Not in Portland. Or Hawaii, Either

Has anyone put a pencil to the success rate of new shows? Just on average, what percentage of new shows fail or succeed? Perhaps Carbonell has little to worry about. This is a win-win for him.

Hey James, have you seen anything yet on Holly Hunter’s show, Saving Grace? I saw a preview after The Closer the other night and didn’t realize it was going to have a “supernatural” angle to it. My original interest in the show was because it was set in my home town of Oklahoma City and I was curious as to how “we” will be portrayed.

Maybe there will be a Dorian Gray type scenario and whatever in the island stopped Richard from aging will stop working and they can get an older actor to play him.

@Keith: Not putting pencil to paper, but I’m thinking a quarter? A third in a good year? If you factor in midseason shows, likely it’s even less.

I have seen 3 eps of Grace, and will be writing more about it later. It’s not entirely my thing–too much of a procedural on the one hand, a little too earnest with regard to the religious themes–but for what it’s attempting to do (basically, doing Touched By an Angel if FX had remade it), it does it very well. And Holly Hunter is unsurprisingly very good. I have absolutely no idea how well it gets OKC, though–never been.

If, as most of us think, Naomi’s Boat is a Hanso Invasion Force?

This season: Whenever we get back to the Others’ new camp, it is mentioned that Richard has taken a group of Others to another hideout. They are all later reported dead.

Last season: Assuming Cane stays on the air, CBS relents and follows the standard TV practice of allowing him back for one or two episodes in the final season (e.g. Boreanaz on Buffy). Richard then either
A) shows up alive to disrupt Hanso in some way; we then get a Richard flashback episode in an attempt to explain his backstory in as compact manner as possible.
B) stays “dead” and we get an Other (Ben/Mikhail/???) flashback that also mentions his history with Richard. If it is a Ben flashback, you could bring back the young Ben actor- Richard would then relate what “the Hostiles” believe in to the (now teenaged) young Ben, as well as explaining his youth. Possibility of mirrioring Ben’s and Walt’s teenage years in some manner.

@Keith: It certainly seems like the success rate of scripted shows has dropped significantly in recent years, even when you count the recent trend of ordering smaller batches of second seasons as midseason replacements. Off the top of my head, only Heroes, Ugly Betty, 30 Rock, and Shark have received normal second seasons; Jericho got a midseason deal. I don’t follow TV enough (nor have ever even seen) Brothers & Sisters, Men in Trees, Til Death, or The Game to tell you what their fates are.

In any case, that works out to, what, 1.5 shows survived per network? Combine with cancellation rates of expensive old shows, and no wonder there are so many new pilots this year.

It appears that all of the above shows have survived their first season, as have October Road, Notes from the Underbelly, and Rules of Engagement. All in all, only 12 shows survived, and at least part of that is simply due to ABC not having anything else to air. It would not surprise me if that survival rate was actually up over the last couple years; its just the large number of veteran cancellations leads to this year’s very young schedule.

@Tom: Also, NBC is bringing back FNL. On the other hand, ABC has as many returning shows as it does in part because it launched so many–it announced at least a dozen at the fall 2006 upfront, and that’s not counting everything in midseason. As for CBS, it’s Shark, Jericho, and God help us, Rules of Engagement.

Still not putting pencil to paper, tho.

James, let me know if you ever pass thru OKC. I’ll buy you a great steak dinner.

I’m a former talent agent for actors. As such I know that every studio has a clause in it’s contract limiting series regulars to a maximum of 3 guest star roles on other shows, as long as none of them are recurring and don’t intefere with production of the show. Technically, he can do 1 episode of lost and CBS can’t stop him, if he doesn’t have to work on Cane. They could do something in that one episode to explain why he won’t be seen again, or Lost can just play the odds and wait for Cane to be cancelled. That worked great for 24 and Kim Raver after The Nine was cancelled.

…and judging from the pilot of Rashida Jones’ sitcom, Karen may have a bigger role than we expected in the second half of The Office next season.

[But Michael, if you're still there: under the terms of such a contract, wouldn't Richard Alpert be considered a recurring character? Or would he not be, if they killed the character off in that episode? Anyway, I'm going by Nina Tassler's statement, in which she seemed to believe it was her call; but she may have been mistaken, or may have meant she wouldn't let him do repeated appearances on Lost.]

I always went under the assumption that what happens before the series contract is irrelevant. So I would think Nestor could do one episode of Lost under the guest star clause but no more than that (until/unless the new series is cancelled).

The combination of Lost’s delayed S4 start, which must buy some time to wait out Cane’s cancellation, and the odds of that cancellation being so stastically high seem to suggest that Carbonell and his management know what they’re doing. If Cane initially got so-so ratings I suppose CBS could keep it going just to mess with Lost, but such a stupidly petty tactic seems out of place in the modern network TV game. (Anyway, Carbonell is hardly the key to Lost’s success.)