Fox rearranges in January…

Updated on November 7, 2008 By Ken Begg 23 Comments

It’s not exactly news that the old idea of a ‘schedule,’ one lasting about a year and running from one fall to the next with but minor tinkering, is dead. However, further evidence is provided by Fox’s announcement that it will rejigger the majority of it’s schedule in January to coincide with the latest iteration of American Idol.

FOX PRIMETIME SCHEDULE: BEGINNING JANUARY 2009
(All Times ET/PT)

MONDAY
8:00-9:00 PM DOLLHOUSE
9:00-10:00 PM 24

TUESDAY
8:00-9:00 PM AMERICAN IDOL
9:00-10:00 PM FRINGE

WEDNESDAY
8:00-9:00 PM HOUSE
9:00-9:30 PM AMERICAN IDOL Results Show
9:30-10:00 PM TBA Comedy

THURSDAY
8:00-9:00 PM HELL’S KITCHEN
9:00-10:00 PM SECRET MILLIONAIRE

FRIDAY
8:00-9:00 PM BONES
9:00-9:30 PM ‘TIL DEATH
9:30-10:00 PM DO NOT DISTURB (wt)

SATURDAY
8:00-8:30 PM COPS
8:30-9:00 PM COPS
9:00-10:00 PM AMERICA’S MOST WANTED: AMERICA FIGHTS BACK
11:00 PM-Midnight MADtv
Midnight-12:30 AM TALKSHOW WITH SPIKE FERESTEN

SUNDAY
7:00-7:30 PM COMEDY ENCORES
7:30-8:00 PM COMEDY ENCORES
8:00-8:30 PM THE SIMPSONS
8:30-9:00 PM KING OF THE HILL (January) / SIT DOWN, SHUT UP (wt) (spring)
9:00-9:30 PM FAMILY GUY
9:30-10:00 PM AMERICAN DAD (January) / THE CLEVELAND SHOW (wt) (spring)

Notes on the new shows:

From Joss Whedon, creator of groundbreaking cult favorites “Buffy the Vampire Slayer” and “Firefly,” comes DOLLHOUSE, a gripping, high-action drama starring Eliza Dushku (“Tru Calling”) as Echo, a member of an underground group of “Actives” who have their personalities wiped clean so they can be imprinted with any number of new personas to carry out a variety of missions. The Actives don’t just pretend to be new people they become new people, yet they are never aware they are actually pawns in someone else’s game. SECRET MILLIONAIRE is a heart-warming new unscripted series that focuses on a different millionaire each week, who goes undercover to some of America’s most disadvantaged areas in search of everyday heroes to possibly change their lives forever.

Two new animated comedies will also join the schedule in the spring. From the creators of FAMILY GUY and AMERICAN DAD, comes THE CLEVELAND SHOW (working title), the story of what happens when FAMILY GUY’s Cleveland Brown moves to Stoolbend, VA, to make good on a promise to his high school sweetheart. SIT DOWN, SHUT UP (working title), created by Emmy Award winner Mitchell Hurwitz (“Arrested Development”), follows a group of unconventional teachers and staff members working at a high school in a small northeastern fishing town who never lose sight of the fact that the students must ALWAYS come second.

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  • jzimbert

    Wait, Cleveland was serious when he told Quagmire he was getting a spin-off? He’s, like, the least interesting character.

  • Racist!

  • fish eye no miko

    @jzimbert: No kidding. I can’t believe that of all the characters on the show, they picked HIM for a spin-off. I’d rather see Stewie and Brian out on their own…

    They’re moving Bones to Friday? First they put it against ABC’s wonderful smash hit Pushing Daisies, and now they’re moving it to the one night of the week no one really wants to watch tv…. So, they’re trying to kill it off, is that it?

  • aphexbr

    I find the enthusiastic DOLLHOUSE blurb quite ironically amusing. From the creator of Firefly (which we canned prematurely!) and the star of Tru Calling (which we killed just when it started to find its audience!) comes a new show which we’re not going to cancel before the end of the 1st season! Honest!

  • Pushing Daisies is hardly a “smash hit.” It gets a bit over 6 million viewers a week. I’m not sure if Bones is the same demographic, however. As for the Friday move, it may actually have been made to save Bones from being cancelled by moving it to a night when there wasn’t much expected from it.

    Don’t expect much from Dollhouse. Remember that Whedon’s most popular show, Buffy, would have been cancelled on Fox due to low ratings. In it’s best year (the third season) it drew slightly more htan five million viewers a week. Only the fact that it was on UPN/WB and got a lot of ink created the impression that it had much of an audience.

    As for Firefly, I still maintain that Fox never should have put it on in the first place. Great show, but you were never going to get many people to watch a space western.

  • fish eye no miko

    Ken Begg said: Pushing Daisies is hardly a “smash hit.” It gets a bit over 6 million viewers a week.

    Really? Damn…

    I’m not sure if Bones is the same demographic, however.

    Well, me and my friend both watch both of them, so clearly some people like both shows. But we’re weird, so who knows…

    As for the Friday move, it may actually have been made to save Bones from being cancelled by moving it to a night when there wasn’t much expected from it.

    Ah, could be.

  • Please don’t take this as me knocking Pushing Daisies, but (if I remember correctly) it was basically only not cancelled because the writer’s strike threw all the schedules into disarry. Hopefully it will do better in its second season.

  • Terrahawk

    So does this mean that “Terminator” bit the dust?

  • Foywonder

    Pushing Daisies is cancelled. There just hasn’t been an official announcement yet. It will not be returning to the schedule come mid-season, along with Dirty Sexy Money and Eli Stone. Pushing Daisies was never a smash hit last season and this season even the absymal new Knight Rider has regularly trounced it in the ratings.

    As for Dollhouse, it was originally supposed to be paired with 24 (Talk about a show that has overstayed its time) on Monday nights. But it has been reported that Fox execs are still iffy on the show so they gave the Monday timeslot House instead and are essentially dumping it to the Friday night death slot.

  • Petoht

    That schedule is going to be hell on my VCR programming.

  • sardu

    I’m waiting to see if Dollhouse gets canceled during the airing of the premiere… they come back from the 3rd act commercial and it’s a re-run of COPS…

  • BeckoningChasm

    The “Dollhouse” premise sounds an awful lot like some show that’s currently on–something about an agent with two lives who keeps having the wrong one “wake up” when least convenient. (I don’t have TV so I’ve only heard about it.)

  • The Rev. D.D.

    BC–I think that’s My Own Worst Enemy on NBC, starring Christian Slater. Sounds like the premise, at any rate (I haven’t seen it).

  • Jim

    So does this mean that “Terminator” bit the dust?[/i]

    It’s will be coming back in February 13. Friday’s at 8pm.

  • Blackadder

    None of those new shows sound interesting. Dollhouse sounds like it might make a good novel or art film, but I don’t see how that can work in a weekly format. The rest of the shows just sound atrocious.

  • rizzo

    I’m with Blackadder…none of these shows sound remotely interesting.

  • Pilgrim

    I dunno, the animated one about the teachers could be good. I don’t think it *will*, just that it *could*. The premise isn’t that much worse than the premise behind, say, The Critic. It’ll be all in the execution.

    I agree that Dollhouse seems like a rediculously hard premise to work with. Also Nthing the question of why we need yet another Seth McFarlane cartoon.

    …Said the guy who doesn’t even get FOX on his TV.

  • sardu

    Actually, Dollhouse seemed to me like it would be quite easy to sustain given the open ended premise. It sounds a bit like Quantum Leap; every week the main character could wind up being anyone, anywhere. It can have aspects of an anthology within the overall structure of the show.

    Or maybe not, who knows *lol*

  • Blackadder

    Some shows – like Quantum Leap and Lost – have premises that should make them DOA, but somehow they succeed against all odds. So Dollhouse could surprise us. I should mention that I like Joss Whedon’s work and I like Eliza Dushku’s, um, everything, so I certainly don’t have any axe to grind against the show. I hope it does well. I just think Mr. Whedon pushed his luck a little too far with the esoteric Firefly and it sounds like he’s doing it again. Good luck to him and Ms. Dushku though.

  • Blackadder

    Man, what a lucky bastard. Not only did Fox just pay Seth MacFarlane a truly obscene $100 million, but he is (or was) dating… Eliza Dushku! I’ll be the first to admit he’s a talented voice artist and cartoonist, but I’m not sure those shows are worth a hundred million. Then again, I guess he should charge whatever the market will bear.

    Eliza Dushku though. Man, what a lucky bastard.

  • Terrahawk

    The thing with Dollhouse though is there won’t be a core personality. With Quantum Leap, even though the situation was different each week, the main character was still the same person. Unless they are going to have Dushku start to realize who she really is, ala My Own Worst Enemy, it seems rather rootless. It sounds doomed anyways since Fox shoved it to Friday and canceled further production.

  • Anders S

    I’d like to see Whedon attempt to make a show where none of the key characters is a mysterious, supposedly attractive young woman. And unless Miss Dushku has taken a few acting lessons since last I saw her, the end-result might be some unintended comedy as she attempts to demonstrate a wide range of emotions despite her acting ability being almost as limited as that of Mr. Hasselhoff.
    Oh, and the whole show seems like the result of Whedon watching the Bourne Trilogy and thinking to himself: “This could be good, if we replace Matt Damon with a scantily clad woman brandishing a sword”.

  • Arichamus

    I’ve never liked Mr. Whedon or his work, so I guess it’ll come as no surprise when I say…

    HERE HERE!