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This month marks the return after extensive retooling of three drama series fronted by bona fide TV stars — Fox’s Touch starring Kiefer Sutherland, NBC’s Smash starring Debra Messing and ABC‘s Body Of Proof toplined by Dana Delany — just as the proposed retooling of another young broadcast series with top-notch cast, NBC comedy Up All Night, is going up in flames. Touch opened its second season with an underwhelming 1.0 rating among adults 18-49 and this past Friday plunged to a 0.7 rating in its second airing, effectively sealing its fate. (For now, Fox is not talking about pulling the show the way CBS did with The Job after its 0.7 showing last Friday but that seems a matter of time.) Smash‘s second season premiere also crashed with a 1.1 demo rating.
Going against the second episode of Smash tonight, ABC’s tweaked Body Of Proof will be making its third-season debut as the crime procedural is looking to avoid the plight of many of its predecessors which didn’t survive a retool. Ironically, the biggest new addition to the cast of Body Of Proof as part of the overhaul, Mark Valley, was the star of another series, Fox’s Human Target, that was unsuccessfully revamped after its freshman season and didn’t last past Season 2. “This has been a unique experience in that… I’ve been actually retooled myself,” he quipped at the Body Of Proof TCA session last month. Other recent series that didn’t last after a revamp include NBC’s Law & Order: LA, retooled midway through a first season that became the series’ last, as well as NBC’s Harry’s Law and USA’s Fairly Legal, both rebooted after Season 1 and cancelled after Season 2. (In another coincidence, Valley was one of the new additions in Harry’s Law‘s revamp.) In most cases, the networks like the overall premise and love the show’s star (Sutherland, Delany, Up All Night‘s Christina Applegate, Will Arnett and Maya Rudolph; Human Target‘s Valley, Harry’s Law‘s Kathy Bates and Fairly Legal‘s Sarah Shahi) and/or the series’ auspices (Harry’s Law‘s David E. Kelley, L&O: LA‘s Dick Wolf) but are looking to shake up soft ratings. Unfortunately, a reboot almost never provides the desired ratings jolt and often has the opposite effect as fickle viewers are rarely willing to give a show a second look, and cast changes sometime alienate core fans. (Body Of Proof axed three regulars in the reboot: John Carroll Lynch, Nicholas Bishop and Sonja Sohn).
Working in Body of Proof‘s favor is the fact that the show is more established, having been on the air for two seasons, while most retools are being done during or after a series’ first season. Additionally, the procedural is returning to its old Tuesday 10 PM slot where it has been a steady performer, and it has been a moneymaker for producing studio ABC Studios with solid international sales. What’s more, the series won the California tax credit lottery, making it even more appealing for Disney-ABC. But in the end, Body’s Of Proof‘s future will be determined by performance, and it should at least stay on par with last season when it averaged a 2.1/6 in 18-49 and 9.9 million viewers in Live+7. Touch did even better, with a 2.7/7 and 9.2 million.
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Another fun tidbit to note is Mark Valley was brought into “Harry’s Law” when the show was rebooted in its second season.
Uh, that was noted in the article, fun facter…
We loved MV in Human Target, not so much in Harry’s Law.
I watched the first episode and was done with this show. I don’t like Dana Delaney and the show didn’t interest me. I love Mark Valley but I don’t think he can save the show. That is no fault of Mark Valley. Sorry Mark Valley. I still hate that Human Target got axed.
Body of proof has the same old production problem for listeners as most other TV series —THEY DROWN OUT THE DIALOG OF ACTORS WITH ALL KINDS OF MOOD MUSIC AND OTHER CLATTER, so that the plot is lost to the audience. Can’t you producers get away from the “WORLD OF NOISE”, and let people “just talk and be understood”?
The same thing applies to singers —don’t minimize their voices with “maximum applified” background music! Let them be heard!!!!!!
Totally agree… the background noise is s annoying. It drowns the conversation.
Gotta feel for Valley who was the victim of the worst retool curses in recent TV history. “Human Target” was one of the best surprises on television with a knockout of a first season and somebody goes and gets a case of “It works, so lets fix it”. Second season was one of the worst disappointments on television and no surprise that it faded to an embarrassing death.
As gal MEs go, I liked the Jill Hennessey show better. This one feels so “its been done” and may not take to CPR. Just hope they don’t stick Valley with the blame.
I didn’t hate “Human Target” season 2. I thought the new boss was lame, but I liked Janet Montgomery.
The reboot of Law and Order: LA was fantastic. Had NBC started out with that version, its possible it may still be on the air.
Reboots sometimes worked, back in the day. Look at “The Doris Day Show” – it evolved every single one of its five seasons…drastically. “Newhart” switched from video to film after season one. I know, the exceptions. Can anyone think of any other old shows that survived format changes?
“Valerie” turning into the “Hogan Family” after they fired Valerie Harper.
Happy Days became a hit after a radical retool.
It’s not the 70s anymore, though, people have a million options and aren’t going to give shows a second chance.
The pivot point for Body of Proof is the age breakdown. The nets and advertisers want younger audiences who make impulse purchases, and while BoP had the older and better educated crowd, they aren’t what brings in the big bucks.
I liked the show, and I know others who did, which shows how a reasonably intelligent show that the older crowd likes needs to be on earlier than ten at night. The way around this might be narrowcasting in place of broadcasting.
I’ve found that in this season Dana Delaney’s character is sounding extremely bitter & nasty. I loved this show and I’ve been so disappointed by her character’s attitude that I just can’t watch it any longer.
I don’t think there’s a ‘retool curse’ as much as there is a ‘renewing low-rated shows curse’. Retools don’t improve the ratings of low-rated shows and, at worst, are misguided and alienate the existing viewerbase.
In fact, the only successful recent retool I can think of was Parks and Recreation, which actually did pretty well in its shortened first season and succeeded by sustaining rather than improving its ratings.
Honestly, it’s going up against Smash and Vegas, two shows destined for cancelation, so I’d say it actually has a very good chance of working out well. And it has The Bachelor as a lead in, so this might just be perfect for Body of Proof.
Yea, I liked Human Target also.
Mark Valley is an actor i love seeing on screen but his recent track history is awful. If BoP lasts past this season i’ll be glad but i don’t think it will.
Sadly enough, the one thing they often seem not to fix in reboots is the writing. The three actors fired from “Body of Evidence,” for instance, are talented, but the writing on this show was rote procedural. As Sandra Bullock proved when she read parts of the script of “Something About Steve” at the Razzies, even Oscar winners can’t elevate bad scripts. Valley and Delaney are talented, so I’m rooting for the show.
For such money-conscious people, network executives are slow to realize they are wasting a lot of it by focusing on the demo. Fuck the demo. The demo is causing a lot of otherwise moderately-viewed shows to be unnecessarily cancelled.
Younger viewers do not watch TV like we used to — and they NEVER WILL.
It’s not the network executives, it’s the advertisers. The networks will try and get whatever audience the advertisers desire.
If advertisers didn’t want young demographics then the broadcast networks would make radically different decisions and, chances are, Body of Proof still wouldn’t be a hit.
I couldn’t agree more. Even at 52 I don’t watch TV the way we did back in the day. So much is scheduled on my DVR or at times on the networks website. Younger folks will watch a proggie bootlegged on a third party site or on their cell phone. This will not factor in for ratings. There have been several decent shows in the last two years that were cancelled due to ratings that were fantastic. I was extremely disappointed they were not kept going. If networks are still basing ratings on neilson by viewer or same day DVR view. They are not at all obtaining a correct viewership. I can envision in the next few decades that scheduled TV will all be VOD, people will watch it when they want to.
Dana Delany is a class act and hope the show does well. Body of Proof is one of the shows that needs to be measured in viewers, not demo. im certain it will do modestly, mean its going against ~Smash.
Body was fine the way it was. There wasn’t a retool necessary. But what could kill it is once again it hasn’t been on in months. Has it been 8/9 ? Networks need to stop this lousy practice.
AS for older audiences – whats wrong with them ? They have disposable incomes not the twentysomethings, They really don’t watch tv to begin with.
Not only do we have substantial disposable income, we also stay up past 10PM contrary to Colcam’s comment above.
I might have been one of the few that actually enjoyed Human Target before the show was retooled.
Mark Valley needs to urn his one around or he is on the verge of becoming this generation’s Ted McGinley.
I love Smash and I am sad it is not doing better.
Isn’t CBS’ “Unforgettable” also going through a retool for its second season this summer? Only three cast members coming back, with the rest getting the boot.
They should have kept Kevin Rankin and booted off Poppy (Look at me everyone!) Montgomery. She cannot act to save her life.
I didn’t watch Body of Proof because I disliked the lead character. The FBI character Delaney played on Castle a couple of seasons back was much more sympathetic.
Agreed, Jack – they should have spun that character off from Castle.
Dumb show, with cliche, warmed up left overs from other shows and cast members that have no charisma. Pretty people does not equal charisma. The networks and the advertisers are cluelessly in panic mode. All they really know is that the ship is sinking but no one really knows how to fix it. It’s called Rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
Does Law & Order SVU count?
It got a pretty big change after Chris Meloni left – two new leads, a new set, and a round-robin of rotating ADAs – and its totally refreshed the show. It’s more interesting now than it has been in a long time.
Not everyone finds the show interesting anymore. As well as losing what many considered the best character, the stories aren’t as interesting and, inexplicably, the lighting and camera work have become poor.The ratings have also fallen considerably so the retool definitely did not improve the show in that regard either. The stunt casting of a convicted rapist this past month caused an online petition and the second worst ratings in 14 years.Notably, the other two worst ratings are also in this season.
Law & Order SVU post-retool isn’t more interesting to me! I was a loyal fan and have since stopped watching.
I liked season 2 of Body of Proof, when Megan wasn’t such a hardass bitch. But now she’s back to being Dr House in a dress and Louboutins, and I have completely lost interest.
Season 3 of Body of Proof gives views what they want, it has more action, suspense and drama. I think the show really found its stride and as long as people tune in once, Im confident that they’ll be hooked!
If ‘a reboot almost never provides the desired ratings jolt,’ why do studios keep rebooting? Isn’t the definition of insanity doing hte same thing over and over and expecting different results? I get the financial reasons for rebooting – it’s more expensive to invest in a new show than to attempt to reboot (although not always), especially if there is the possibility of a long-lasting success story – but history seems to clearly indicate that it’s a fool’s decision. I still remember the pilot for ‘Body of Proof’ which was so wildly mediocre and generic that it’s frankly incredible it lasted this long.
As long as the broadcast networks try to placate their advertisers by chasing the demographic least likely to watch television, they will continue to circle the drain. Maybe it’s time to go back to way it was done in the old days: one or two sponsors pay for and run the show (e.g., Chevrolet/BONANZA, Lucky Strike/JACK BENNY) and the nets just air them.
Personally, not that it matters, I miss the 3 booted characters–maybe my middle age is showing–the original setup was an interesting fit. Liked the medicolegal aspect of the Peter character tho any spark between that character and Dr Hunt couldn’t work due to his inferior role to the ME. Particularly hope Nicholas Bishop turns up somewhere soon in a new series (a non-Florida Glades or non-Montana Longmire type?). I can barely stand to watch stiff Jeri Ryan so hoping her character wins her possible election campaign and rarely appears. My least favorite character/actor is Curtis/Broomfield whose mumbling/bumbling is irritating and too close to an outdated stereotype, followed by Dr Hunt’s daughter–how many teens watch this show so not sure she boosts a younger demo; too bad the character didn’t move with her dad. What else can she do but be ongoing victim of bad guys hoping to get to dr Hunt? Bamber was great on BBC’s Law and Order but too young for a romantic match to Delaney and comes across as a more passive actor even tho he is supposed to be second lead in Monday Mornings–Valley is a much better fit vis a vis Delaney. Finally, wish the emphasis would remain on the forensic ME side but see it becoming more of a detective show with Dr Hunt tagging along to continue the back n forth with Valley’s detective. I will continue to watch due to my appreciation of Delaney and the ME angle but don’t believe the reboot will succeed.