May 12, 2008 2:21

Corporate Press Release Theater: Christian Slater, Car Salesman

NBC already announced its fall schedule (or its fall schedule for now) a month ago, so its "upfront" today will consist mainly of—well, I'm not entirely sure, but it seems like it, like the other big-network upfronts, will be focused less on new shows than on new ways for advertisers to make money off shows. Such as this product-placement deal for the new Jekyll/Hyde Christian Slater drama, My Own Worst Enemy. With Knight Rider, this completes the transformation of NBC into an on-air car dealership:

NBC AND GM FORM IMPORTANT CROSS-PLATFORM MARKETING AND PROGRAMMING PARTNERSHIP FOR NEW NBC FALL DRAMA 'MY OWN WORST ENEMY'

BURBANK -- May 12, 2008 – NBC and GM announced an important cross-platform marketing and programming partnership that will make GM the exclusive automotive integration partner for NBC's new fall drama "My Own Worst Enemy" (starring Christian Slater). The show (Mondays, 10-11 p.m. ET starting this fall) will prominently feature two different GM cars -- one for each of the personalities embodied by Slater's character.

But what will be the good car, and what will be the evil car?

In actual programming news, by the way, Fox is reportedly bringing back 'Til Death, but not Back to You.

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May 12, 2008 12:30

Upfronts Preview: TV Faces Its Shrinkage

We TV critics like to pretend we're a heartless, puppy-kicking, candy-from-baby-taking bunch, but we're as sentimental as anyone else. So don't be surprised if you read a bit of a melancholy streak in the this week's coverage of the big-network upfronts, which kick off today.

As I've mentioned, this week's presentations will be a diminished affair, in several ways. First, thanks to the strike, there will be less new programming to announce. Now, the upfront schedules were highly theoretical to begin with—some shows would never air, some would be heavily retooled, many would suck and most would ultimately fail. Nonetheless... there was something heady about having the network execs get on stage and preview an entire season's worth of programming all in one day. There was an exciting, first-day-of-school feel to it (depending how much you liked school) or a Christmas-morning feel (depending how good your childhood Christmases / alternative holidays were). Now it's more like Santa coming down the chimney and leaving you a vague promise about all the great toys his elves will be producing sometime in the next fiscal year.

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May 12, 2008 11:25

BSG Watch: Mother's Day

Sharon (Grace Park) gave her selves a good talking-to. / SCI FI Channel Photo: Carole Segal

SPOILER ALERT: Considering this episode of Battlestar Galactica aired Friday, you really have no excuse to have waited three days to watch it—um, like I did...

Mother's Day plans, and the Survivor finale, got in the way of my normal time-shifted viewing of BSG, so of course it makes perfect sense that this one should have turned out to be a pistol from start to finish. And apropos of Mother's Day, it also reminded us that BSG—contrary to the usual image of TV sci-fi—is a series most of whose most interesting characters are women. Not to take anything away from, say, Baltar or Adama (nice "You made me believe" moment at the close of the episode with Roslin), but this episode really showcased BSG's fascinating women: Starbuck, Sharon and Roslin on the Colonial side, and on the Cylon side, the Sixes, the Eights—and, of course, the hybrid. Since I'm running late to begin with, I'll go straight to the hail of bullets and let you join in:

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May 12, 2008 9:16

Fallon Upward

Making months of speculation official, it is being widely reported that NBC will announce today (at a press conference scheduled noon-ish) that Jimmy Fallon will succeed Conan O'Brien as host of Late Night.

It's a brilliant, brilliant move. For Jimmy Fallon. For the rest of the parties involved, I'm not so sure. Granted, Conan O'Brien himself proved that an underrated host could succeed wildly. (As I wrote a few years back when Jimmy Kimmel launched, hosts the world over owe O'Brien a huge debt for lowering the bar of expectations.)

But O'Brien was someone whom few outside Simpsons fans knew at all, and even those who liked his writing hadn't seen him before a camera. Fallon is a known quantity—just known for something else, reading scripted material and doing characters, and the marketplace's verdict on that work is mixed, judging from his post-SNL career. Of course it's entirely possible that Lorne Michaels and the bigs at NBC have seen things in him that we haven't been privy to, but the rest of us will just have to wait. Does the move make any sense to you?

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May 12, 2008 7:53

The Morning After: Old Girls' Club

Last night's final four end the season's wild ride. / Monty Brinton/CBS

SPOILER ALERT: Spoilers for last night's Survivor finale after the jump:

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