Category Archives: News

2012 Winter TCAs: NBC’s Bob Greenblatt on ‘really bad fall’, hope for success with ‘Smash’, the return of ‘Community’

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Last week at the Television Critics Association’s winter press tour NBC was the first big network to publicly shed light on its fall TV season performance and hint at where they’re headed in 2012. NBC entertainment president Bob Greenblatt didn’t waste anyone’s time with these opening words. “We had a really bad fall, worse than I’d hoped for but about as I expected,” he said. “People say the only way to go is up which I believe is true, but there is a long way to get there.” He continued, “We had few strong lead-ins — our most recent scripted hit is six years old [30 Rock]. Some of our older hits lost cast members [Law & Order: SVU and The Office].” He also blames the network’s overall ratings decline on “the fact that we have few strong lead-ins.” He added, “There was no great revelation or shocking epiphany about fall expect it just [reinforced] how hard it is to break through.” Later he spun things positively acknowledging the recent NBCUniversal/Comcast merger. “But the good news is we now have new owners, they’re investing in our business, not only with financial resources, but with their patience.”

NBC’s major disappoints this fall were Prime Suspect, The Playboy Club, and the Hank Azaria comedy Free Agents. Greenblatt made sure to share his thoughts on each failed project. On Prime Suspect: “[It] was probably the biggest disappointment. Was it too cable, was [Maria Bello’s character] too abrasive? Maybe I should say it was the hat and move on…the audience wanted to be entertained with comedy and fairytales [this fall], and there wasn’t appetite in the country for a hard-hitting cop show.” On The Playboy Club: ” “Was Playboy Club too dark? I don’t know. I think it was a just a rejected concept…I know everybody thinks we sat in a room and said, ‘Oh, we have a show like Mad Men, let’s put that on.’ We thought going into the period would interest people, but I don’t think people were that fascinated by that milieu and place.” And finally on Free Agents:  “I’ll go on record stating I liked it. Am I surprised that it went down? I’m really not surprised about anything going down today.” Though comedies Whitney and Up All Night haven’t become ratings hits yet, Greenblatt is confident that in time they will find bigger audiences.

The NBC chairmen went on to share his excitement about upcoming drama Smash, and at the same time he made sure to keep expectations at a realistic level. “I think that Smash is going to be very important to us,” said Greenblatt. “I don’t believe it’s a make or break show for us. I think we’re all proud of it and we’re excited to see what it can do. If I had a dime for every time someone said to me, ‘You just need one hit…’ I think in this day and age you need four or five shows to start to turn things around. Smash could be one of those. If it isn’t, it’s not like we’re going to go into receivership. But we do think it’s special and it can break through the clutter.” He noted that the musical will have a ratings advantage since it will be attached to one of the network’s “few and far between” lead-ins in The Voice.

He also discussed the future of cult-favorite Community. “When I announced our midseason changes last fall and took Community off the schedule, I failed to explicitly say that it would be back,” he said. “I want to expel any notion that it is just disappearing off the schedule.” It has been confirmed that season 3 will resume this spring. He continued, “Community was moved to 8PM a couple years ago and that’s an incredibly competitive time slot now on Thursday and I’m really curious to see what something else [30 Rock] would do there. I don’t know if it makes sense to ask it to start off the night again. We’ve tried to migrate some comedies to Wednesday this year. It’s a matter of looking at what happens with the six comedies we’ve got at midseason, to figure out where Community makes the most sense.” And when can viewers expect to hear news of possible renewal? “We’re just going to look at the success of what pilots yield, what the scheduling needs are and make that decision closer to the upfront [in May],” Greenblatt explained.

Greenblatt went on to share his thoughts about other NBC programming. Here are some choice quotes. On Howard Stern joining America’s Got Talent: “I have headaches about a lot of other things but that’s not one of them. I think he’s going to be a great judge and take it seriously. I don’t think his plan is to usurp the show and make it the Howard Stern Circus.” On the status of Fear Factor: “People like to see the snake cage and the swallowing of the bees. What can I say? We’re always happy to have those ratings. It’s [a show] that will probably come and go [on the schedule] as needed.”

The former head of programming at Showtime ended the panel like this. “The beauty of cable is the ratings for a program really don’t correlate to the bottom line. At Showtime, Prime Suspect would have been picked up in the third episode, it would have been declared a hit and it would have been in production for four or five years.” With broadcast TV, “You can’t be as cavalier about, ‘Oh we love the show. We’re just going to keep it on as long as we want.’ That’s the big dilemma that I’m in.” He concluded, “We have to figure out how to cease up on that and not end up in a narrow place.”

Can new midseason shows like Smash, Awake, The Firm, and Are You There, Chelsea? help lift the Peacock out of the ratings rubble and into a better place? Like many things in life, time will tell.

[Via Deadline; THR; EW; TVLine]

‘Punk’d’ returns to MTV this Spring with celeb hosts galore

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With Fear Factor back on the air, call it a return to the early naughts with this announcement. Hidden camera reality series Punk’d is making a comeback this March. Original host Ashton Kutcher will not serve as host this time around, however he remains in the background as executive producer. Each episode will be hosted by a different celebrity. So far the list of celeb guests include Justin Bieber, Miley Cyrus, Kellan Lutz, Bam Margera, and Dax Shepard. The Parenthood star, I’m sure you remember, is part of the original Punk’d team. According to Deadline, the reboot “will also offer a behind-the-scenes look at how the elaborate pranks were put together.” MTV recently aired a preview of what’s in store for unsuspecting stars. Embedded up top you’ll find celeb host Miley Cyrus pranking the eldest Kardashian sister Khloe. It involves a penis and a zipper. Use your imagination and watch it unfold above. Punk’d premieres March 19.

Google adds LG, Vizio, Marvell & MediaTek to their TV initiative

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The next wave of Google TV products is upon us. In a blog post the search giant announced that they’re building on their partnership with Sony and expanding their TV-centric software to new companies. In 2012, Google TV will run on TV sets made by LG, Samsung, and Vizio, as well as a new generation of Sony devices. Marvell and MediaTek are also working closely with Google to provide chips to power GTV hardware. Though more information will be made available next week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, LG celebrated the news early in a press release. Here’s their plan: “LG Smart TV with Google TV combines the familiarity of Google’s Android OS with the convenience and comfort of LG’s 3D and Smart TV technologies, offering consumers a new and attractive home entertainment option.” They’ve announced that they will ship two “series” of TVs in 2012 that will come loaded with GTV, and they will take advantage of a new voice and gestured based remote control they branded the “Magic Remote QWERTY.”

Stick right here for the lastest on Google TV’s expansion. For a peak into the future, hop after the break to watch Google’s CES preview video that highlights upgraded search functionality and Android Market app selections for Google TV.

Update (1/15): LG and Vizio announced new TVs with Google TV baked in, and Sony (also on cue) unveiled their next generation of Google TV products including a new Blu-ray player and a network streaming device. Pricing and release dates for all of these GTV-infused products haven’t been made final. When they are I’ll go more into detail about the individual hardware units.

[Via Google; Engadget] Continue reading Google adds LG, Vizio, Marvell & MediaTek to their TV initiative →

AT&T and Sprint announce 4G LTE market expansion

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Verizon flipped on its 4G LTE service back in December 2010 and since then it’s rather quickly spread to 190 million US cities and 118 million major airports, covering more than 200 million Americans. At long last, the time has come for the competition to throw their hats into the ring.

In early September, AT&T launched their 4G LTE service in 5 markets (Chicago, Atlanta, San Antonio, Dallas-Fort Worth and Houston) to complement its HSPA+ network (also known as “faux-G”). Later in November they expanded to eleven additional markets including Athens, Ga., Baltimore, Boston, Charlotte, Indianapolis, Kansas City, Las Vegas, Oklahoma City, San Juan, Puerto Rico, and Washington, D.C. On January 5, AT&T added another eleven markets to the mix, and they’re big ones: New York City metro area, Austin, Chapel Hill, Los Angeles, Oakland, Orlando, Phoenix, Raleigh, San Diego, San Francisco, and San Jose. Ma Bell calculates that this addition makes AT&T 4G LTE available in a total of 26 markets to 74 million consumers. The company expects its 4G LTE deployment to be mostly complete by the end of 2013.

And then there’s Sprint. They’ve been innovating behind Verizon and AT&T, only just announcing their first major markets to receive 4G LTE. Dallas, Atlanta, Houston and San Antonio will be the first four markets to see the faster speeds in the first half of 2012. Sprint is also working on boosting their 3G speeds as well. They call it Network Vision: “Sprint customers can expect to enjoy ultra-fast data speeds, improved 3G voice and data quality, and stronger in-building signal penetration providing a more reliable wireless experience…everyone in the upgraded areas is expected to benefit from the advanced 3G/4G LTE network.”

With 4G LTE markets spreading across America like wildfire from Verizon Wireless, AT&T, and Sprint, consumers can expect new smartphones to release this year that take advantage of the faster voice and data speeds that 4G provides. Rumor has it that the next iPhone will in fact be compatible on VZW, at least. Now that AT&T isn’t allowed to swallow T-Mobile, the network that made popular the Sidekick is going to have to act quickly if they want to remain the race; their speedy HSPA+ network won’t stand a chance once the other three carriers are boasting their expansive 4G LTE ones. Let the games begin.

[Via AT&T; Sprint]

Nintendo sells 4.5 million Wii consoles and 4 million 3DS systems in 2011, blames Mario and Zelda

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The new year is just underway, and Nintendo wants to make sure the world knows how well they’re doing and how confident they are heading into 2012. In a gleeful press release, Ninty broke news that they sold more than 12 million total hardware units in the US  in 2011. It breaks down like this: 4.5 million units of Wii, more than 4 million Nintendo 3DS systems, and over 3.4 million units of the Nintendo DS family of systems were sold last year. Some calculations later, the current install base for Wii is 39 million and for Nintendo DS it’s over 51 million. The house that built Mario blames their recent successes on a strong software lineup. 3DS games Super Mario 3D Land and Mario Kart 7 have been crowned the fastest-selling titles in the history of their respective franchises when they launched. Additionally, Nintendo notes that they are now also the first 3DS games to sell 1 million units each in the US. Zelda also made an impact on the Wii; The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword became the 45th Wii game to sell over 1 million units in the States. And 2012 is already looking to be a solid year for Nintendo with highly anticipated games on the horizon; first-party titles from franchises such as Mario Party, Pokémon, and Kid Icarus as well as third party titles like Resident Evil Revelations (Capcom) and Metal Gear Solid 3D Snake Eater (Konami) are coming soon. And of course, don’t forget that their next home console the Wii U is expected to launch later this year. Get the full debrief directly from Nintendo after the break.

[Via Nintendo] Continue reading Nintendo sells 4.5 million Wii consoles and 4 million 3DS systems in 2011, blames Mario and Zelda →

Sony announces 25 launch titles for PlayStation Vita

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In a blog post this month Sony announced that 25 games will be launching alongside the PlayStation Vita on February 22 in North America. John Koller, Director of Hardware Marketing, says that the PS Vita “will have the biggest and best lineup we’ve ever launched across the history of PlayStation platforms.” Specifically, 8 titles from SCEA will release on the 22nd along with 17 third party publisher titles. Lingering in the “launch window” are 4 games from SCEA and 6 games from third parties. Games will range from $9.99 to $49.99 in price, and all of them will be available over the counter at retail shops and downloadable over the PlayStation Network. A handful of titles are labeled PSN-exclusives. Sony also says that the Vita will come bundled with six AR Play Cards and one voucher to download a selection of augmented reality mini games called AR Play over PSN. Looks like somebody is stealing a page out of Nintendo’s playbook. A myriad of Vita accessories such as memory cards, cases, and charges will release slightly ahead of the Vita’s launch date on February 15. Hop after the break to view the full list of games and accessories coming down the pipeline.

[Via PlayStationBlog] Continue reading Sony announces 25 launch titles for PlayStation Vita →

‘American Horror Story’ season 2 will be “radically different” as series creator Ryan Murphy confirms anthological roots

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[Major spoilers inside] On Wednesday FX’s hit new show American Horror Story came to a dramatic conclusion, leaving most of its main cast members dead. The entire Harmon family passed on (including Dylan McDermott, Connie Britton, and Taissa Farmiga) and they linger in the haunted house as ghosts with their dead child and the sweet maid Moira played by Frances Conroy. The only series regular that managed to survive the whole ordeal is Jessica Lange, who was recently nominated a Golden Globe for her portrayal as the neighborly Constance. So with the Harmon story complete, where does the show go from here? Today AHS co-creator Ryan Murphy led a conference call with members of the press and explained that the show was originally built as an anthology meaning that each season will be “radically different” from the last.

“Every season of the show will be a different haunting,” Murphy explains. “That’s always been the plan. Every season of the show will have a beginning, middle and end, and all new characters and setting … and we’ll have a new overriding theme.” So does this mean McDermott, Britton, Farmiga, Conroy, Lange, and even Rubber Man himself Evan Peters will not be returning for season 2? Not necessarily. “We’re still negotiating with a handful [of the cast members] about returning,” Murphy says. “We’re also meeting with new actors whom we’ve targeted roles for. I will say that Connie and Dylan will not be playing the leads of the show in the second season. We’d love for them to come back and do something, maybe a smaller role or a cameo.” He continued, “There will be familiar faces and some new faces. People that are coming back will be playing completely new characters… Getting to tell a different aspect of what an American horror story can be [every season] is fascinating.”

And with that it is confirmed from the man at the top that AHS season 2 will tell an entirely new story and introduce to viewers a new slate of characters that will have new issues to deal with. Murphy went on to tease what may be in store for season 2. “There are all kinds of different American horror stories to tell. There are serial killing stories, prison stories, true crime stories…Each year of the show is designed to be a little miniseries unto itself. The only thing we’re not open to doing is a season on vampires.” Phew. More: “The second season of the show will [feature] a brand new home or building to haunt,” so in addition to the main cast you can also kiss goodbye the haunted manor you’ve become accustomed to during season one. Itching to find out what exactly the next American Horror Story will be about? “There’s a clue in the last three episodes where we say what the second season will be,” Murphy teases.

Jump after the break for more. Continue reading ‘American Horror Story’ season 2 will be “radically different” as series creator Ryan Murphy confirms anthological roots →

HBO cancels ‘How To Make It In America’ & ‘Bored To Death’

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Just when I thought this TV season was coasting along just fine, this brunt of bad news knocked me unconscious today. HBO has decided to part ways with three of its cult comedies: How To Make It In America, Bored To Death, and Hung. How To Make It only managed to score two seasons before getting the axe, and fans of the show will never get to see if Ben and Cam, well, make it in America as fashion icons with the Crisp brand. They were definitely going places; season 2 managed to top the premiere season in almost every way and still the show was doomed in the end. Also concluding is Jonathan Ames’ Bored To Death starring Jason Schwartzman, Zach Galifianakis, and the talented Ted Danson. This series lasted a total of three seasons and rightly deserved many more. What started as a detective-story-of-the-week quickly turned into a more serial adventure exploring the eccentric lives of the title characters. Though I must say, the season three finale thankfully wraps things up and leaves viewers pleasantly satisfied. Why did HBO suddenly feel the urge to clear out its Sunday night lineup? Ratings is to blame, as is usually the case (according to Variety How To Make It and Bored To Death were “down about 25% from their respective previous seasons”), plus the premium cabler is making room for new shows in the pipeline for next year. They did keep one, however. Enlightened starring Lauren Dern is coming back for a second season despite rather dismal ratings. Perhaps the comedy’s recent Golden Globe nomination came into play.

Ben and Cam’s hustle and the zany adventures of Jonathan, Ray, and George have come to an end. Triumphant tears are shed in their honor for making it this far.

[Via Deadline]

New ‘Avatar’ special features come to iTunes

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James Cameron’s cash cow Avatar saw its first home release on April 22, 2010. Months later on November 16 Avatar was re-released into the wild as a “Three-Disc Extended Collector’s Edition.” Unlike the original release, this one included bonus features like 45 minutes worth of deleted scenes. While we wait for the Blu-ray 3D release to end its exclusivity with Panasonic, Cameron’s inviting fans of the movie to revisit Pandora by purchasing a new digital version of Avatar. This release is dubbed the “iTunes Extras Special Edition” and it comes with new, never-before-seen bonus material. Features include scene deconstruction, allowing viewers to interact with the performance capture and visual effects levels in 17 of the film’s scene; green screen x-ray gives viewers an interactive look through the visual effects levels to see the original green screen footage hiding behind certain scenes; it also comes with an original screenplay penned by Cameron, his scriptment, a gallery of 1,700 images, “and more.” Interested? Click over to iTunes, hand over $19.99 and immerse yourself in Pandora once more. At least until the 3D version comes out. Video promoting the new edition sits after the break. Continue reading New ‘Avatar’ special features come to iTunes →

AT&T to acquire T-Mobile USA for $39 billion …NOT

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The first half of this post’s title was a major announcement back in March. Almost exactly nine months after news broke that AT&T would eat up T-Mobile to become a giant force against competitors Verizon Wireless and Sprint, Ma Bell has decided to end its bid to acquire T-Mobile USA. In a press release, AT&T blames the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice for blocking the transaction from happening. Over the past few months, the FCC and the DOJ have been making it difficult for AT&T to buy out T-Mobile. Why you ask? I’ll let competitor Sprint express their viewpoint on the matter:

“From the beginning, Sprint has stood with consumers who spoke loudly and clearly that AT&T’s proposed takeover of T-Mobile would create an undeniable duopoly that would have resulted in higher prices, less innovation and fewer choices for the American consumer.”

In other words, with T-Mobile gone consumers would have a limited selection choosing a wireless carrier and this would impede competition and lead to lower expectations when it comes to innovation. AT&T sees things differently:

The actions by the Federal Communications Commission and the Department of Justice to block this transaction do not change the realities of the U.S. wireless industry. It is one of the most fiercely competitive industries in the world, with a mounting need for more spectrum that has not diminished and must be addressed immediately. The AT&T and T-Mobile USA combination would have offered an interim solution to this spectrum shortage. In the absence of such steps, customers will be harmed and needed investment will be stifled.

Since Ma Bell wasn’t able to carry through with its acquisition as planned, the company must pay Deutsche Telekom (T-Mobile USA’s German-based parent company) $4 billion before year’s end. Also, AT&T will enter a mutually beneficial roaming agreement with Deutsche Telekom. For more pop after the break to read the PR.

[Via Engadget] Continue reading AT&T to acquire T-Mobile USA for $39 billion …NOT →

Google’s Zeitgeist & Twitter’s Year in Review look back at 2011

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2011 has been one helluva year. One question that should be lingering on your mind: what did people search for and tweet most about in 2011? Answers come straight from the source. This week Google pushed out their Zeitgeist 2011, an interactive look at the most popular and the fastest rising terms in many categories across many countries around the world. The results are in and the #1 fastest-rising global query in 2011 is… Rebecca Black! That’s right, the YouTube star famous for the annoying but admittedly catchy song “Friday” is at the top of the chart. Rounding out the top five is Google’s very own social network Google+, the late Jackass star Ryan Dunn, defendant Casey Anthony, and the video game Battlefield 3. The second half of the top ten includes three Apple-related items (iPhone 5, Steve Jobs, and iPad 2), singer Adele, and Japan’s Fukushima plant. At the Zeitgeist website you can view top ten lists from a myriad of countries.

Twitter followed suit and released their own Year in Review portal. Things are broken down by the year’s top stories and hot topics. It should come as no surprise that Charlie Sheen was the most talked about actor (the #2 worldwide hashtag was #tigerblood) and four of the ten tech trends are Apple-related. In another section Twitter calculated how many tweets per second occurred during major events over the course of the year. The MTV Video Music Awards saw 8,868 tweets per second; Steve Jobs’ resignation 7,064; and the raid on Osama bin Laden 5,106.

All in all, it can easily be said that 2011 has been a year of change. Google does a good job highlighting our impact on the world on a global scale in the video embedded above.

Louis C.K. releases new stand-up special on the ‘Net, launches a user-friendly website to self-promote it

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On December 10 comedian Louis C.K. released a new stand-up special to his fans. The special contains brand new, never before seen material and was shot over two performances at the Beacon Theater in New York City. Louie directed, produced, and edited the video himself, just like he does on his FX show Louie. Instead of working with a big company to promote and distribute the 62-minute special, Louie developed his own website to do all the heavy lifting. In an open letter to his fans and the public at large, he explained his “‘experiment” like this:

If I put out a brand new standup special at a drastically low price ($5) and make it as easy as possible to buy, download and enjoy, free of any restrictions, will everyone just go and steal it? Will they pay for it? And how much money can be made by an individual in this manner?

In a couple words, his experiment was a raging success. In just four days Louie posted a $200,000 profit. In the open letter he shared the costs that went into the making of the special; namely the production of the video ($170,000) and the construction of the simplistic website ($32,000). In the first 12 hours of the website being live, the special saw 50,000 purchases and earned $250,000, breaking even on the cost of production and the website. Three days later 110,000 copies had sold for a total of over $500,000. In the letter Louis goes on to explain how in a typical situation a big company would have charged customers around $20 for the special and restrictions like limited reply value, encryption, and international availability would apply. By self-distributing his special, Louie was able to keep the price of entry low, the purchase experience delightful, and best of all once it’s purchased you can watch it over and over no matter where you are in the world. Also, Louie made a crapload of money. In his own words:

I really hope people keep buying it a lot, so I can have shitloads of money, but at this point I think we can safely say that the experiment really worked. If anybody stole it, it wasn’t many of you. Pretty much everybody bought it. And so now we all get to know that about people and stuff. I’m really glad I put this out here this way and I’ll certainly do it again. If the trend continues with sales on this video, my goal is that i can reach the point where when I sell anything, be it videos, CDs or tickets to my tours, I’ll do it here and I’ll continue to follow the model of keeping my price as far down as possible, not overmarketing to you, keeping as few people between you and me as possible in the transaction.

Let’s hope that other comedians and even the entertainment industry as a whole takes notice of Louie’s grand experiment. A fundamental shift in the way companies distribute content to customers is needed if said companies want people to stop illegally torrenting movies, music, and TV shows. If they can figure out how to do it the Louis way, the world will be a better place for it.

Head over to https://buy.louisck.net/ and the But The Thing button to easily purchase the stand-up special via PayPal for five bucks. And if you’re interested in reading Louie’s candid statement, click here.

Update: In a new statement issued on the website, Louis announced that he hit the $1 million mark in sales. Insane, right? Now because he’s not a greedy man, here’s what he plans on doing with all the money. 250K “is going to pay back what the special cost to produce and the website to build;”  a “second 250k is going back to my staff and the people who work for me on the special and on my show;” 280k “is going to [four] different charities;” and Louis is going to keep 220k for himself. “Some of that will pay my rent and will care for my children,” he explains. “The rest I will do terrible, horrible things with and none of that is any of your business. In any case, to me, 220k is enough out of a million.” Read the statement in full here. Way to go, Louis.