Bhodi_Li
11-22-2005, 12:16 PM
Any fans of this show out there?
FX network ends Iraq war drama Over There (http://www.tv.com/story/story.html&story_id=2218)
FX network ends Iraq war drama Over There
November 2, 2005 at 09:58:00 AM
Steven Bochco's take on Iraq war gets honorable discharge from FX following ratings-starved first season.
It's Over. Cable television's FX channel has decided not to renew the critically praised Iraq war drama Over There for a second season due to weak ratings during the show's initial 13-episode run, the network said Tuesday.
Over There, a first-of-its-kind contemporary war drama about US troops in combat and their families back home, was cocreated by Steven Bochco, the veteran TV producer behind such landmark cop shows as Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue.
While Over There garnered mostly favorable reviews, the gritty, albeit fictionalized, depiction of a real war that has grown increasingly unpopular with the American public ultimately proved a turnoff to TV viewers.
Although the series contained references to real-life events that have stirred debate over the war, including the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal, the producers sought to avoid overt political messages about the conflict.
The show got off to a promising start July 27 with 4.1 million viewers tuning in, a fairly healthy launch by cable TV standards, but the audience steadily declined from there.
Through the 13th and final episode on Oct. 26, the program averaged a meager 2.1 million viewers overall. Only 1.35 million watched the series finale.
"It became evident to us that the American public didn't want to see a dramatization of a war that was already going on," Yemaya Royce, a spokeswoman for Bochco's production company, told Reuters.
"It made people uncomfortable to watch. I think that was the case for a lot of people," FX spokesman John Solberg added. "Clearly it was subject matter that was harsh."
Said FX president and general manager John Landgraf: "The series was arguably the most critically acclaimed new television show of the year, a fact which made the decision not to renew it all the more difficult."
Launching any new TV show is always a gamble. But for Bochco, the stakes were especially high for Over There, his first series on basic cable following a string of misfires on network television, including the ABC crime and legal dramas Blind Justice, Philly, and Total Security.
Bochco recently took over as producer for the ABC political drama Commander In Chief and signed a three-year production deal with sister studio Touchstone Television.
Both ABC and Touchstone are units of the Walt Disney. The FX network is owned by News Corp. Ltd.
Story Copyright © 2005 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
Personally I prefer Discovery's Off to War (http://times.discovery.com/convergence/offtowar/offtowar.html) much better. It does a better job covering the family life (although if they really wanted to cover the family life they would show all the kids screaming and throwing fits LOL) and you get to hear the thoughts of the soldiers, both officer and enlisted.
'Over There' was too Hollywood and unrealistic for me. However, I was thankful that FX made the attempt and thought the series had a lot of potential. Maybe someone else will pick it up.:frown:
FX network ends Iraq war drama Over There (http://www.tv.com/story/story.html&story_id=2218)
FX network ends Iraq war drama Over There
November 2, 2005 at 09:58:00 AM
Steven Bochco's take on Iraq war gets honorable discharge from FX following ratings-starved first season.
It's Over. Cable television's FX channel has decided not to renew the critically praised Iraq war drama Over There for a second season due to weak ratings during the show's initial 13-episode run, the network said Tuesday.
Over There, a first-of-its-kind contemporary war drama about US troops in combat and their families back home, was cocreated by Steven Bochco, the veteran TV producer behind such landmark cop shows as Hill Street Blues and NYPD Blue.
While Over There garnered mostly favorable reviews, the gritty, albeit fictionalized, depiction of a real war that has grown increasingly unpopular with the American public ultimately proved a turnoff to TV viewers.
Although the series contained references to real-life events that have stirred debate over the war, including the Abu Ghraib prisoner-abuse scandal, the producers sought to avoid overt political messages about the conflict.
The show got off to a promising start July 27 with 4.1 million viewers tuning in, a fairly healthy launch by cable TV standards, but the audience steadily declined from there.
Through the 13th and final episode on Oct. 26, the program averaged a meager 2.1 million viewers overall. Only 1.35 million watched the series finale.
"It became evident to us that the American public didn't want to see a dramatization of a war that was already going on," Yemaya Royce, a spokeswoman for Bochco's production company, told Reuters.
"It made people uncomfortable to watch. I think that was the case for a lot of people," FX spokesman John Solberg added. "Clearly it was subject matter that was harsh."
Said FX president and general manager John Landgraf: "The series was arguably the most critically acclaimed new television show of the year, a fact which made the decision not to renew it all the more difficult."
Launching any new TV show is always a gamble. But for Bochco, the stakes were especially high for Over There, his first series on basic cable following a string of misfires on network television, including the ABC crime and legal dramas Blind Justice, Philly, and Total Security.
Bochco recently took over as producer for the ABC political drama Commander In Chief and signed a three-year production deal with sister studio Touchstone Television.
Both ABC and Touchstone are units of the Walt Disney. The FX network is owned by News Corp. Ltd.
Story Copyright © 2005 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
Personally I prefer Discovery's Off to War (http://times.discovery.com/convergence/offtowar/offtowar.html) much better. It does a better job covering the family life (although if they really wanted to cover the family life they would show all the kids screaming and throwing fits LOL) and you get to hear the thoughts of the soldiers, both officer and enlisted.
'Over There' was too Hollywood and unrealistic for me. However, I was thankful that FX made the attempt and thought the series had a lot of potential. Maybe someone else will pick it up.:frown: