The LA Times did a hit piece on Ben Lyons today... Saturday... two days after Christmas... pretty much a burial...
But what really struck me about the mostly cut-n-paste story was that there was not a single full-time critic quoted. Stu van Arsdale came closest to making the point that is basically missed by the existance of a piece like this...
Who Fucking Cares?
While it is, indeed, something to have a syndicated platform, powered by Disney O&Os, after four months of this embarrassing Disney experiment - though not close to being as embarrassing as Ebert's exit was mishandled - there has been ZERO impact by either host or the thumbless show. If Disney took the show out of prime slots in LA, NY, and Chicago, the ratings would be comedically low (as they are for the pater Lyons' show) and Disney would be "no commenting" instead of defending a show that was hamstrung not only by hack hosts, but by a lack of a philosophy behind the show or the meager prduction budget needed to have behind-the-scenes talent to drive the machine.
I intensely disagree that there is not a syndication movie review show that can work. Really, that is a stupid argument made only by people who don't understand television. The big mistake by Disney was thinkng that youth and cable celebrity was a way to draw. Dumb. If that were true, E! would not have programmed itself into a whorehouse and still be getting soft ratings and you'd all be talking about G4.
The shame is that opportunities like this - and Roeper... and Shoot Out, which never figured out how to turn so many good elements into the fun show it always wanted to be - poison the well for "the next show.". Not only is there a flop, but this will be a flop that signals that such a show should never be tried again. Maltin's show failed. Lyons Sr and Bailes will be on the deathwatch as soon as NBC has a few months post-At The Movies to see no ratings increase, Shootout is out at AMC. And while I love Elvis Costello and much of the Sundance Channel programming, they are signalling for TV what we see on fashion mags on the racks every day... why just have someone who can deliver when you can have a celebrity deliver with some built-in awareness?
Regardless... Lyons and Mank3 will be gone and forgotten soon enough... like Dixie Whatley and Bill whateverhisnamewas and so many others. Even Roeper, who like him or not had years sitting right there with Roger, was unable, with the support of Roger and other backstagers from the old show, was unable to get a show started that would have had the thumbs and all. No one wants that show. No one wants this show (but Disney wants to role the dice to try to hold valuable syndication slots). If it were a lame animal, we'd shoot it in the head.
But do we really need another column inch used to watch it shoot itself in the foot?
I don't.
(via iPhone... from Atlanta)
Read the complete post at http://www.mcnblogs.com/thehotblog/archives/2008/12/why_ly.html