Ben Silverman Out At NBC

Quite a surprise to wake up to this morning: co-chairman of NBC Entertainment Studios and Universal Media Studios Ben Silverman is leaving. The surprise is due to the fact that, not only are we quickly approaching the fall season, but just two weeks ago his employment contract had been extended.

When I first heard about Silverman's departure, I have to admit that a smile came to my face. Since a young age, I've always felt like NBC was my channel. Like your mom or grandma who refers to her favorite soap opera as "my story", throughout my life I felt like I had become invested in the network. That's loyalty only a true TV junkie could possibly understand, of course, but hey, that's why I'm writing a TV blog for absolutely no money and you are not.

Anyway, the majority of my favorite shows were on the network and many of the shows shaped my hopes and aspirations as I grew up. My life long fascination with New York City was constantly egged on watching shows like Law & Order, Mad About You and Seinfeld. The dazzling skyline after the evening news and shots of Rockefeller Center didn't hurt, either.

When Silverman first took position at the network, I was pretty hesitant. NBC was pretty down at the time, already in final place, and losing big time. What I knew of Silverman didn't give me much hope. He had produced one of my favorite shows, The Office, but also complete crap like Date My Mom and The Biggest Loser.

I also thought it odd that they would hire someone with so much potential for conflict of interest, considering he would still profit from both his current Reveille shows already on the network and even new ones sold after his move. Trumping even that: not long after taking his place at the company, stories circulated about frat-boy behavior, caged tigers, and lot's of party-hopping.

Here we are at the end of his reign now and I am a bit conflicted. Should I celebrate? He was the guy that made the ridiculous decision to cancel both Medium and My Name Is Earl and then make it publicly known that he did so because, according to The LA Times "neither the fans nor the advertisers had waged a campaign to save them the way viewers and the Subway restaurant chain did for Chuck."

Well, yeah, you know, people didn't wage a campaign to save the shows because no one knew they were on the verge of being canceled. I mean, you know, most networks don't cancel a highly rated show like Medium for no reason, therefore the fans, even devoted TV geeks who try to stay "in the know" such as myself, would never have imagined that we would be obligated to campaign around every single show they want to return, especially if it is one of the highest rated and most consistent shows on a dying network.

But then there's also the fact that, without Silverman, Friday Night Lights, easily one of the most brilliant shows to ever grace network television, probably wouldn't not have made it past it's first season. Because of the deal Silverman worked out with DirecTV, we are guaranteed new Friday Night Lights up through it's fifth season.

So there ya go. It's hard to know what to feel. He made some terrible decisions, acted like an ass, but also created some quality TV. His tenure was not all good or all bad. Not sure if it was even more bad than good or vice versa.

Anyway, we're not gonna go into all the politics and power shifts involved in his departure. If you're interested in that side of things, I would suggest reading the Hitfix article about the situation - they lay it all out in an easy to understand way.

Update: While rinsing and shampooing this very morning, I thought of another point I wanted to bring up about Silverman's reign: the majority of "new" scripted programming on NBC hasn't actually been "new". In his time at the network we've been treated to really terrible remakes (Bionic Woman, Knight Rider), imports (Merlin, The Listener), or remakes of imports (Kath & Kim). There's even been a remake of an import remake (Parks & Recreation).

Just kidding about that last one. While the whole mock documentary thing was over long before it debuted, Parks & Recreation definately got better towards the end of the season. At first we kinda passed it off as The Office (US Version) part two, but it kinda grew into it's own eventually.

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Is SNL Taking Over NBC?

At times it may seem as if Saturday Night Live is taking over NBC. I worry that all the attention and praise heaped upon SNL this last season may stretch fans a little thin. The show is as strong as ever, thankfully, and it's alum are doing great things but it seems like NBC may be on a mission to fill what little non-Jay Leno airtime they have with SNL projects. That's placing a lot of pressure and hopes on only two franchises.

With the election last year Weekend Update Thursday editions seemed like a necessity. Their ratings, as well as those for the multiple SNL specials (Presidential Bash, 90's Pop Culture), were a good thing for both the network and the franchise and proved that the show is doing just as well as at anytime in it's history.

Now, with SNL television and movie off-shoots, Lorne Michaels has a huge list of winners and losers. In the movies, for each winner there seem to be multiple losers. For every Wayne's World, there's a Cone Heads (which bombed as a sitcom first, then later as a movie), Night At The Roxy and Stuart Saves His Family. Granted, televison's 30 Rock is a stellar show with heaps of critical praise and awards and Jimmy Fallon's new Late Night has been doing good but for every winner Lorne Michaels produces for the televison network there's also a loser like The Tracy Morgan Show.


I don't think the new Weekend Update Thursday Edition will do badly, quite the opposite actually, as word has leaked that both Amy Poehler and Tina Fey will make appearances, but let's hope they stop there.

In the 2009 season NBC will be broadcasting five shows featuring SNL alum. They are 30 Rock, featuring Tina Fey and Tracy Morgan, Late Night With Jimmy Fallon, Parks And Recreation with Amy Poehler, Community starring Chevy Chase and Saturday Night Live Weekend Update Thursday Edition. That's a lot of airtime for one group, no matter how brilliant they are.

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Incoming!

Tonight (Tuesday)
Fringe. Finally got caught up from that American Moron debacle and must say the show has come back from hiatus with a vengeance.

The Unusuals. As posted earlier, ABC is running two new episodes of The Unusuals this week, hoping to see if a new time slot and lead-in will bump ratings up. That means there's some high hopes for this show in the upper echelons of the network.

Rescue Me. The season is off to a funny start, as per usual. With all the build up towards the section 8 hearing, the outcome was a bit flat but...probably more true to life than if anything crazy would have happened.

Wednesday
Lie To Me. Each week brings up another intriguing story. I wonder how long they can keep it up, though. Seems like the stories could get stale after a bit but Tim Roth's facial expressions and dead pan, though sometimes squeaky, acting will probably make up for that.

Better Off Ted. I'm not a fan of multicamera sitcoms but I have to admit to much chuckling during this show. Perhaps it's making fun of corporations that I love so much, but the off and on again romantic story line between Ted and Linda is rather cute and the bickering between Lem and Phil is quite comical. Veronica, though, is just creepy. Those Veridian Dynamics mock commercials are hilarious. ABC should have broadcast those as a mystery campaign before the show aired.

Lost. Very excited to see what Faraday has to say about what's going on. And where the hell is Sayid?

The Unusuals. It's a double shot this week.

Thursday.
My Name Is Earl. So sad the ratings for this show have been in declined because it probably creates the most laugh out loud moments of any show on my DVR.

Smallville. Who would have thought this show could last so many years and not get tiresome? Chloe is now in charge of keeping Davis from becoming Dr. Doom. That's a pretty big job. When she closed the basement door at the end of the last episode...Well let;s just say it was creepy.

Supernatural. This season has been ruling. The addition of the angels has made for some great moments (and great visuals). While I route for Sam and Dean to defeat evil, I take great pleasure in watch Dean wield his power...even if it is evil.

Parks and Recreation. The show has been getting a lot of hype and decent ratings...But I'm not really feeling it. Maybe because it's just storylines from The Office being reused.

Grey's Anatomy. When we last left them, Izzie had surgery, Meredeth and Derek were engaged, George was pouting, Alex was hiding his feelings (surprise!) and Owen and Cristina broke up. I'm hoping we start seeing more George lately. I miss him.

The Office. The new story line with the Michael Scott Paper Company has been pretty fantastic. Good job to the writers for freshening things up a bit. This is probably the best season since the second.

30 Rock. They've thankfully gotten out of the guest star slump the season started off with and the wit and charm has returned. When watching this show always listen carefully to catch all the great one-liners.

Southland. Episode three airs this week so the blog reviews should start flooding in. I'll just go ahead and say 'stunning'. Great new show that I look forward to weekly. Benjamin McKenzie portrayal of rookie officer Ben Sherman has been flawless and, much like Tim Roth but in a very different manner, he makes his facial expressions do most of the work. At times I have trouble watching an actor from a beloved show (The O.C.) take on a new part with out my mind unconciously melding the two characters together, but McKenzie, through sheer talent alone, managed to break that habit this time. I thought last week's episode was lacking in screen time for him, though.

Friday.
Flashpoint. Those Canadians know how to pack an emotional wallop, don't they. An upper-middle female aged coworker of mine had this to say about the series: "I love how these big burly men do manly things but are also so sensitive...but manly."

Dollhouse. The new blogger darling. Too bad 90% of the shows audience is watching it via illegal torrent downloads. Some may say that's what the network gets for scheduling the show on Friday nights but atleast you can get it at Hulu, people.

Numb3rs. For someone that failed pretty much every math related course offered at my high school, I still find this show pretty intriguing. Without continuing storylines, though, there's not much to write about.

Saturday.
Kings. Perhaps the move to Saturdays was warrented...I can see where the storylines are getting a bit tedious.

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