled. The TV industry is a business after all.
Again, I agree that Firefly is not about the Sci-fi or western aspects. However, it is set in these environments and there was no way around this when promoting the show. A show that is sci-fi or western-like is going to lose a potential segment of the audience right off the bat. There are simply people who will not watch a show with spaceships or with horses.
I'm not a FOX defender: they butchered Firefly, Wonderfalls, and the Inside. But the network is not completely to blame because those shows were very tough sells that do not appeal to a large proportion of the TV audience, which prefers to watch horrible singers and the nth version of CSI. Also, don't forget the FOX has stuck with some creative shows (i.e. X-Files, Simpsons, Family Guy, 24, Arrested Development (for a while)). They are no worse than the other networks.
The Friday night slot is killer and I wish FOX had tried another night, but I don't think it would have found an audience on any other night either.
Also, how do you explain the failure of Serenity in terms of box office? Did Universal botch that like FOX did with the show? Or could it be that this material just does not connect with a large audience and we fans are simply too blinded by its brillance to realize that most people do not get it?
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Fox didn't stick with Family Guy. They cancelled it and only brought it back after its success on Adult Swim.
And because Firefly might seem a hardsell if not promoted properly is exactly why FOX is to blame. They approved the show knowing what it was going to be about, so they should have made up for that with proper promotions and time-slots.
Posted by Aerto (Member # 8810) on :
What proper promotions? I would like to know how this show could have been sold to bring in an audience.
You are right about Family Guy. I don't watch it and forgot that it went off the air for awhile. Thanks for the correction.
Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
I don't know that they are any worse than other networks. But if they'd really stuck with and promoted Firefly like they did X-Files, for example, they could have had another hit on their hands. X-Files can be much weirder and potentially off-putting than Firefly ever was, but it ran for nine seasons!
Firefly had terrible ratings because *no one* had heard of it. No one knew it was on- it would have been a miracle for it to have decent ratings in only fourteen episodes. I still think that, properly promoted, it would have worked. Buffy did, even spawned a spinoff, and it was also a *lot* weirder than Firefly. By about an order of magnitude.
And yes, I love Buffy.
I'm certainly no expert in the art of TV show promotions, but it seems to me that whatever worked for X-Files and Buffy the Vampire Slayer would have worked for Firefly.
Posted by Aerto (Member # 8810) on :
There is no doubt that FOX has changed since the X-Files premiered. Back then it was a small little network that would stick with low-rated quality shows. (Like WB and UPN did with Buffy, which was highly rated for them, but low-rated for the 4 big networks) Now FOX wants low-cost ratings from putrid reality television. No one can know what would have happened had FOX stuck with Firefly. It is impossible to predict that it would have turned into another X-Files, but I think it is unlikely. I won't say impossible, just unlikely.
And by the way, don't say "no one" had heard of it. I had never heard of Joss Whedon and never seen Buffy or Angel before Firefly premiered, but I watched Firefly from the beginning because of FOX's advertising for it. So theres one, just wish it could have been more.
I'm not sure anything "worked" for Buffy in the way you mean. It never built a huge audience compared to what FOX would have wanted out of Firefly. It was a beloved show, but beloved by a fairly small number of people.
FOX's business model has changed since the X-Files. They now want shows that start off with high ratings from the start, as do most networks, with a few exceptions. For example, there is no way that Lost would still be on the air if, in its first few weeks, it had been in the 60s and 70s in terms of rated shows, as was Firefly.
Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
Well, alas, given how they've bungled it I guess we'll never know.
I meant "no one", of course, in the best tradition of American hyperbole. Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
I actually haven't seen Serenity, yet. My husband has been sick and we weren't able to make it to the theaters. Now the only theaters showing it are quite a drive away.
And no, I don't think University promoted the movie enough. I rarely saw advertisements or trailers for it, and what I did see wasn't that impressive. Only reason I know it's good is because I have seen Firefly. Also, it wasn't in enough theaters. It did very well in the theaters it was in its first weekend. Only reason it couldn't compete with Flightplan was because it was in about half the theaters that Flightplan was in. One good thing they did was let FX air Firefly before Stargate.
You can talk about how quirky Firefly was all day long. Fact is, FOX knew that when they signed on and they should have promoted it accordingly, aired it in the proper order, and on a night where it had a chance. I think maybe FOX was counting on Buffy/Angel fans to watch it simply out of loyalty for Joss--but they should have known that the numbers still wouldn't have been enough.
A good advertising campaign for a show can do WONDERS. They should have advertised it during their hits, and they should have bought ad time on cable stations.
FOX Screwed Up.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Initial ratings for The X-Files weren't great. It didn't take off until it was moved to Sunday and heavily promoted. Ratings for The Lone Gunmen, in the same Friday night slot, were very close to the initial ratings for The X-Files yet it was dropped instead of nurtured. The difference? In the years between, FOX had discovered shows that got huge ratings quickly and they lost their patience for quirky shows that needed to find a following. FOX had sports, American Idol, and assorted awfuk-but-highly-rated reality shows. As a business model I can't fault their planning. But speaking as a TV viewer, well, I don't watch FOX anymore.
My thoughts on what would have helped Serenity's box office? I applaud Universal's fantastic efforts to spread the word among the faithful, but I was very disappointed in two things: trailers that didn't give a clear idea of the movie to the non-fan, and the utter and total lack of any of the stars on any of the talk shows the week(s) before the release. The movie was already sold to the fans, it needed to pitch to everyone else. This was one of the very few trailers that could have used a voiceover. Not the "In a world.." guy, but just Mal giving a quick rundown of what's going on.
It's all well and good to say the show wasn't going to find an audience anyway, but since the show was botched and many vieers at the time were turned off by out-of-order shows and several pre-emptions, we'll never know what it might have done with network support.
Interesting to note that right now at Amazon, the preorder of Serenity is #12 in the DVD sales rankings and Firefly is at #16.
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
Thanks for the facts on X-Files, Chris. I was talking from memory and was hoping someone would correct me.
The fact that they failed Serenity so much makes me sad. If they had played it right, it would probably be playing in a theater near me and I'd still have a chance to see it on the big screen. Instead, I have to hope that it will still be there the next time I travel near a theater that's playing it.
Posted by Aerto (Member # 8810) on :
The Lone Gunmen, speaking as a huge X-Files fan, stunk. I'm glad they dropped it quickly, but thats a different debate.
You are right in that we will never know what Firefly COULD have done. My problem with many fans of the show is that they blindly believe it would have gone on to become a ratings giant and muliple-Emmy winner when there is absolutely no evidence to suggest that would have happened. Problem number 2 with many fans is that they only want to blame FOX and act like the shows "failure" stems from only one cause. This, I think, comes from many Whedonites inability to see that Whedon does not appeal to everyone or even to most people. Its a case of willful blindness. (One example is acting like Buffy and Angel were major cultural phenomenons that drew massive TV ratings) I was just hoping to make the point that there were multiple reasons for Firefly's "failure."
As far as Serenity goes, I personally think that the best thing Universal could have done would have been to open the movie in the early Summer, rather than in the fall. The release date felt more like a dump date and, after Star Wars and War of the Worlds, many people had seen enough sci-fi. I would have liked to have seen the stars out promoting, but the problem is that I have a feeling the talk shows and like didn't really care if they had the "stars" of Serenity on. None of them are well-known and none of them would draw anybody to see the movie. The first trailer was a disappointment, largely because it tried to sell Joss Whedon more than the movie, overestimating his drawing power.
Also, while Serenity did not open on a massive number of screens, about 2200, the biggest problem was that it didn't have the sticking power that many hoped it would. It performed just as most sci-fi movies do, with a substantial second weekend drop.
For the DVD, the true test will be how it sells in Best Buy and the like. Many devoted fans will preorder it on Amazon, but the question is how many people will go into their local mall and pick it up when it is released.
Not to be too picky, but Firefly actually aired before Stargate on the SciFi channel, which is owned by Universal.
And one big reason Serentiy couldn't compete with Flightplan was Jodie Foster. She can open a movie. Nobody involved in Serenity can.
Chris: Obviously your TV watching habits are up to you, but instead of saying you won't watch FOX anymore, wouldn't it be better to say you won't watch the crappy shows that FOX puts on? FOX still has a number of good, innovative shows. Instead making your decision based on where the show airs, isn't it better to make the decision based on the quality of the show? When those who appreciate good TV, like you obviously do, the networks are even more likely to stop making quality programs. When good people do nothing. . .
Edited to remove a stupid comment I made after misreading Katarain's post. Sorry.
Posted by Katarain (Member # 6659) on :
I wasn't saying Fox did it. I said "they". And you're right. I meant SciFi, not FX. I watch a lot of FX.
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Because FOX has broken faith with me too many times. Far too many shows I've liked have been cancelled early, more of them on that network than the others combined. I applaud FOX for taking chances on shows no one else will, but when the odds are good that any show I like will be cancelled in 6 weeks I'd rather just not bother. Even shows that last get shuffled around time slots or stuck in reruns every other month so new shows will hit sweeps months. I don't have TiVO or DVR and frankly I'm not willing to put that much work into following a show.
Lately I prefer to skip broadcast television entirely and either buy the DVDs or get them through Netflix.
As I've posted elsewhere, I don't blame FOX for getting cold feet over the pilot. It's paced very slowly and could use a good half hour or so trimmed out. I do blame them for forcing a second pilot rather than pressing for changes in the first, and I blame them big time for mixing up the stories (in a story arc! think 24 would have lasted if it was shown out of order?) and pre-empting for local sports.
I don't see Firefly ever breaking the top 10 ratings, but I do think it could have gotten X-Files level ratings given the right slot and support from FOX. X-Files was no less quirky and strange, and it had intrique and shadowy storylines a decade before Lost. X-Files found its audience.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
Aerto, I couldn't agree more.
Whenever my friends start whining about the loss of Firefly or the great Farscape, I tell them we have a much better show now with broader appeal in the form of Battlestar Galactica. We should be thankful!
Posted by Yank (Member # 2514) on :
quote:we have a much better show now with broader appeal in the form of Battlestar Galactica.
Battlestar Galactica better than Firefly? To each his own, I guess, but bleh. No comparison in my mind.
Posted by ketchupqueen (Member # 6877) on :
Yeah, ick.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
For one thing, the acting in BSG is very good.
I actually have friends who've never been into anything remotely sci fi before who are now hooked on BSG. Never heard of that happening with Firefly, or Buffy for that matter. Seems like only real genre fans get into Whedon shows.
Posted by The Pixiest (Member # 1863) on :
BSG is a great show but it's not Firefly. BSG just doesn't have the.... "Moe"...
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Never got into BSG. I tried, watched it after the Firefly run on SciFi, but I'm not a fan of military stories and there was too little humor for me. Heard great things about it and I can tell there's quality work there, but not to my tastes.
Posted by james01 (Member # 8863) on :
Fox is indeed the devil because they cancelled Firefly. Oh what could have come
Posted by Grisha (Member # 6871) on :
If FOK is a branch of Wolfram & Hart, what was the problem with Dark Angel? Titus? or The Tick?
Posted by Rico (Member # 7533) on :
Fox is evil because they cancelled yet one more of my favorite shows. Arrested Development, I will avenge you!
Posted by Chris Bridges (Member # 1138) on :
Actually Arrested Development is one case where FOX backed the show completely even though the ratings were never there. They promoted it, gave it a sweet time slot, and kept it on far longer than anyone would expect. Critics loved it, awards were won, rabid fan base spring up, and... it didn't get the ratings.
Titus confused me, because when it was cancelled (after a timeslot change) it still had better ratings than a few other shows that were kept on. From what I remember at the time, FOX was uneasy with the direction the show was going but I could be wrong.
Posted by Rico (Member # 7533) on :
That's a pack of lies I tell you, a pack of lies!
*runs away crying and in denial*
Posted by Miro (Member # 1178) on :
quote:Originally posted by Grisha: If FOK is a branch of Wolfram & Hart, what was the problem with Dark Angel? Titus? or The Tick?
Dark Angel was actually cancelled in favor of Firefly after Whedon redid the pilot. Ironic, huh?
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