Television networks try to appeal to new viewers with midseason replacements
by John Gonzalez

New episodes of "House" air Mondays at 7 pm on Fox. Image courtesy of goomedic.com

Mr. Marcos Alcozer, technology department, has something very important to do every Monday at eight o’clock – he has to watch “House” on FOX.  Mr. Alcozer shares this “important” task with millions of others across the nation according to the Nielsen ratings system, an audience size measuring system, which reported that returning shows like “House” and “Crime Scene Investigation: Miami” dominate television ratings.

However new shows are coming out of the woodwork and could potentially win over viewers from returning shows. While some of the midseason replacements are the same old shows, such as “American Idol,” another ratings dominator, and “24,” there are some fresh new shows like TNT’s “Men of a Certain Age,” FOX’s  “Past Life,” and NBC’s “Parenthood,” along with popular newcomers such as FOX’s “Glee” and the CW’s “Vampire Diaries,” according to AOL.com.

“Men of a Certain Age” is a new dramedy, a comedy and drama hybrid, on TNT starring comedian Ray Romano. The show revolves around three men in their forties who first meet in college and support each other as they face the challenges and tribulations that come with old age, according to www.tnt.tv. The show might appeal to those who want to watch a show that closely resembles real life, as it fuses humor with drama.

“Our Little Genius,” a game show that seems as if it is set to replace “Who’s Smarter than a 5^th Grader,” takes gifted students from ages six to 12 and asks them questions on advanced topics such as Shakespearean Literature. Parents of the child contestants also participate in the game as well and can have their child “drop out,” in other words have them quit if they feel their children cannot keep answering the questions correctly.  It was originally scheduled to air before “American Idol,” but FOX pulled the plug on the show on January 17 due to issues over how information was brought to contestants during pre-production, according to Variety.

One show that FOX has not cancelled before its premiere is “Past Life,” which is in the vein of shows like CBS’s “Medium.” The show stars Kelli Giddish as Dr. Kate McGinn who helps patients deal with troubles caused by their past lives. Nicholas Bishop plays her foil, and skeptic partner Prince Whatley, a former New York Police Department homicide detective who thinks Dr. McGinn is working on the fringe of science. Together they set out to find out about the past lives of her patients, according to fox.com.

With the popularity of medical shows such as “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Scrubs,” and “Trauma,” CBS is adding its own medical show to the mix with “Miami Trauma.” The show is about a team of surgeons who work at a premiere trauma hospital. The show stands out from other medical shows in the sense that not all patients are allowed there but only those with life threatening injuries.  The crew has to work within the first hour of a patient’s injury or the patient’s chance of survival decreases dramatically, according to www.cbs.com.  The show is fast paced and more dramatic than other medical shows since the doctors have to deal with patients on the verge of death everyday, and as such the show also shows the motional burden.

FOX’s “Human Target” stars Mark Valley, who plays the role of Christopher Chance, a special bodyguard who prevents murder attempts by taking on the identity and personality of the intended victim. However, Chance is not the usual action hero who protects people while doing unreasonable things as he literally becomes a human target for anyone who wants to kill his client, hence the name. This series is based on a comic book of the same name, according to www.imdb.com.
The mid-season is a season worth noting due to the fact that networks have seen what audiences like and have adapted to their tastes, producing new shows that will hopefully capture the attention of new viewers. This is demonstrated by how many of the shows have premises that are either based on other successful shows or a newer version of a previous show.  However, some midseason shows that are often thought to be future successes are cancelled before they can ever broadcast. This is evidenced by FOX, which has pulled the plug on “Our Little Geniuses” and has a history of cancelling shows before they air, an example being 2008’s “When Women Rule the World.” Some shows do not even get a chance to prove themselves, while others do, but still get canceled.  The fact is that it is difficult to gauge a show’s ratings because shows can have a strong following but score badly on the Nielsen ratings, a survey which keeps track of 5,000 families’ television viewing habits, according to www.howstuffworks.com. As such, a show can have a loyal following but gets cut because not many of those 5000 families watch the show. Most viewers are unaware of a show’s position on the Nielsen ratings and hope that the new midseason shows are not awful, or worse – awful and not canceled.