There’s a worrying new trend I’ve just started to notice. Its perpetrator is Channel 4.
As we all know, in the US, TV seasons tend to run from August/September through to May/June (give or take a month depending on which network the show’s on, the show, whether it’s a summer season show, etc). Now, with 22-24 episodes per season, that’s still not enough to allow for new episodes every week. Sometimes, as with Lost and Daybreak, US networks will simply insert a new show into the time slot and then carry on with the old show.
But most of the time, they’ll simply put on an old episode of the same show – hence the pressing need for gruff narrators to preface trailers with “next week on an all-new Woof the Sheepdog” or whatever, so that viewers know when a new episode rather than a re-run is going to be on.
This plays havoc with the ratings and annoys fans. But it doesn’t seem to be stopping Channel 4 from trying it out for themselves.
