← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Sertorius
Thread ID: 20881 | Posts: 6 | Started: 2005-11-04
2005-11-04 02:43 | User Profile
Reuters
FX network ends Iraq war drama 'Over There' Tue Nov 1, 2005 7:51 PM ET
By Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Cable television's FX channel has decided not to renew the critically praised Iraq war drama "Over There" for a second season due to weak ratings during the show's initial 13-episode run, the network said on Tuesday.
"Over There," a first-of-its-kind contemporary war drama about U.S. troops in combat and their families back home, was co-created by Steven Bochco, the veteran TV producer behind such landmark cop shows as "Hill Street Blues" and "NYPD Blue."
While "Over There" garnered mostly favorable reviews, the gritty, albeit fictionalized, depiction of a real war that has grown increasingly unpopular with the American public ultimately proved a turnoff to TV viewers.
Although the series contained references to real-life events that have stirred debate over the war, including the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal, the producers sought to avoid overt political messages about the conflict.
The show got off to a promising start on July 27 with 4.1 million viewers tuning in, a fairly healthy launch by cable TV standards, but the audience steadily declined from there.
Through the 13th and final episode on October 26, the program averaged a meager 2.1 million viewers overall. Only 1.35 million watched the series finale.
"It became evident to us that the American public didn't want to see a dramatization of a war that was already going on," Yemaya Royce, a spokeswoman for Bochco's production company, told Reuters.
"It made people uncomfortable to watch. I think that was the case for a lot of people," FX spokesman John Solberg added. "Clearly it was subject matter that was harsh."
Said FX president and general manager John Landgraf: "The series was arguably the most critically acclaimed new television show of the year, a fact which made the decision not to renew it all the more difficult."
Launching any new TV show is always a gamble. But for Bochco, the stakes were especially high for "Over There," his first series on basic cable following a string of misfires on network television, including the ABC crime and legal dramas "Blind Justice," "Philly" and "Total Security."
Bochco recently took over as producer for the ABC political drama "Commander In Chief" and signed a three-year production deal with sister studio Touchstone Television.
Both ABC and Touchstone are units of the Walt Disney Co. The FX network is owned by News Corp. Ltd
Reuters/VNU
é Reuters 2005. All rights reserved. [url]http://today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=televisionNews&storyID=2005-11-02T005147Z_01_WRI184763_RTRIDST_0_TELEVISION-OVERTHERE-DC.XML&archived=False[/url] ===================== Good, I'm glad they cancelled this crap show in bad taste. It figures that Fox and Murdoch are behind it.
2005-11-04 03:34 | User Profile
The Marines and former Marines I know look at it the way cops look at Hill Street Blues:
"It's TV, man, not reality."
AE
[quote=Sertorius]Reuters
FX network ends Iraq war drama 'Over There' Tue Nov 1, 2005 7:51 PM ET ===================== Good, I'm glad they cancelled this crap show in bad taste. It figures that Fox and Murdoch are behind it.
2005-11-04 03:47 | User Profile
It's crap t.v. If they are going to do shows like this they should wait a number of years before they do it, as they did with Tour of Duty.
2005-11-04 04:17 | User Profile
The promo's they were showing for this dreck, had a good looking blond (of course) kissing a black guy goodby.
Good riddance to such vile propaganda and may the fleas of 1000 camels infest the scrotums of Bochco & co.
2005-11-04 04:21 | User Profile
You got it Sert., if the real truth of what is gong on down there were to come to light the American people would raise so much hell that the troops would be back home in one week.
I wonder if they are gong to make a episode about the so called "British" who were setting up those car bombs.......I read that they were Jews, and the two Americans doing the same thing.
Angel? thanks for reposting the whole thing all over again......glad it wasen't longer.
2005-11-05 03:16 | User Profile
[quote=Ponce] Angel? thanks for reposting the whole thing all over again......glad it wasen't longer.
Fixed that boo boo, blach, need to be a bit more careful.
AE