NBC FALL 2012: Pick-ups, Cancelleds, and Schedule

Whoa, blogger is different!  Hopefully better...  If not, my apologies.  Geez, how long has it been since I blogged that I didn't know about this till now?  Oh, well.  On with the show.  UPDATE:  Oh my holy hell, it is SO MUCH WORSE!  Just when I thought that wasn't possible!!!  Yeah, that picture above?  Hard as hell to move around without screwing up all your text.  If it moves at all.  Kudos, Blogger.  Way to suck.  Yeah, I'm gonna be looking for a new program to use in the very near future, because if pictures are this hard, embedding videos is going to be a blast...

As per usual with NBC over the past 5-10 years, they have more an insane number of new pilots.  Why, you ask?  Because the network is underwater and they cancel nearly everything they pick up.  Seriously, when a fantasy show in the Friday night death slot is the highlight and biggest success of last season’s pilot ventures, you’re truly, truly in trouble.  Here’s the breakdown of pick-ups and cancelleds (only the scripted shows, naturally).

PICKED-UP FOR NEXT SEASON:  30 Rock (final season), Community (wahoo! 13 episode initial order), Grimm (yay!), Law & Order: SVU, The Office, Parenthood, Parks & Recreation, Smash (will be held till midseason), Up All Night, and Whitney.

CANCELLED:  Are You There Chelsea?, Awake, Bent, Best Friends Forever, Chuck, Free Agents, Harry’s Law, The Playboy Club, Prime Suspect, and The Firm.

Along with the largely unsurprising pick-up and cancellation news, some scheduling changes should be noted.  Biggest change?  Community has been moved to Fridays.  This, in and of itself, wouldn’t be a death sentence (if ever a show could survive on a Friday, it’s a show with a niche audience), and quite frankly, not being up against The Big Bang Theory anymore can only be good news, but that it will now follow Whitney is a big problem.  Whitney’s ratings are bad, and the fans aren’t going to follow it to Friday.  I think Community’s base certainly will, but no casual viewer is going to watching Whitney and then stick around.  It’s a terrible lead-in and Community is going to suffer for it.  Ugh.  Other than that, here’s how things are stacking up.

The entries in ALL CAPS are new shows for fall.  The times are all Eastern Time Zone because I was too lazy to adjust for the time zone I actually live in.

NBC FALL 2012 SCHEDULE

MONDAY
8/7c The Voice
10 pm REVOLUTION

TUESDAY
8 pm The Voice
9 pm GO ON
9:30 pm THE NEW NORMAL
10 pm Parenthood

WEDNESDAY
8 pm ANIMAL PRACTICE
8:30 pm GUYS WITH KIDS
9 pm Law & Order: Special Victims Unit
10 pm CHICAGO FIRE

THURSDAY
8 pm 30 Rock
8:30 pm Up All Night
9 pm The Office
9:30 pm Parks and Recreation
10 pm Rock Center with Brian Williams

FRIDAY
8 pm Whitney
8:30 pm Community
9 pm Grimm
10-11 pm Dateline NBC

SUNDAY (Post-football/Winter 2013)
8 pm Fashion Star
9 pm The Celebrity Apprentice
10 pm DO NO HARM

I’ll be posting clips and trailers of the new shows with my knee-jerk reactions in the coming weeks, but for now, that’s what we’re in for.  Having watched the trailers already, I can tell you that there are some absolute disasters coming down the pike, but also a couple of possible contenders.