Saturday, April 23, 2016

CBS Television Cancels Person Of Interest - How Stupid Are TV Networks?


UPDATE:

I cannot express in words just how much I love Person of Interest and how upset, angry and pissed off I am at its demise. Over the next few days, I intend to break this article up into shorter ones to post on Social media. 

I believe we cannot give up if we hope for this show to return and I ask the fans of Person of Interest for your support here. Sign the petition if you haven't already and retweet this article. Write your own Tweets and Facebook posts about how much you love Person of Interest and tell the networks why you love this show so much. Post your favourite YouTube videos of Person of Interest, so other people can see for themselves just how fantastic this show was.

And lastly, many thanks to Alison for your comment back in April. I apologise for not replying to you and I will do so soon. I just want you to know that your words and thought mean a lot to many fans who are grieving the loss of this show.

Many thanks to the best fandom in the world. 






Now I am well aware that this is old news and the lovers of Person of Interest have been talking about this for weeks, but I just had to share my two cents and post my rant about the absolute stupid decisions that CBS make and have made regarding Person of Interest.







Viewers Don't Want to Watch Mindless Dribble

TV is becoming the thing to watch when people want to veg out or simply have some noise in the background. Turn on the telly and you will find many shows that do not require us to use our brain.




These guys are who I want to watch.



THIS is NOT what I USE TV for!



Now, unless I am sleeping, I usually always want to be doing something that stimulates my brain and Person of Interest was one of the very few TV shows that did this for me and it still does even if I am watching reruns that I've seen, ten times over.

Person of Interest not only makes me think, it was also very relevant to what we face in today's society in regards to Government spying on their citizens and Artificial Intelligence. And the reasons for this show's cancellation make me sick to my stomach.

And please; stop with the conspiracy theories! It was not the Government that shut down production of Person of Interest. It was GREED! Pure and simple. I am not ruling out that this kind of thing could happen. The possibility of the Government intervening on the production of a TV show is possible; but wasn't the damage already done when Edward Snowden did his thing? He certainly did some damage to the CIA and the NSA, in any case I digress.








It basically comes down to money. CBS do not own Person of Interest, (Warner Bros do) so they only make a profit on the advertising fees they generate while airing the show. When ratings dropped towards the final episodes of Season four, CBS were obviously not making enough profits. Not to mention, Warner Bros refusal to allow the episodes to be put on CBS's website (this well may have affected ratings). Not allowing the already aired episodes to be accessed by viewers, hindered CBS's ability to attain new viewers. Instead of cancelling the show there and then and cutting their losses. CBS hedged their bets, lied to the fans and the media and waited too long to air Season five which incidentally, ended production in Dec/Jan. 


CBS May End Up Regretting Cancelling Person of Interest


CBS also screwed up by announcing the show's cancellation at the same time. They should have waited until the first few episodes had gone to air and then announced POI's cancellation. If the ratings are very, very good this summer and another network jumps at the chance to pick up POI, I really think CBS are going to regret this decision. In fact, I damned well hope that they do. They bloody well deserve it for being so focused on profits and money and not what the viewers want to see on their TV screens.

Fans were told they would see how the ratings shook out during Season five, and make a decision on its future. When it was revealed that only 13 episodes were ordered from WB, the fans started to panic. CBS did the same thing to the Mentalist, so the writing was on the wall. Guess what? CBS lied.







A few weeks ago after keeping the fans waiting for almost a year, they announced a May 3, Season five premiere of Person of Interest, and also announced the show's cancellation. So much for waiting on how the show rates. CBS lied, again and again. This was their canned excuse for the media whenever they were questioned on why POI had not been renewed along with all of their other shows. 

Fans were pissed at the lies, but even more disheartened. Given the time that had passed, fans are less positive that POI will be picked up for Season six and are angry that CBS did not just cancel the show after announcing the initial order for 13 episodes for Season five.





Personally for me; I hate being lied to, it does not matter who it is telling the porkies, I hate it with a passion. So after being lied to many times by the Nine network and Seven network here in Australia. For a long time I stuck with the Network Ten, however when the shit hit the fan regarding Person of Interest in May last year and it was not looking good for the show, I dropped this network too, as CBS own a third of this network. 

Funny thing is though, Network Ten do not broadcast Person of Interest. The Nine network do, and it was when they lied to viewers regarding this show, I dropped them. Apparently the Nine network's deal is with Warner Bros, not CBS. Anyway, this is all a little off topic, except to point out that many POI fans in the US have boycotted CBS. What does this tell the networks? 


If It Ain't Broke, Don't Fix It


All of this aside, CBS have let go the best quality TV show to have hit the screens in years and have treated the show like crap since the end of Season 2. CBS replaced this show in May 2015 with another show that they own outright and its ratings are below what Person of Interest's ratings were at the same time last year. Way below! Moving the show at the start of Season three to Tuesdays at 10 pm was a mistake, and was motivated by greed. 





Thursday nights are when advertisers pay the big bucks, and CBS wanted their own show to reap those benefits, not a TV show owned by another entity. This greed is what I believed killed Person of Interest's chances of getting the seven or eight seasons that Jonathan Nolan wanted to tell his story the way he had planned it. Changing POI's time-slot did damage to the show. Surely CBS understand the golden rule? If it ain't broke, don't fix it.


Greed Will Kill Free to Air TV

The greed that motivates broadcast TV networks and cable networks will kill their profits in the long run. There will always be a market for free to air broadcast TV and cable, but if the people who run these networks do not start listening to the viewers and paying attention to the statistics of just how many viewers choose to stream their content or watch online, they are going to go bankrupt. And free to air TV will contain nothing but crap shows and no one will tune in. The only high ratings will be from reality TV shows which the majority of viewers hate, and the big sports events.

And the biggest issue I have with this idiotic decision by CBS to cancel Person of Interest is that they obviously believe that their viewers do not want quality TV to watch. This could not be more false. Of all the crap shows that have debuted on broadcast networks in recent years, how many of them were of great quality and how many of them are still around? CSI Cyber comes to mind, it will be cancelled this season after how many years? Two, maybe three? Limitless also comes to mind, this show replaced Person of Interest. It will probably get a Season two, only because CBS own it outright. Expect this show to be gone after its second season. I could name many, but my point has been made.


Do Network Executives Even Care What Viewers Want?


We as viewers are well aware of the shit on our TV screens and we are sick and tired of networks cancelling the good shows and keeping all the crap shows, which is what seems to be happening. Viewers are getting so conditioned to seeing nothing bu crap on their TV screens, that they are not even bothering to give a show that might be good quality, a chance because it probably won't rate well. The attitude of many viewers is what's the point because it will probably be cancelled? This is crazy and this is what is hurting the broadcast networks. And the worst of it is, it is pretty clear that these network executives just don't get it or they simply do not give a rat's ass.





It is also true that really good quality TV does not survive, because no matter how good the show is, it does have to rate well. So some great TV just doesn't get aired and this is sometimes not the networks fault. They do the promotion and throw everything at the show, but it fails. One such example, is The Family on ABC. Are ABC doing enough to promote this show? I am not a US citizen, so I don't know, but from what I've seen, this show is excellent and it will be a shame if it is cancelled.


Person of Interest Did Not Stand A Chance at CBS


While some networks do all they can to give a show a fighting chance to get high ratings, CBS were not interested in doing this. Person of Interest was rating well enough for it to be given a full Season five. If CBS were interested in promoting the show, they may have seen it do better in the ratings in Season four, but from what I hear, because Warner Bros own the show, CBS were not interested in spending money on promotion for POI. This completely blows. 

The bottom line is; TV networks have to try to get good quality scripted TV and keep it rating well, or viewers will simply piss off to cable shows, streaming services or worse still, download their content and not necessarily via a method the entertainment industry consider legal, but this is a whole different argument for another time.





And at the end of the day if TV networks, particularly free to air networks want to keep profits rolling in, they will need good quality TV shows and they need to listen to their viewers, not rely on their outdated way of measuring who is watching what shows. I really hope that all US fans of Person of Interest tune in live to CBS to watch the final season of this amazing show, because if the ratings go beyond their expectations, then Person of Interest might be saved by another network and who is the loser? CBS. 


Person of Interest Won A People's Choice Award

The very last gripe I want to point out is that Person of Interest won a People's Choice Award in January/Feb 2016, and what's more, POI had not been on the air since May 2015. Why on earth would you cancel a show that achieved this? The answer is obviously money and greed and it plain STINKS to high heaven. How many TV shows have won major awards when they are not even on the air?

If you currently boycott CBS or are thinking of doing so because you are angry with them for cancelling Person of Interest, I am all for it, but please do it after the Season five finale. Please watch live if you can; this will help in the fight to convince Netflix and other networks that this show is worth more seasons.





And whatever you do; don't stop fighting, let Netflix and all of the other TV networks know that we are not IRRELEVANT and will fighting back with our remote controls or credit cards. It is my firm belief that if Netflix pick up Person of Interest for a sixth season as a Netflix original, their subscription numbers will skyrocket. They would have me as a subscriber for life.








You can sign the Save POI Petition right now!






UPDATE!

This petition has generated over 33,00 signatures thus far, please get behind it and sign today!









Now it is your turn, if you want to have your say about my rant, do so in the comments, or join me on Facebook or Twitter.


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Copyright © 2016 Janelle Coulton

1 comment:

  1. A&E cancelled Longmire even though it was their MOST watched show EVER, because the demographics showed most of the watchers were over 45. The sponsors wanted to appeal to the late teens to the early 30's, mistakenly believing that they had the most disposable money to spend. Fans were totally besides themselves. Fortunately Netflix picked it up, fimed S4 and is now filming S5. POI actually started with a wide range of intellects watching But when Carter died and it got "too weird" the numbskulls went off to watch Scorpion or other really mindless shows. So, lost some viewers and what you said happened.

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