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Sci-Fi fans turn on TEN

Since TEN dumped Supernatural and Stargate Universe, fans have been venting their anger. TV Tonight looks for answers amid a wave of fury.

In the dying days of 2009, TEN made a programming amendment that saw two of its US shows, Supernatural and Stargate: Universe, dumped from Mondays and replaced with movie repeats.

Since that time, Sci-Fi and Horror fans have been relentless in their anger at the network.

Neither show was rating well enough to stay on air, even in the less competitive summer season. SGU only had three weeks on air, after a successful Fastracking on the SciFi Channel. The long-running Supernatural, which had nearly a three month delay from its US season premiere, was appeasing those fans who had patiently waited for its Free to Air return. Others had resorted to bit torrent downloads, a growing, if illegal, practice aimed at many shows that take their time in broadcasting in Australia. Those may have affected the show’s eventual on air numbers.

So far TEN has been silent about its future plans for Supernatural and SGU. Despite previous network campaigns that “You Blogged. We Listened,” it hasn’t appeared to have heard this flood of online complaints.

On TEN’s own website there are over 400 responding to the Supernatural axing. Some have mounted a campaign to send postcards to the network -a practice that has seen success for other shows in the US.

Fans have also been relentless in their anger in comments on TV Tonight. Ratings stories aside, the thread now has one of the highest comment counts in  this site’s 3 year history (Nine’s dumping of Fringe was another). Here’s a sample of what they have been saying:

Ant: “I have had a gutful of Ten. They do this constantly, the channel must be run by idiots. I turned the TV on tonight to watch Supernatural and there was a movie on.”

Aims: “Maybe we’d get more Supernatural ratings if they bothered advertising the damn show in a slot other than the few shows before it airs, and Dr. Phil. Seriously. They’re not even targeting the SPN demographic with their advertising.”

Brooklyn: “I am sick of channel ten, its pathetic. Its the only good show on at the moment, and you take it off!
Channel 10, get your act together.”

Trix: “OMG, here we go again, channel friggin ten has done it again!!! oh yay crappy movies instead of Supernatural (my fav show)…”

Cherrie: “Can the ratings really be trusted at this time of year anyway given so many people have been at Christmas functions and are on hols etc.. I would be surprised if the crappy movies they are showing got better ratings!”

TJet: “Maybe if tv stations started showing some loyalty to their viewers they may get some loyalty in return. Lost track of the number of shows I’ve started to watch and enjoy, only to have them pulled from the air.”

Agent 86: “Boo! I’ve waited long enough for channel 10 to actually screen the new episodes. I guess I’ll have to view them via other means.”

Minnie: “Well, yet another reason not to watch Channel Ten, or any of the main commercial channels really.”

Alaina: “This is one of the stupidest things Ten has ever done, and that’s saying something. Supernatural Rocks! Of course their viewing numbers might be up if they fast-tracked it instead of waiting so long. Big mistake.”

Steph: “Nooooooooooo!!!! I couldn’t believe they swapped the Supernatural time, but this, pulling it off! I had so much faith in Ten to play this correctly, now to do this!”

Clayton Baxter: “Its very simple, keep a record of who advertises in these time slots, when the station does a stupid act like this write to the customer service and marketing office telling them you are going to boycott their products…”

Adding to TEN’s woes is an equally bitter fanbase for Stargate: Universe. They too have levelled sustained criticism at the network since the show was pulled off air.

Mike: “Thanks soo much for canning Stargate Universe Ch 10 Not!………fantastic effort …..get us hooked and finally watching your shows. Oh well back to channel 7 then for this fella…”

Jeremy: “You suck channel 10, you don’t even give SGU a chance to get off the ground. If you have not realised there is a following of stargate fans in Australia who would jump on board if you showed some respect for your viewers.”

Ant: “SGU was great ten u are wrong with taken it off. Put it back on. Everyone stop watching ten. That will show them. People power will win over these.”

Fans of both shows are angry that TEN has not deemed to reschedule the shows in a later timeslot, whilst playing reruns of House, Law and Order: CI and Numb3rs, which all air after David Letterman. But TEN could be stockpiling episodes to screen on it third channel, to launch later this year.

Given the volume of complaints against TEN, TV Tonight sought some answers from the network, in the hope of bringing some optimistic news.

Unfortunately, the response was brief in the extreme:

“The Monday night movie has resonated quite well with viewers, but for those Supernatural fans we may look at returning it later in the year.”

Which is also network-speak for “Frankly, we have no news right now.”

The only good news? Supernatural creator Eric Kripke is said to be warming to the idea of a sixth season.

97 Responses

  1. Wow Channel Ten is epic fail. They can shows even before it can develop a suitable audience. They might as well have kept Stargate and Supernatural if they were just going to show old movies. But I am not suprised as this has happened countless times before.

    At the very least Channel 7 and 9 faithfully run shows (even with lackluster ratings) till their end (if sometimes they put it at a terrible timeslot ala *30 rock*)

    No wonder why Channel 10 is the worst commercial TV channel. They put on crappy reality shows (especially Big Brother), and not only that, they spam us to death with them. A couple at a time is fine, but not every bloody month. Even the ABC beats them often with ratings, (though thats prob due to Doctor Who).

    Seriously Ten needs new movies in the repitore, seriously I’ve seen Ice age Meltdown like 5 times in the past year, its a good movie but overplayed, people are going to get sick of them. And what does that equal, you guess it lower ratings. Either repeat movies that haven’t been played as often (if money is an issue), or get new ones, it’s not that hard.

    At the very least bring back 10HD.

  2. Who are Ten trying to kid? “The Monday night movie has resonated quite well with viewers”? These are movies that practically flopped at the cinemas and have been seen ad nauseum since. Tonight, we have “Speed”. I know where I’ll be…watching a rerun of “The Mentalist”. Far more entertaining. Boycotting Ten is easy – there is quite simply nothing worth watching on there anyway. I never download eps due to the mostly-illegal nature of it, but what do we do when the stars are visiting the country and we wish to see the eps before they come? Ten, you leave us no choice, and then you wonder why your ratings are down!

  3. Supernatural is one of my favorite television shows and I am really disappointed in Channel 10 for its rash decision to remove it from Monday nights. For the station to suggest it was pulled due to poor ratings is pretty lame. Like many other people who watch television, I have a life. Over the Christmas and New Year period I was going to Christmas parties and traveling – not sitting at home on a Monday night glued to the television. That’s what a VCR is far. Dear Channel 10 did you even consider that perhaps the same was true of those people who actually have ratings meters attached to their televisions.

    Sadly I fear dear Channel 10 the time has come for us to part ways. You have nothing to offer me and I know that any new shows scheduled to screen on your channel this you that might look interesting will only last an episode or two before they are randomly rescheduled or dropped from the line up. So I ask myself – what is the point of making the effort to watch them. Farewell Channel 10. One day reality tv will fall out of favour with the Australian public and your station will be a lonely desolate place.

  4. The only show I look forward to watching is Supernatural & i’ve only just found out that Ch10 have dropped it! Does anybody know if it is coming back or is it dropped for good? I don’t understand, it is a great show with obviously a strong & consistent fanbase – why don’t Ch10 take that in to consideration??? As for airing over xmas holidays – of course ratings are going to be low – hardly anybody actually watches tv at this time! As for downloading, well, I for one wouldn’t even know how to do it nor do I think my hd is even fast enough to do it, therefore I am one of I’m sure Many loyal fans who wait patiently all year for the show to air, only for Ch10 to pull it Again! What gives?? I’d also love to join the support campaign apparently that is happening on Facebook if anybody has the link! I’m Over B-grade movie reruns – Bring Back Supernatural Now Please!!!!

  5. 1. Not everyone has te resources to download the damn show &
    2. If they think everyone was downloading it before what the hell do they think is gonna happen no they pulled it off the air.
    3. no one in their right mind watches 90’s movies over supernatural, even my nan picks supernatural.

    but, everyone makes mistakes,
    channel 10 just makes 35463208461098347.

  6. LIke I’ve said on the TEN website and countless SPN blogs…maybe an earlier time might help the slot…8:30pm but it on or maybe 9-10…good news week screwed SPN around big time last year going over time…what talking about the gov’t and cracking jokes at kevin rudd needs to go for 90 minutes?? i don’t think so…SPN brings something different to the table, not a usual CSI or Law and Order, their young guys doing something that it based on real accounts and stories and make good TV…Channel Ten like everyone elses tips do the following..
    a. more advertising during all programs times and genres
    b. stop making other shows go over, make them start earlier!
    c. trial a better time slot (then the younger viewers can watch)
    d. listen to the fans and the viewers…we are loyal and feel disadvantaged..no wonder everyone downloads, you’re 3 mnths behind USA…what happend to fasttracking? or do u only do that for House????

  7. Corey B

    Stay on the subject, fewer than expected watched SN and that results in no scheduling or at best a late timeslot. No one is defending Ten but bringing some perspective other than “how can Ten do this???” nonsense.

    People watched it on the web then avoided the FTA broadcast or didn’t bothered at all. If Ten cut it after 800 or 900k then fair eniugh but cheap mindless crap is outrating so that’s the real answer, nothing more nothing less. Will it rate better elsewhere or on Paytv – no, but they might not care or have bills to pay.

  8. To maximise the audience for a show any commerical station in Australia needs to do the following:

    – Advertise it in timeslots relating to the demographic of the show being advertised
    – Not overdoing the advertising
    – Sticking to the timeslot, not changing and swapping things around. This means getting the timeslot right from the start!
    – Starting the programme when advertised, and finishing the programme at the advertised time. Starting a show at 20:40 instead of 20:30 as advertised may mean the person finds something interesting to watch on another station.
    – Fasttracking shows is Vital. I mean preferably within a few days of it shown in the US, not even a couple of weeks.
    – Not cutting bits out of the programme to fit in more ads (happens sporadically across all the networks), its more clipping the bits off before the allotted space for the ad.
    – Not putting advertising across the bottom of the screen for other shows. That (insert expletive here) off viewers and even if it is fasttracked many will still download a ‘clean’ copy from the internet.
    – Bring back the old say, 7pm to midnight tv programme guide breaks for the current day, and even say have, ‘tomorrow night on channel 10’. Hey that way instead of advertising one crappy show they have on they get to advertise all the crappy shows on that night and the following night 🙂

    Fasttracking is critical, top shows are very easily downloaded and fans will resort to downloading them instead of even waiting a week to view it.

  9. It is so frustrating when Ten get good shows, because you just know what will happen. And it always does. Change the night and the timeslot. Repeat. Take it off for a few weeks. And then claim the ratings were bad. Really?!

    The worst thing is, we can’t even legally buy the DVDs for this current season because it’s still airing in the US.

  10. im sooo glad i have finally found out now why supernatural hasnt been on. im sooo disappointed in the channel 10 network, this is my fav show and we waited sooo long for it to return to have it taken again, this is a crock, they need to stop showing old crap movies and bring back supernatural or at least stop shopping all the damn re-runs..they suck. But i am very glad to see someone is looking into this and also glad that there are as many annoyed people as i am. Ta

  11. Thank you, David, we need someone to push Channel Ten with us. Supernatural hasn’t got a hope in Australia while Channel Ten airs it spasmodically, runs it later than it’s allocated timeslot due to the previous show running over time, failsto promote and advertise it, leaves huge gaps mid season so its impossible for new viewers to follow the story, fails to fast track it so most diehard fans have seen it anyway and then drops it without a word. No wonder Supernatural wasn’t gaining more viewers!
    Channel Ten, we are so tired of you blaming the ratings when your shabby promotion and treatment of our show are the real reasons.
    Kripke always asks us to show our loyalty by watching SN as it airs. And we want to. Channel Ten need to step up to the plate and allow us the opportunity to show we are loyal viewers when treated fairly.

  12. ten imo should launch their lesser ranked shows out of their existing highly rated shows, Lie to Me got good viewers with the NCIS lead-in, try Supernatural with White COllar lead-in, that way, White COllar gets The Mentalist as competition.

  13. If 10 aren’t going to show them they should sell them on to 7TWO or GO! Both these channels appear to be pretty good at showing this kind of material at the moment, & without messing with the schedule. I’d far rather watch them in HD anyway. Specially free to air instead of paying for a larger download quota.

  14. wow, brings back memories of Charmed, damn channel ten how could you axe it when it was on its last season, and you have been sticking with it for the last 7 years and you decide to end it on its last season, Shame on Youuu!!

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