Fucking NBC

The story so far:

Studio 60, written by Aaron Sorkin, premieres; does poorly in ratings.

30 Rock, the similarly titled, similarly themed series starring and written by Tina Fey, premieres; does poorly in the ratings.

Studio 60 sinks beneath the waves with nary a trace, to be replaced by The Black Donnellys, which is quickly cancelled.

In a bitter irony, NBC announces plans to replace it with a reality series of the kind which Studio 60 regularly skewered.

30 Rock, however, remains on the air; receives second season order.

You may well be asking yourself, as I was: Whycome?

My first theory was that 30 Rock has a "Godfather" (Lorne Michaels) looking out for it. I also considered the possibility that Studio 60 On The Sunset Strip's highfalutin' attitude (Gilbert and Sullivan? On the second show?) may not have been appreciated by "the suits."

To say nothing of the aforementioned skewering of the kinds of shows that NBC is just praying will get them more shows in the top 20 than Deal Or No Deal.

All of these may have been factors. But the Washington Post's Lisa de Moraes has discerned another...

...season to date, "30 Rock" is averaging 2.7 percent of the country's audience of 18-to-49-year-olds. That's the age bracket advertisers pay a premium to reach and NBC therefore targets with its entertainment series.

"Studio 60" is averaging only 3.6 percent of the audience in that age bracket.

Hmmmmm.

Well, how about this: "30 Rock's" overall audience, season to date, is a solid 5.8 million viewers, NBC says in its announcement.

"Studio 60's" season-to-date overall audience is just 8.5 million.

[Crickets.] Upscale -- "30 Rock" is very upscale. NBC likes upscale. According to NBC, "30 Rock" is one of the most upscale comedies on television. In fact, NBC says, it rates 28 percent higher among adults 18-49 living in homes with $100,000-plus incomes than it rates among all adults 18-49.

"Studio 60"? Well, "Studio 60" rates 28 percent higher among adults 18-49 living in homes with $100,000-plus incomes than it rates among all adults 18-49.

Now that it's become so transparent why one show got picked up but not the other, it's barely worth mentioning that NBC Universal 2.0 owns "30 Rock" but not "Studio 60" -- that's owned by Warner Bros.

Emphasis mine.

Fucking NBC.

As I said last October, I was prepared to be philisophical should S60 in fact be cancelled because not enough Nielsen viewers were watching. Even the best television show is, in the end, just a television show, I said; let's not do this like it was a member of the family who died.

(Although frankly, I'll have more right to complain than those whiny brats who said seven years of Buffy and five of Angel wasn't "a fair chance")

But for Studio 60 to go and 30 Rock to make it because of this kind of favoritism and not simply because more people wanted to watch it...that pisses me off.