CBS Cancels "Cold Case"

[JI7]

i guess they want more reality shows for attention whores and shows trying to make corporote bosses out to be some heroic figures.

fuck cbs

[Inchworm]

1. Maybe they'll play episodes online somewhere now

I haven't got to see it since the digital blackout. :(

[littlebit]

3. They can't.

I tried to find it on dvd and was told that they can't sell them in the US because of the music rights.

[JI7]

4. that's right, the music is why it's not available on dvd but there are illegal ones out there

i would like some cable channel to pick it up but i don't know if it would be too expensive.

the show is also repeated on different channels. not sure if that would stop with the shows end.

[DarthDem]

6. Reruns Are on TNT

I doubt they'll be stopping anytime soon.

[Jkid]

32. Music rights

The main reason why most classic shows will never see the light of day via DVD.

[Angry Dragon]

23. Try this place

http://www.tvduck.com/

[Kerrytravelers]

2. I just detest reality shows.

It is a shame to see actual writers, producers, above and below the line talent discarded for more "reality" nonsense.

[TheMadMonk]

8. Reality shows pay for themselves.

Sponsors, phone voting, attention whores working for nothing. Advertising revenue is pure gravy. Very rich gravy.

Never forget that one half of the population is of below average inteligence. With a few carefully chosen gimmicks (voyeurism being the biggest) you can immediately capture large chunks of that part of the market most likely to be swayed by all the subconscious cues built into advertising.

Catering to the above average half means catering to a much wider range of tastes. AND trying to sell to a demographic that is at least a little less credulous.

[lazarus]

11. Some reality shows

are above average, and plenty of people who are of above average intelligence enjoy them. Not every reality show is Rock Of Love Bus, you know.

Survivor and Amazing Race are enjoyable fare for intelligent people. Several of the shows on Bravo are good, Top Chef, for instance.

I don't like being considered to have below average intelligence because I happen to like a couple of TV shows you don't like. It's insulting.

Have you ever watched a season of Survivor? It's not mindless pandering to the illiterate, it's a complex game of social and psychological dimensions. My entire family enjoys it, and I can assure you we're not in the lower half of intelligence.

[rpannier]

22. Tried watching it

Didn't like it

[lazarus]

28. that's fair

I don't demand that people like what I like. :hi:

[TheMadMonk]

30. Never managed to sit through a full episode of survivor.

Watched a couple of eps of Amazing Race. Pretty much about what I manage for most reality shows before my brains start melting.

My most common thought when I do see little bits of these Reality TV programs is: How do they find such fucking dumb smart people? Their lack of even basic general knowlege is seriously frightening in some cases.

As a matter of fact I don't consider people to be of below average intelligence just because of what programs they like. However I do seriously question their intelligence (or at least critical thinking ability) when they chose to take personal umbrage at what was a very general observation.

[lazarus]

31. It wasn't that general

you were fairly clear that people who like reality tv are in the lower half of average intelligence. That's a very broad brush you're painting with.

As for intelligence of the participants, how can you judge - if you've never even seen a whole episode of Survivor - how smart the contestants are? Some are smart, some are dumb. Kinda like the general populace.

Yes, some shows out there tend to feature dumb people, but not all of them. To simply say that all reality tv is like that is just wrong. There are a lot of fans of those shows on DU, and you're basically attacking other DUers when you say that viewers of reality TV are below average intelligence.

That's what I took umbrage with. It wasn't personal, because I really don't give a damn what someone thinks about me. But broad brush attacks on groups of people that have no basis in reality do annoy me.

[TheMadMonk]

33. No I am not saying people that like reality TV must be of below average...

...intelligence. Not without having the other end of the bone pointing straight at me, since my taste in humour and some other forms of entertaiment can be very decidedly "lowbrow".

There are aspects of Survivor (and other programs) that appeal to you and indeed appeal to some of my friends who I most definitely know are not idiots. However those same friends do agree with me on why the contestants are "stoopid". Although to be charitable I should say, were chosen with certain well chosen ignorances in mind as well as whatever "presence" they might bring to the screen. The odds of assembling a random group of that size and not not have a single actual useful survival skill bettween them are infintessimal.

That the primary target audience has an overpreponderance of hyphenated christian names doesn't exclude a certain degree of "layering" in the programming, after all Looney Tunes has been doing it for half a century and more. And writers were doing it centuries before that.

The utterly artificial unreality of "Reality TV" jars with me so much that anything that might otherwise be redeeming in the content is lost on me. Not even the talent type shows, since I know a certain percentage of the contestants there are deliberately chosen not for talent, but for the entertainment value when the obligatory nasty judge tears them to shreds. From Jackass to Who dares Wins, Wifeswap to Big Brother, the outlines of the scripts are as predictable as the tides.

All I see is what looks like a larger agenda of distraction, giving the audience all these meaningless people and their doings to occupy their minds and time. It goes with "What are the people in Hollywood doing?" and "After the break, we'll be meeting the man who has beein collecting and cataloging his belly button lint for thirty years." and hand in hand with current afairs programing which won't hold over the bi-annual grocery/petrol/real estate/... comparison for anything less than an airline crash; That puts a neighbourhood dispute ahead of any industrial shutdowns that gut less than 10% of a town/community.

Fluff, fluff, fluff and more fluff. It's a fairly commonly expressed complaint here on DU.

You might be able to find something redeeming in Survivor and Lost. I personally view much of what passes for television programming (and Reality TV in particular) to be part of a deliberate campaign of fostering ignorance amongst the easily led and keeping those who are more curious stuffed with as much of exactly the wrong information as possible.

Take a close critical look at television programming and you soon see through the illusion of variety. Different networks each have their own versions of the same basic program and they'll even go head to head over the same demographics (and even match topic for topic) in the same time slots. There will always be something there to cater to the base demographics, but for anything at all discriminating you wait your turn and don't expect to be able to chase your interest around the dial. Oh and in the meantime surely there's some anaesthetic to critical thinking on, that you're interested in.

[kickysnana]

5. It never started on time because of sports, they moved it around constantly and it was not On Demand

I was surprised it lasted as long as it did.

[Cleita]

7. Too bad.

I guess there is less and less reason for watching broadcast TV. For me the only reality show I watch is Project Runway, but it's on cable.

[Mojeoux]

9. I really love Cold Case. I love the music,

and I love the depictions of different eras.

Reality Shows Blow.

[Blue_In_AK]

10. Oh, that's so sad.

I love that show. It always seems to have such a human touch.

[Drunken Irishman]

12. Cold Case is a fun little show...

Not always accurate, but it's always cool going back in time and seeing characters change over the course of a generation.

They also cancelled Ghost Whisperer and I hear Medium is next in line (probably will happen next year).

Add their cancelling of New Adventures and I don't see any reason to watch their network anymore.

[hyphenate]

14. Medium

is actually in a better category than GW, which down the line brings more money to the pot. GW is partially owned by ABC, and the cost is a lot higher as a result. OTOH, Medium is now wholly owned by CBS, so it isn't leeching the network. I liked the fact that CBS at least cared enough to treat it to a full season, unlike NBC which shit all over it when it was there.

Two great sites to talk TV are zap2it.com and thefutoncritic.com.

[hyphenate]

13. Actually, it was lucky it made it so far

Last season, there was a toss-up--either Without a Trace or Cold Case was definitely going to be cancelled. In the end, Without a Trace was bumped off, with Cold Case returning. It was in the cards, it seems.

Actually, I think I've finally made my peace with the television industry. Many of my favorites have gotten older, and in some cases, they've been going through the motions instead of being fresh. I admit I'm going to miss shows like "Numb3rs" but it's had a healthy run of 7 years, and "Ghost Whisperer" which I enjoyed up to last season, when I essentially stopped watching it. But every now and then a show catches my eye, and I sign on to see what it's like.

With DVDs coming out more and more for older TV and newer shows, too, it's gotten to the point where I don't bother watching something on a given night.

[undeterred]

15. Without a Trace was a really good show.

[DesertFlower]

19. me too. i liked it better than cold case.

what happened to "three rivers"?

[saracat]

16. I thought that was announced awhile ago? Cold Case was one of my favorites!

[droidamus2]

17. Question

Is it just a coincidence that the shows that they are canceling seem to all have female lead characters?

[BrklynLiberal]

36. hmmmmmmm Food for thought.

Guess the much touted, testosterone-rich, 18-35 audience was not watching those shows....

Too bad.

[TexasObserver]

18. The biggest mystery was why they painted the star's face white each week.

That is a strange feature of the show, which I watched a few times after seeing it hilariously parodied on MAD TV. Interesting shtick, but what's the deal with the alabaster paint job on the star's face? No one has skin that shade of white.

[DesertFlower]

20. are you talking about Lily?

[DesertFlower]

21. self delete. dupe

[theHandpuppet]

24. Good catch

Hmmm........

[Bitwit1234]

25. The also canceled

a damn good show..Numbers and another one Ghost Whisperer. Some not so hot ones like The New Adventures of Old Christine and Gary Unmarried. But they said Numbers and Ghost Whisperer had good ratings. I don't know what they are thinking they are going to screw up like NBC. Which used to have the good shows and started canceling them. They are moving CSI New York to Friday probably after Medium (which will probably be the next to go) and they will put one of those shows about young somethings jumping up and down and simulating sex. Remember the show "Shark" good one also.

I think they cancel the ones and get newer ones because that way they can pay the cast less money.

[BrklynLiberal]

35. Damn. I thought NUMBERS was a GREAT show.... :(

[elleng]

37. Me, too, Bklyn.

Like Judd Hirsch character. Born March 15, 1935 (1935-03-15) (age 75)
Bronx, New York

[BrklynLiberal]

38. LOVED the family interaction.....

[elocs]

26. One of my old favorites, "Homicide: Life on the Streets" is available on dvd

and I remember it having a good deal of music on it as well, but maybe not as much as "Cold Case".

Series come and go and it happens on every network, even PBS. Such is life.

[Onceuponalife]

29. "Homicide" was great!

and much better than Cold Case. They pretty much invented the "shaky cam" style for network TV.

[stray cat]

27. Then I assume not enough people like it well enough to watch it - no conspiracy to that

[BrklynLiberal]

34. VERY disappointing....One of the few shows that I try to make sure to watch.