There's public outcry among soap fans over the recent cancellations of One Life to Live and All My Children. Some see these latest in a string of closures as a last gasp for a genre that had long been out of sync with the culture as a whole. But on the popular site, We Love Soaps, Kevin Mulcahy, Jr. makes a convincing argument that that premise is built on smoke and mirrors and that in fact this recent public outry is indicative of something else: a fundamental disconnect between the power suits in the halls of network television and the people who watch TV all across this country during the day.
Here's a quote from Mulcahy's piece, This is America. Why is our Television Trending Fascist:
From the beginning, the argument that there weren't enough viewers to be profitable didn't pass the smell test. After massive community outcry and mobilization, it's just plain as day that there is, in fact, an audience out there. A passionate, educated, diverse, and very loyal audience. Is it possible that Corporate missed this? If so, it might be because they glanced at the broadcast Nielsens and called it a day.
But this is 2011—people watch continuing dramas on the Internet, they record them, they share them on their smart phones, in their dorms, at their parents' or friends' homes... they have ALL MY CHILDREN playing at my barbershop, for goodness sake. My barbershop is not a Nielsen family! If executives in their ivory towers are making rash decisions based on faulty intel, your treasured TV show may be the next to go. Buy what's even more frustrating is that I get the sense it might be possible they're just not all that interested in the numbers—the facts--to begin with. It’s not supposed to work that way.
If there really is a groundswell of support for these shows, maybe someone will step up and create a new home for the genre. A safe network, independent of the corporate cross-collateralizing balance sheet. What do you think? Is such a thing possible? Could it be economically viable?
Read the full post here.
