Hey Guys,
Here's an article that sure to intrigue the various fans of the site, written by Laura Prudom of The Huffington Post. You can read the opening paragraphs below, before continuing with the rest of the article through the link at the bottom!
It's all in relation to last night's Peoples Choice Awards, and as Captain Edmund Blackadder once said, "I smell something fishy, and I'm not talking about the contents of Baldrick's apple crumble."
Supernatural Wins At The People's Choice Awards, But Is There Evidence Of A Genre Conspiracy? by Laura Prudom
Genre shows have always been the red-headed stepchildren of network TV. That's why "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" never won -- heck, was never nominated -- in a lead Emmy category. It's why "Firefly" and "Jericho" were unceremoniously cancelled by trigger-happy execs years before their time. And it's also why envelope-pushing, groundbreaking series such as "Fringe" never seem to receive the accolades they so richly deserve, regardless of how awesome John Noble is.
Sure, "True Blood" and "The Walking Dead" are occasionally allowed to defy the genre curse because they're cable shows -- though they're also somewhat less consistent in quality -- but generally, us Whovians, Trekkies, Browncoats, Nerd Herders and the like have become accustomed to having our tastes ignored or disparaged by mainstream awards ceremonies like the Golden Globes and Emmys.
If there's one award ceremony we can occasionally count on to reflect our nerdy interests, it's the People's Choice Awards, largely because we're the ones doing the voting, so no actual energy has to be expended by industry insiders in coming up with a winner. It's a point of pride for many fans who vote non-stop for weeks to try and earn their favorite shows the recognition they merit, whether it's tweeting out People's Choice nominations or developing carpal tunnel entering TV Guide's Fan Favorite cover contest, in which an underrated show can win a coveted place on the magazine's front cover through a Facebook poll.
The CW's "Supernatural," a resilient and unpredictable drama, now in its seventh season, which currently averages just under two million viewers per episode, for example, is a show that has always relied on avid fan engagement. Its paltry rating is thanks, in part, to its unenviable Friday night time slot opposite Fox's equally quirky "Fringe," because all genre shows are inevitably relegated to the so-called end-of-week "Death Slot" when networks grow bored of trying to pair them with incompatible time slot companions (see also: "Chuck" and "Grimm" on NBC).
It's not heavily promoted on The CW's line-up -- which is understandable, given that shows in their seventh years don't generally pick up a slew of new viewers -- but it was still the recipient of TV Guide's very first Fan Favorite Cover, and the winner of two People's Choice Awards last night.
So why complain about a genre TV conspiracy? Because, despite the fact that one of "Supernatural's" wins was the prestigious "Favorite Network TV Drama" award, up against ratings heavy-hitters like "The Good Wife," "Grey's Anatomy," "House" and The CW's most successful show, "The Vampire Diaries," the People's Choice Awards producers neglected to announce its victory during the live show. Instead, both of "Supernatural" wins, for Drama and Sci-fi/Fantasy, were broadcast during the pre-show coverage, which streamed online and was aired on Reelzchannel, but many fans weren't aware, judging by some of the Twitter reactions last night.
Obviously, it would be impossible to fit 43 awards categories into a two-hour live telecast that already seemed embarrassingly over-saturated with product placement, sponsorship tie-ins (the cheesy CVS segment, in particular, was utterly cringe-inducing) and incessant commercials, as well as two ill-advised performances from Demi Lovato and Faith Hill. We don't expect CBS to bend the laws of physics, here.
Read the second half of the article HERE
What are your thoughts on the article? Certainly is an interesting one!!
Adam
Source: TheHuffingtonPost
I read it earlier today and finally someone spoke out what all of us were thinking. At least the Supernatural fans. Not bringing the Award for Favourite TV Drama live in the show, but instead in a few second long video during the red carpet?? Did they really think nobody would notice!? Shows how much worth this so called "People's Choice" Awards really is.
ReplyDeleteThank you for that.
ReplyDeletereally good article!!!
ReplyDeleteI agree with Laura's article 100%! Very well said as a fan of most of the shows mentioned in her article (Firefly, Jericho etc), I'm so disappointed that the best shows get overlooked by treated so badly all the time. Unless they're sexy vampires (but even that only since the Twilight era arrived).
ReplyDeleteSo sorry to say this, but I feel like it's painfully accurate.
ReplyDeleteWere they really NOT invited? Can't believe this.
Great article. Thanks
ReplyDeleteIt is bizarre that anyone from Supernatural was invited. I can understand if they were only nominated for best sci-fi because that award never gets televised but best Drama?! They televised best Comedy why not the drama?! It is very very fishy....
ReplyDeleteI agree with the article, but then again, if I was CBS, I probably would have done exactly the same thing, keeping all of my shows for the end and leaving them in the spotlight, much like I'm sure on any other year ABC would have done the same with Castle or any other show involved.
ReplyDeleteOn top of this, talking about another award ceremony, when the Academy Awards are on, if a Big Blockbuster is tipped to win, or at least have a chance (think Inception) the Awards will have much higher viewership, and as such when The Hurt Locker and No Country For Old Men won the respective Best Picture Accolades, the viewership of the Academy Awards was way down.
In a situation like this, why pin your spectacle on a drama with 2 million followers rather than three with upwards of 10 million?
It's one thing to be upset about being snubbed by awards shows that are not interested in that genre for some reason, but to have the fanbase dedicated to have some decent exposure and show how strongly they feel for their favorite tv show to win what is arguably the best and most important award of the night just get absolutely no air time, while 15-minute skits about CVS products and Pantiene product placement follow each freakin' commercial break...and to not even invite the winners of the award in the first place while filling seats with useless celebrities that have no reason to be there, and just ignore that effort altogether? CBS should issue a f***ing statement of apology to the fans that took the time to give the PCA site hit after hit after hit only to be ignored when they finally have the show. It's more than a snub, it's just rude and ridiculous. And that's all on top of a mountain of garbage that they threw together during the show...It was boring, and awkward, with non-stop product placement. It just made me sick and it upset me by the end of the show. "People's Choice" my ass.
ReplyDeleteMeh. It's a multi-vote popularity contest. Whatever slight or underhanded behavior that comes out of that doesn't really interest me much.
ReplyDeleteThe people who should really be pissed are the agents, the network, and publicists. Those are the people who really benefit from the People's Choice Awards.
I agree with this!
ReplyDeleteWow, they have a lot of awards given out...better to pick and choose which winners end up on TV with, huh?
ReplyDeletePopularity contests are annoying. Even when a genre show wins, they just decide not to air it, stupid.
Supernatural over Good Wife, Greys and House its shocking and for that reason im glad it wasn't aired live.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting article!The last sentence sums the whole thing perfectly..
ReplyDeleteA show called People's Choice Awards simply decided that the choices people made weren't worth the recognition.
It's disrespectful to say the least.Not even taking the time to announce the winner during the show,to show the thank you video from the cast(honestly,I'm not even going to comment on their attitude towards the cast)?!?
Either change the strategy or change the name.
You consider it shocking,I don't,that's a matter of opinion...
ReplyDeleteBut that's not the point.Shocking or not,fair or not,it was what people voted for on a show called the People's Choice Awards.
Even if the winner was the most terrible drama on TV,from the moment it won,they just had to air it.Because that's the right thing to do..
ive never watched one episode of Supernatural so im bias. I could care either way even if one of my show won.
ReplyDeleteWhen I read this article, I was extremely grateful that someone put my own feelings into words. It's one thing not to show the best sci fi winner but to not show best network drama? That's beyond fishy. That should have been one of the biggest awards of the night given it is one of the highest awards in TV given. For me it is all summed up in her sentence, "Shame on the People's Choice Awards for deciding that our choice wasn't good enough." Supernatural is always shafted by larger TV awards and it finally looked like the fans were going to get it much needed publicity. Instead we were snubbed again and quite honestly this time it was worse. We expect to be left empty handed by the Emmys, but SPN fans worked hard to promote the PCAs and get people talking about them. Many SPN fans tuned into the broadcast. What we got was a deliberate smackdown and told that our opinion was not worth it. So much for the people's choice. I for one will not be promoting the PCAs ever again and I will certainly not watch it (and not just for the insult they gave to Supernatural - it was one long litany of advertising). However, I do want to say thanks for one thing to the PCAs. It has united the fandom just as much as the CW postponing the midseason premiere did last year. At a time when fandom contention and brother wars have escalated to intolerable levels, all Supernatural fans can at least agree on one thing. The People's Choice Awards suck out loud!
ReplyDeleteVery well-stated. It was disrespectful in the extreme and completely biased. How they thought that fans of a show that won against major hitters would find this acceptable is beyond me. Actually, I know it i that they don't care what we thought and thus the name "People's Choice" is a joke. It wouldn't have taken more than a minute to include them and the Supernatural fandom would be singing their praises. It just make the PCAs more intolerable than that hideous 2 hour commercial they called a show. Of and you are right, that may be the worst I've ever seen Faith Hill. First off, she was drowned out by her own background music. I came off that performance wondering if she had a sore throat and they wanted to disguise it by the incredibly loud music.
ReplyDeleteAh you must have been a fan of the 5 minute CVS ad instead then because Supernatural could have easily been put in its spot and still left them 3 minutes to remind us that if we spend $50 at CVS we get $5 back. I find this comment sad and bitter because even if a show I didn't like had won, I would still have expected them to air the winners. It's common courtesy and fits with the idea of People's Choice.
ReplyDeleteIf they didn't like who the winner was,change the voting system.Be like all other award shows,one vote per person.If they don't want a repeat next year they will have to do something about it now.
ReplyDeleteWhat really rips my undies about all this is that everyone, not just the cast, but the crew and staff, work their butts off up against a tiny budget and tight time frames to bring us this show. ALL the fans know how much they appreciate our support, because people like Jim Michaels, Jared Padalecki, Clif Kosterman and many others, bother to interact with us via twitter, videos (ie the notorious 'pantless' PCA voting clip) and conventions. We did this for them so they could finally get some major recognition, and we were all let down badly.
ReplyDeleteWe did what People's Choice asked us to do: vote for our favorite, and they decided that wasn't good enough. I say we feed them to the leviathans.
At first I thought it would be only an opinion piece, but connecting all the previous genre snubs really opened my eyes. Interesting article.
ReplyDeleteTHANK YOU to Laura Prudom and The Huffington Post. I just wish that it would make any difference at all to the powers that be in the Television Industry. I envision the execs at CBS and who produced last night's telecast, looking at the article's title, yawning, and tossing it in the can.
ReplyDeleteI guess, more than being used to disappointment, I'm used to being dismissed as unimportant.
Aside: An acquaintance, ages ago, was approached by Nielsen to take part in the ratings gathering. When she admitted to watching a considerable among of genre programming (then mostly aired as first run syndication programming) she was told she's skew the results and rejected her.
Unlike the Emmy's which rotate networks, I don't thing the PCAs have ever been aired on another network. In theory, CBS should be handling this award show like the other awards are handled. Where the network doesn't know the results ahead of time. It up to an autonomous People's Choice organization to design and set the program and invitees, but it does appear as though CBS was running the show, literally. That, seems wrong to me. I guess we're lucky the results weren't changed so CBS would win everything.
ReplyDeleteI this particular situation, I think they're hoping that all of people who voted for their favorite shows would tune in to see if they won. At that level I wouldn' t think the number of fans for a specific show in 2 out of 16 categories would have that much of an affect on the proceedings.
Just out of curiosity, I haven't FF'd through my recording of the show yet, did either of these people *win* (or even get nominated) in music categories?
ReplyDeleteI think Demi won "Favorite Pop Artist"
ReplyDelete*cringe*
I agree with all of this!! Thank you for saying this!!
ReplyDeleteHa! Always finding that silver lining, huh Dahne? :)
ReplyDeleteThat's me. It's kind of nice to have a common enemy again. Usually the CW has filled that role but they are falling down on the job. :-)
ReplyDeleteYeah, you'd think Favorite Network Drama would get time on the main broadcast. I'm no conspiracy theorist, but I have to say, it's a little odd "Supernatural" didn't get any real air time, considering the category.
ReplyDeleteI am getting an error when I click on the link so I can't read it! First half was intersting though, will read the rest when the site goes back on line.
ReplyDeletegreat article. ridiculous situation. i can't believe cbs or the award show or whoever made the decision to not even invite them (supposedly) could do that!!!. at least they won over the cbs show
ReplyDeleteTry right-clicking on the HERE and open it in a new tab. That usually works for me when the link gets cranky.
ReplyDeleteThanks! So proud of Supernatural - I'm glad they got the recognition they deserve.
ReplyDeleteLOL! A conspiracy?!? You've got to be kidding! XD!
ReplyDeleteJared and Jensen were not invited? what the fuck?!
ReplyDeleteIts really sad that genre shows don't get the recognition or the attention that they deserve!
ReplyDeleteExcellent article!
ReplyDelete