FOX Upfronts!
Yay, more upfronts! Does the fun ever start?! FOX this season seems to be playing with a familiar gameplan. The will air a handful of popular shows through out the fall and just coast until American Idol comes back in January, where they will then rule the ratings. Throw into the mix five or so new dramas and a couple comedies that will surely be jerked around for months before being yanked off the air and there you have it. Follow the bouncing link for the new series…
Happy Hour — Classic FOX comedy. A small-town guy moves in with a cool-guy in Chicago who tries to get him to forget about his problems– likely through the employ of really hot chicks. What’s funny is that this show could easily last the longest on the network (War at Home anyone?).
Justice — An hour-long drama starring the dad from Alias about high-powered defense lawyers. Finally, someone is sticking up for the rich and famous.
Standoff — This isn’t a show I’m necessarily going to watch, but I’m going to take this opportunity to declare Standoff is a sure thing. This series is going to be a big hit. Here’s why: 1) Rob Livingston! Ladies love him, guys love him, he’s a hunk. 2) Hostage Negotiations! That sounds exciting, right? The premise is that Livingston and his parter (played by Rosemarie DeWitt) are the aforementioned hostage negotiators AND they happen to be romantically involved. So we can expect a lot of 3) SEX! 4) Gina Torres is also in the show. She played the awesome Zoe on Firefly, a show EVERYONE should try to watch before they die (you might also remember her as Cavanaugh’s ex-wife from this season’s The Shield).
‘Til Death — Oafish human, Brad Garrett, plays a man in a stagnate marriage that gets shook up after a fiery young couple moves next door. Remember that show Everybody Loves Raymond? I’ve never seen it, but people seemed to find it quite enjoyable.
Vanished — Political thriller about the missing wife of a senator. Â I obviously haven’t seen this show yet, but it wouldn’t surprise me if President Logan is behind the whole damn thing.
Talk Show with Spike Feresten — Like the title suggests, this is a talk show, and it stars Spike Feresten, who I do not know, but whose credits include writing for The Late Show, Simpsons, and The Dana Carvey Show. The spin is that the celebrity guests will be doing the monologue and taking part in the sketches. It’s unclear at this point if the show will actually be FOX’s attempt to get into the late-night game or if this will air in primetime.
The Wedding Album — A midseason drama that follows a wedding planner and photographer as they go from high-profile wedding to high-profile wedding. Basically, the show I’ve been waiting my life to see, right?
The Winner: — The Daily Show’s Rob Corddry stars as a man who keeps thinking about the mid-nineties, when his life was completely different. First, I love the mid-nineties, and I’m all about a show that frequently referrences them. Unfortunately, this show was created by Seth MacFarlane which means that the 90s references will be completely random and without significance. It’s slated for midseason, but it seems like a prime contender for getting the Andy Richter treatment.
Not too many surprises here. FOX is in the lucky positon of having established a formula that works for them. They aren’t a ratings juggernaut, but they have a pretty strong lock on their audience. They also have playoff baseball and don’t need much of a fall schedule to fill the airtime.
Sources: Zap2It’s 2006 Network Upfront Coverage | The New York Times
Tags: FOX, The Industry, Upfronts
May 18th, 2006 at 7:21 pm
So I guess Mischa Barton’s character dies on the OC tonight. Well, maybe she’ll return for her own reality talk show — call it “That’s So Mischa.”