Fox’s 2012-13 schedule
Fox unveiled its prime time campaign for the 2012-13 season Monday morning, in advance of the network’s upfront presentation later in the afternoon.
The biggest move coming out of this schedule is the relocation of Glee from Tuesday to Thursday night to make room for a live-action sitcom block.
Fox’s 2012-13 schedule, which is surprisingly skimp on new programming, sees veteran Bones lead-off on Mondays, followed by new drama Mob Doctor, about a woman who is involved with “The South Chicago Mob” (the what now?)
Tuesdays features a new live-action sitcom lineup. Sandwiched between retuning shows Raising Hope and New Girl is Ben & Kate, a sitcom about a single mother who let her freewheeling brother move in. After New Girl is The Mindy Project (they better change the name of this title quick), featuring former Office star Mindy Kaling as a doctor who works in a small office with rather odd co-workers.
Wednesday nights is karaoke – er, I mean singing reality competition night with X Factor in the fall and American Idol in the winter and spring. The big news of course, is the announcement today of Britney Spears and Demi Lovato as the new X Factor judges.
Thursday starts off with the results of Factor/Idol, and followed by a relocated Glee.
Fridays has Touch, followed by the final episodes of Fringe, while Saturdays for the most part will be filled with sporting events (if no sports, then Cops will air, followed by an hour of repeat programming.)
Sunday’s Animation Domination block remains unchanged, though The Cleveland Show is being held for mideseason.
And speaking of midseason, Fox has two announced two new entries thus far: The Goodwin Games and The Following, which replaces Mob Doctor when its season ends. Other shows scheduled for midseason include Kitchen Nightmares.
Aside from the Fox shows yours truly mentioned on Saturday, exiting shows include House (which is retiring after eight seasons), Napoleon Dynamite, and expensive flop Terra Nova.
To see the complete schedule and detailed program descriptions of each new show, click here.
Thought: Fox’s 2012-13 schedule was panned by some, as well as its upfront presentation (pairing Zooey Deschannel and Mindy Kaling was like pairing Mancow Mueller with Jonathan Brandmeier.) Fox is likely to keep its 18-49 crown next season but the margin of victory over CBS could be quite tiny.
Bones is aging on Monday night, and will lose steam opposite The Voice and Dancing With The Stars, not to mention CBS’ comedies. Mondays at 9/8 continues to be Fox’s weakest on the schedule, so I don’t expect too much from Mob Doctor or Goodwin Games, neither worth watching (The South Chicago Mob? Fail.)
Love or hate her, Britney Spears going to X Factor is a good move. But Demi Lovato? If you live outside the controlled world of Disney (which means anyone who isn’t female aged 12-24), chances are you won’t know who she is. Yours truly has never heard of her before today.
Glee’s move to Thursday isn’t a shock – the show is being propped up by either X Factor and Idol as lead-in as ratings and buzz continues to decline for the show. Meanwhile, Fox’s decision to go with an all-comedy Tuesday lineup is questionable, given Hope is still struggling, and the two new shows look like rating losers.
Moving Touch to Friday with Fringe is a good idea – both are a compatible fit with each other, despite the low ratings.
Fox is using weekend prime-time to target males and 18-34 audiences with sports (Saturday) and animation (Sunday). With the planned Flintstones project likely dead, look for more declines for Animation Domination on Sunday, as the block is increasingly becoming a ratings niche, along the lines of The CW and NBC’s Thursday night sitcom lineup. While yours truly is happy that Bob’s Burgers made the fall schedule, it needs to show some ratings improvement in order to stick around.
A disappointing lineup all around, meaning we’re 0-for-2 so far. Let’s see what happens with ABC on Tuesday, but yours truly isn’t expecting much. Both Fox and NBC’s 2012-13 schedules isn’t going to stop viewers from fleeing the exits to cable. In fact, these weak schedules might just accelerate the trend.