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Seven Years of TV Predictions

Seven Years of TV Predictions

Why even bother talking about my “TV predictions” over the past seven years?
For one, I can’t resist channeling my Nikki Finke, and screaming “TOLDJA!” over and over again.
More importantly though, looking back, I’m actually surprised at the amount of things I predicted in the first place.
And what better way to celebrate seven years than by tooting one’s horn?

Let’s start with hipsterdom: the cool things I thought were cool before everyone else.

Numero uno has got to be, hands down, Breaking Bad. Remember: that show was so underrated, I thought it would never win an Emmy. Thankfully, everyone came to their senses before the series finale. Praising Breaking Bad has since become a banality.

There’s another show, and tad more recent in the US TV-verse: Black Mirror. Or as I called it: the best UK show no one knows about.
Also worth noting on the list: The Shadow Line, Dancing on the Edge, Inside Men, Cuckoo, Mr. Selfridge, and The Hour.

Say it with me: TOLDJA (that these were great shows)!

I know. Those weren’t really TV industry predictions. (I did mention being a hipster though.)

How about this…

Six years before ClickHole happened, I did this amazing list of five games Hollywood should make into movies. If only I had also written for Buzzfeed, I would be able to call myself a journalist!
The aforementioned comedic clickbait list was in response to a previous post I did about Hollywood’s trivial pursuit of games. (Get it?) Thankfully, we didn’t get many of these adaptations on the screen. Although we are getting Pixels.

Okay.
Moving on to actual TV industry predictions.

Let’s address the big elephanTOLDJA in the room with a post from early 2011—

Is Netflix’s original programming strategy a game-changer?

Spoiler alert (if you haven’t read the original post): yes.

The House of Cards two-season deal had just been announced, so I wrote this think-piece about the future of television. Over four years later, people are just starting to realize this apparently. Yet we’ve already seen it’s already the case: Netflix has changed the game. Good thing I bought some Netflix shares when they were under $85.

And speaking of the future of television—
On the cusp of the 24 and Lost series finales (over five years ago!), I published an extensive article entitled “Ding Dong, Appointment TV is Dead“.
As the name doesn’t imply but outright states, I dig deep into the rise and fall of so-called “appointment TV”—now extinct.
And I know what you’re going to say, which is why way back when I also mentioned the current advent of “Event TV”. Oh, and “social television”. Because Twitter.

Which brings us to two little articles from 2008…
Nine ideas to save television – Part One and Part Two.

As of June 2015, I’m 9 for 9 on applied and successful ideas. Why am I still not CEO of ViaDisneyBCVersal? Maybe I should have gotten an MBA in horribleness.

Several of my nine ideas have since become ubiquitous:
– (1) Shows all year long
– (2) VOD
– (3) Fewer ads
– (5) Cost efficiency
– (6) Webisodes
– (9) Taking chances

The other three are a bit more recent “trends” (for better or for worse):
– (4) Shorter seasons
Pretty self-explanatory now, but seven years ago, it was a head-scratching thought for a lot of people. I even called it, yes, a game-changer.
– (7) Re-develop ideas and pilots
Look at the sea of reboots/makes/quels we’re in. It’s all about IPs now. I also suggested networks should redevelop/tweak their DOA pilots. Almost a no-brainer strategy nowadays.
– (8) Big names for big shows
This one is now an entrenched problem, and controversial for a lot of up-and-coming writers. It’s now harder than ever to transition from the lower echelons to EP-level. All thanks to networks only wanting “seasoned showrunners” for their writing rooms. And that’s about 20 people in this town.

So. That’s that.
Yes, I just spent an entire post patting myself on the back. It’s just another way of celebrating the evolution of TV over the past seven years.

I’ll be sure to make a ton of other predictions. I seem to always be right. I also need an encyclopedia to keep track of every good TV show out there.

Too much content. The ultimate first-world problem.

HBO’s victory lap and a garbage can (Week Roundup)

HBO’s victory lap and a garbage can (Week Roundup)

On this week’s TV news link roundup: pilot season mad-dash, the Sopranos final sequence by its director, a cable victory lap, some YouTube garbage and ABC Family targets a new buzz word.

Tight Production Schedules Put Pressure On Pilot Quality

An interesting look at the mad-dash of pilot season, especially since pilots are being ordered later and later.

All networks, particularly ABC and CBS, were again way behind in their pickups, compressing the time for staffing, casting and producing the pilots.

Let’s be honest here. Network pilots have never had that much lead-time to begin with. It’s always been an insane game of last-minute reshoots and deliveries. There’s a reason pilots have often (if not always) been considered a show’s weakest episode. That is, until “they” run the concept into the ground by season five.
The crazy news of the article however comes from the opening date of Upfront Week: May 11. Yes, that’s hell-a early and “the earliest in at least a decade”. Good luck to post-production.

Eight years after it aired, David Chase explains how he created the excruciating tension of the last Sopranos scene

It was my decision to direct the episode such that whenever Tony arrives someplace, he would see himself. He would get to the place and he would look and see where he was going.

Spoiler alert: he doesn’t say what happens after.
Although not directly related to the show’s writing per se, it is still worth the gander. Definitely a must-read if if you care even just a bit about the visual component of this historical HBO show.

And speaking of HBO…

At the Head of the Pack, HBO Shows the Way Forward

The NY Times rocked it with an in-depth look at the inside of HBO’s current programming direction. Watch and read as Richard Plepler, HBO’s CEO, makes a victory lap.

Interesting, isn’t it, that at a time that’s been called the most competitive moment in our industry’s history, we have, in my opinion, the best array of content in our history.

Best array of content in your history? While HBO’s 2015 series are certainly more popular while airing than the ones from the 2000s, I’m not sure the quality and endurance compares. The Sopranos, Six Feet Under, Rome, Deadwood, Carnivàle and The Wire just called. And it was a weird conference call.
The piece also states that back in 2007/2008 “[HBO’s] content cupboard was bare, and rival TV executives openly referred to the cable network as HB-Over.”
Was “HB-Over” an actual thing? Well, yes. In fact, it came from this previous NY Times piece where Showtime’s chairman and CEO Matthew C. Blank was quoted:

HB-Over. I’ve heard that term used for HBO both outside and inside our network.

Tough pill to swallow now that Starz has taken Showtime’s second place in the premium cable world. Woops.
It’ll be interesting to see how CBS competes with HBO Now’s (nearly) independent streaming service.

Seinfeld calls YouTube a ‘giant garbage can’

Although Seinfeld was joking, he was in fact touting his Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee arriving at Crackle.

When you get to a certain point in the business, what a man is looking for in a network is the same thing he’s looking for in his underwear. He’s looking for a little bit of support and a little bit of freedom. And that’s exactly what Crackle offered.

You can tell how much he respects online content. I think he’s reached that rare apex of making people giving him money laugh as he openly mocks them.

ABC Family Doubles Down on Original Programming to Reach Young Women

Or as they call them, the “becomers”. Shudder.
In non-buzzy marketing words, they’re referring to young women between 14 and 29 “entering new life phases”. This is good news for the content side of things: the cable network is on the verge of announcing at the upfronts it will “double its original programming slate over the next four years”. ABC Family president Tom Ascheim also added:

The phone is the first smart TV. It’s an incredible source of video. We’re also embedding the social tools they love so much into the ABC Watch experience.

ABC Wat–Oh. For a second there I thought you were referring to Android Wear and apps for your wrist. You’re just talking about your VOD service. Gotcha. Actually, that makes me want to develop some kind of app for smartwatches. Maybe a crappy asymmetric viewing experience?
ABC Family is actually revamping its online viewing service this summer to increase mobile viewing. No surprise there considering that phones are now the way most 25-and-under watch video content.
And the AdWeek article is already talking about Generation Z. God help us.

Long story short, I hate plagiarism.

Yesterday, I came across this video, which is an episode of a web-series called Long Story Short.
It was posted a couple of weeks ago on reddit, under the title “This youtube series is really good. It has everything it takes to be popular except the popularity“.
I immediately recognized the concept and execution of the series from a similar identical French show on Canal+ named Bref.
Here’s a sample episode:
http://vimeo.com/45587443

It was interesting seeing an American version of this very popular French series.
Except for the part where this American version was actually plagiarizing the very popular French series.

I’m already hearing the complaints about my plagiarism complaints:[list]

  • Didn’t Picasso say “great artists steal”? (spoiler alert: he wasn’t talking about plagiarism)
  • Are voice-overs copyrightable now?!
  • Isn’t every creation actually recreation?
  • Dude, chillax, we’re all made from the same star junk, right? Isn’t our life, like, really about copying each other? You know? Like if you think about it, we’re all just one big gooey mess. Right?

Groan.[/list]

According to a comment they made, the “creators” were not ripping off Bref, but were actually “inspired” by a similar Israeli show/concept. This one.
The thing is, they forgot to mention the part about how the Israeli show is actually an official remake of Bref. And by official, I mean it has the complete blessing of the original creators, et al.
Woops.

Long Story Short is more than the cover of a song. (Which, by the way, would still have to be credited to its original author.)
It is more than just “inspired by”.
If anything, the lack of acknowledgement towards Bref or its Israeli counterpart in an official capacity (i.e. in the show’s credits) is, well, completely disingenuous.
To quote a reddit comment on the subject:

I’m all for official adaptations of this format and style but the original creators did something really specific and special and to just steal it for an American knockoff without crediting (or getting the blessing of) the original filmmakers isn’t cool.

Now, I’m not saying you should pay royalties to Lost every time you use flashforwards, but there are times when “inspiration” is just a code-word for plagiarism.
This is one of them.
Because I’m not just talking about copying a format. Or just copying a voice-over. Or just copying pacing. Or just copying characters. Or just copying jokes.
I’m talking about copying all of the above. At once. Not just about copying the idea, but copying the execution and the content.
You know, pulling a LaBeouf.

Long Story Short is a blatant disrespect to both the original material and original creators it is stealing from.
It is plagiarism, pure and simple. And it needs to be known.

P.S.: If you’re curious about the original version of Bref, with English subtitles, check this channel out.