HollywoodIdiocy.com

In a season with so little original program, it’s a wonder so many shows are rumored to be on the bubble right now. Some of those currently balancing between cancellation and renewal are silly shows to think of cancelling, while others seem long overdue and you’d need a magnifying glasses to see how they’ve lasted as long as they have.

Here’s the lowdown on the “bubble shows.”

CBS’ How I Met Your Mother: Though consistently winning its time slot demographically against stiff competition like NBC’s American Gladiators and Chuck, as well as Fox’ Prison Break and Sarah Conner Chronicles, this is a show ABC should be talking to about a multiseason renewal, not possible cancellation. But it’s produced by Fox, so it’s not their own money on the line. This is one bubble show that must not die.

CBS’ Moonlight: Although it does not involve Joss Whedon or David Greenwalt, the vampire drama has carved out an interesting niche all its own and deserves a full-season renewal.

ABC’s Women’s Murder Club: The James Patterson-based crime drama has a good pedigree and was stirring up some competition against CBS’ Friday night lineup; again, this one should get the “quality television” renewal.

Fox’s Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles: A strong reboot of the Terminator franchise, the show has been tossed about the network schedule in the wake of the writers strike, never really given a chance to shine. It deserves another shot.

The rest are shows I don’t care for myself and won’t feel strongly one way or another if they bow after this season: NBC’s Friday Night Lights, CW’s Aliens In America, ABC’s Carpoolers, ABC’s Men In Trees, ABC’s October Road, CBS’s Cane, Shark and The Unit.

Bye and good riddance to all, if you ask me. I just hope The CW keeps Reaper around for a full-season run.

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It may need to be heavily edited for broadcast TV, but one of Showtime’s most critically-acclaimed shows may provide the Eye network with some “fresh” programming in the strike-shortened season that’s headed our way after the first of the year. CBS is considering airing the first two seasons of Showtime’s Dexter, which will expose the cleverly-written show to a broader audience that doesn’t necessarily subscribe to Showtime.

The drama, headlined by Michael C. Hall, focuses on the saga of a serial killer who works as a police CSI blood-splatter specialist by day, and preys on other serial killers by night. The first season of Dexter garnered rave reviews and the soon-to-be-completed second season has overachieved in the eyes of critics who expected a sophomore slump form the witty drama, based on the 2004 Jeffrey Lindsay novel, Darkly Dreaming Dexter. Two more novels have followed, 2005’s Dearly Devoted Dexter and 2007’s Dexter In the Dark. If the show performs well on CBS, it could be a money making move that results in diamond pendants for everyone; if it falters, it could show that viewers have little tolerance for shows that have already appeared on other networks being repurposed for broadcast network airings. Time will tell.

While the Showtime drama features a fair amount of nudity and a heavy dose of profanity compared to traditional network fare, the important aspect in picking up the show for network rebroadcast, from CBS’s point of view, is that there are 24 completed episodes completed that, so far, only Showtime subscribers - and those who bought the Season One DVDs - have seen before now.

In other news, freshman sitcom The Big Bang Theory and freshman vampire drama Moonlight have both received second-season orders from the Eye network; The Big Bang Theory is a Chuck Lorre Productions show that did well in the eight episodes completed prior to the strike; Moonlight has about 12 to 14 episodes in the can, with roughly 10 episodes aired so far. It is unclear whether the second-season orders will consist of 22 new episodes plus the uncompleted episodes from the first season, or if the uncompleted first season episodes and scrapped and storylines planned for the first season will be moved into the second-season order, once the WGA writers strike is ultimately resolved.

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