AP: FOX ADDS NEW J.J. ABRAMS SCI-FI DRAMA TO FALL SCHEDULE

[MichaelDoran]

NEW YORK (AP) _ Fox will bring only two new series on the air in the fall, traditionally its slow season, but plans flashy two-hour season premieres of four programs during the same August week as the Democratic National Convention.

``Lost'' producer J.J. Abrams is behind the new science fiction drama, ``Fringe,'' about an airplane flight whose passengers meet untimely ends. ``Fringe'' will be paired on the schedule with ``House'' on Tuesdays in the fall and ``American Idol'' in the spring.
A new comedy, ``Do Not Disturb,'' is set in one of Manhattan's trendiest hotels. It replaces the canceled ``Back to You'' (the wife of disappointed star Kelsey Grammer is encouraging an Internet petition to get it back).

Fox will finish the season as the nation's most popular network among all viewers, instead of just young viewers, taking a title owned by CBS for the past five years.
``Fringe,'' ``Bones,'' ``Prison Break'' and ``Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader'' will open the fall season the week of Aug. 25.

They should not conflict with major moments of the convention because political planners try to time them after 10 p.m. on the East Coast, when the Fox shows will be over, said Peter Liguori, Fox entertainment chairman. Fox is avoiding any conflict on Thursday, when the party's nominee gives an acceptance speech.

Fox executives said their development season was hindered by the writers strike, one reason why only two new series will premiere in the fall.

But Fox usually comes alive in January, anyway, when ``American Idol'' premieres. Fox will introduce another new sci-fi series, ``Dollhouse,'' two animated and one alternative series in midseason.

Fox executives said they were disappointed with the ratings declines for ``American Idol'' this season, and will cut back the Wednesday results show to 30 minutes.

[J. Dincauze]

Dollhouse is Joss Whedon's new show... can't wait for that.

Is it weird that Abrams' new show about an airline and its passengers?

[jayb00gie]

Yeah, DOLLHOUSE is by far the one show I'm most excited to see this upcoming season. Such a great premise!

[Punchy]

Lance Reddick from the Wire will be in Fringe, so I'm interested.

[SMARTASS8]

I really don't even know if I should bother watching this. It seems every time I get into a genre show(Invasion, Moonlight, Surface, Threshold, Night Stalker, Journeyman), I'm lucky if I get an entire season out of it before it's canceled. Too bad I'm not into Star Trek since that seems to be the one franchise that is guaranteed at least 3 seasons before cancellation.

[silvanthalas]

Fox + Sci-fi = place your bets on how many episodes it will last before it's canceled.

[Knowbrainer]

Fringe is what...? I read somewhere else: "The Abrams thriller “Fringe,” about a trio who explore paranormal mysteries", which sounded to me like yet another X-Files wannabe show.

But I, too, am also waiting on Whedon's Dollhouse. I'm just not happy that the show's gonna be on Fox, the network that seems to hate and not understand Whedon's creative vision.

[G Dog]

Originally Posted by Knowbrainer

Fox, the network that seems to hate and not understand Whedon's creative vision.

Why, because nobody watched Firefly, the difficult to market western/sci-fi hybrid? YEAH, damn Fox jerks!!!

[edgejedi]

Originally Posted by G Dog

Why, because nobody watched Firefly, the difficult to market western/sci-fi hybrid? YEAH, damn Fox jerks!!!

Oh man...i think you just opened up a can of worms...be prepared to hear "episodes out of order" about a thousand times..

[Brad h]

If I knows me the JJ Abrams, expect Lost to start sucking balls. Watch Felicity after Alias started if you don't think it'll happen. In the fourth season, Felicity traveled backwards through time with the aid of witchcraft. This, after winning a beauty contest. She then comes back to her own time where it ends up she changed nothing, but ta-da, the friend who got shot was just fine. No one mentioned it. Boo.

[bluedevil2002]

Come to think of it, Alias started going downhill when Lost started. Or maybe a year before.

But Lost has more top producers than just JJ, and it's already had it's downhill scare (beginning of season 3).

[Robot H Brian]

Originally Posted by Brad h

If I knows me the JJ Abrams, expect Lost to start sucking balls. Watch Felicity after Alias started if you don't think it'll happen. In the fourth season, Felicity traveled backwards through time with the aid of witchcraft. This, after winning a beauty contest. She then comes back to her own time where it ends up she changed nothing, but ta-da, the friend who got shot was just fine. No one mentioned it. Boo.

From Wikipedia:

"The last five episodes of the series involve a mystical "what if" storyline in which Meghan casts one of her spells, sending Felicity back one year prior to the very moment when she slept with Noel on the roof. The reason for this was due to the fact that the WB originally ordered only 17 episodes for the final season. The final episode, "Graduation," was then written and the show was to end with Felicity and Ben in Palo Alto together. But The WB quickly ordered five more episodes and writers were stuck with the dilemma of how to keep the show going when Felicity and her friends were supposed to be done with college. After scrambling for ideas, including a silly "Summer Spanish Class" storyline, the writers decided to go with the time travel theme and play with the idea of what would've happened had Felicity chosen Noel."

and

"During the time traveling episodes in the final season, Tangi Miller's character of Elena was said to have been killed in the present day. When Felicity finally returns from the past, Elena is mysteriously resurrected and present at Noel's wedding, seemingly creating an error in the show's continuity. Producers have since explained the error as a problem in editing, as a scene in which Felicity left Elena a note on her last night in the past, telling Elena not to go to Columbia in order to avoid her fatal car accident was cut from the final episode due to length. These scenes have been restored on the fourth season DVD set to relieve confusion for fans."

[SMARTASS8]

As girly as it is for me to say, the leads always end up with the wrong guy in Abrams' TV shows.

Felicity should have picked Noel.

Sydney should have hooked up with Will.

I'm sure Kate is going to somehow end up with Sawyer instead of Jack.

[anakin1138]

Originally Posted by G Dog

Why, because nobody watched Firefly, the difficult to market western/sci-fi hybrid? YEAH, damn Fox jerks!!!

damn right! western + scifi = doomed to failure These two things just don't make sense to be put together. Plus there's the fact that Whedon was never a good writer to begin with. He was always overrated and overhyped.

[ZeoVGM]

Originally Posted by Brad h

If I knows me the JJ Abrams, expect Lost to start sucking balls.

J.J has like next to nothing to do with Lost anymore. His name is attached, and that's it.

Originally Posted by anakin1138

damn right! western + scifi = doomed to failure These two things just don't make sense to be put together. Plus there's the fact that Whedon was never a good writer to begin with. He was always overrated and overhyped.

Well, you see, this is actually very wrong. Whedon is a fantastic writer. Ignoring delays, Astonishing, Runaways, and the current Buffy comic proves this fact.

But the fact that you said "these two things just don't make sense to be put together" shows you have a lack of imagination. You limit your mind to what you already know, which sucks.

[BKole]

I love Firefly. Like actually Love it, and I love Buffy and Angel as well.

Though, I am LESS Impressed with his Comicbook Offerings. His Runaways is...not really that good in my opinion, it's really delayed, which i don't mind. I waited for Ultimates after all, but this is just a bit...Lacklustre? Nobodies really doing anything of any worth, and I don't actually care about the characters or the story anymore.

Similar with Astonishing, that lost me three issues into Danger. Lets drag out a fairly rudimentary storyline filled with 80's Nostalgia and lob it into 6 issues of wandering around aimlessly and witty dialogue.

Plus, Buffy is being written by fill in writers currently, isn't it? Wolves at the Door or Gate, I forget the title, is written by that Cloverfield guy. Like I say, I like the TV programmes he produces, but...I have less love for his comics.

[Eric Palicki]

Originally Posted by anakin1138

damn right! western + scifi = doomed to failure These two things just don't make sense to be put together.

STAR WARS was a space western, "anakin1138."

[Troy Brownfield]

Originally Posted by Eric Palicki

STAR WARS was a space western, "anakin1138."

Indeed. Movie Math!

"The Searchers" + "Hidden Fortress" + Hero's Journey theory = Star Wars.

[Brian Garside]

Originally Posted by anakin1138

damn right! western + scifi = doomed to failure These two things just don't make sense to be put together. Plus there's the fact that Whedon was never a good writer to begin with. He was always overrated and overhyped.

I actually don't think it would be possible for a paragraph to be more ignorant.

Firefly allowed shows like BattleStar Galactica to exist, and make no mistake if Firefly were on SciFi instead of Fox, we would be watching the 8th season of Firefly right now.

[MadBandit]

Originally Posted by SMARTASS8

I really don't even know if I should bother watching this. It seems every time I get into a genre show(Invasion, Moonlight, Surface, Threshold, Night Stalker, Journeyman), I'm lucky if I get an entire season out of it before it's canceled. Too bad I'm not into Star Trek since that seems to be the one franchise that is guaranteed at least 3 seasons before cancellation.

Well, after the success of The X-Files, Buffy and Smallville, you'd think the (big four) networks would be more into giving sci-fi/fantasy shows more of a chance to build an audience. Instead, they want to go into developing third-rate ripoffs and (Lord help us) stick with reality/game shows. You could say there's hope with Heroes, but I see it as Cliff's Notes version of "Watchmen" (March 6, 2009 seems so close and so far).

[MadBandit]

Originally Posted by Brian Garside

I actually don't think it would be possible for a paragraph to be more ignorant.

Firefly allowed shows like BattleStar Galactica to exist, and make no mistake if Firefly were on SciFi instead of Fox, we would be watching the 8th season of Firefly right now.

I thought it was "The X-Files" that helped sci-fi shows get a better standing nowadays. Besides BG is a revamped version of the short-lived 1970s series.

[alias28]

fox also cancelled wonderfalls after just four episodes. i'm weary to watch anything on fox since they are so terrible at letting a show grow gradually.

[jbz16]

I noticed they did not mention Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles. Did that show already kick the bucket already too? I have only been able to watch a few episodes due to work. And I never thought much about it, but it seems Sci-Fi shows on Fox do get cancelled quickly. And why is it that they never get picked up by Sci-Fi Channel? I can't see how thier lame Saturday Night Original movies can pull in more viewers than Star Trek: Enterpise, Firefly or Terminator. I don't think Sci-Fi should take sloppy seconds but some of these shows have got to be worth continuing production. After all, it is all about the $$$$$ in the end.

[Jason Seaver]

Sci-fi shows get cancelled quickly on other networks, too - they just order far fewer of them than Fox. Fox's strategy is they'll throw anything on the air for a few weeks to see what sticks, which is obviously a thoroughly mixed bag - they'll put junk on, they'll put weird ideas that scare other networks on, with the only condition being that they apparently won't try to ride out a downward trend - lose half the audience between week one and week two, and they figure it's time to throw something else against the wall.

As to why Sci-fi doesn't pick other stuff up, it's probably only really economical for them to consider it if it's an NBC/Universal production, because what a network spends on one series is a huge chunk of their budget for original programming. A Universal show, the parent company has a chance at long-term money, but anyone else's is just a rental that will likely lose money. I also don't think they produce most of their lame Saturday night movies - they pick direct-to-video slop up cheap and brand it.

[Pseudoderm]

It said in USA Today that Terminator was renewed and would return. I'm not sure if it'll have a Fall start or January start, but it is coming back.

As for Joss Whedon's excellent Buffy comic...he didn't write everyepisode of the tv series either. Many of the best are by his pen, but the majority were written by others so it makes sense that the comic would follow this direction. Besides, the comic has been very good...the fill-in writers thus far rival some of Joss' best work. Vaughan's Faith storyline was especially good.

LOL concerning Felicity. I never watched the show, and all I remember of it was the fury the show faced from its fans when the lead actress cut her hair!! It might be fun to watch those time travel episodes...

As for Back To You...it was a great concept and Kelsey was great, but I couldn't stand the woman from Everybody Loves Raymond. They should have cast Bebe Neuwirth, the actress who played Lilith on Cheers and Frasier. She would have been dynamic with Kelsey in a newsroom setting. (Especially with their experience of playing a divorced couple so well.) I think it should RIP or go through a major overhaul before ever returning. Didn't they recast the daughter halfway through the season? That seemed desperate and pointless.