Last season, the writers' strike led to the shutdown of all of our favorite scripted television shows, forcing many of them to wrap up their seasons with less than 22 episodes. A few shows bounced back from the strike and went on to ratings gold, but others have found their numbers plummeting since the new season began. Viewers are a fickle bunch, and if a show disappears for too long it's likely many people will forget about it and move on.
The CW has struggled to court viewers since its inception, and their latest plan ensures that fickle audience members won't have time to forget their shows. According to
Entertainment Weekly's Michael Ausiello, the network has ordered additional episodes of
Gossip Girl,
One Tree Hill and
90210, allowing each series to have an extra long season.
The CW has ordered three additional episodes of
Gossip Girl, bringing its total to 25 for the season, and two of both
One Tree Hill and
90210, extending each to 24 episodes. This decision is obviously driven by business needs and not creative desires, so let's hope the writers of these series can create compelling story lines to fill a few more episodes. I can barely watch an hour of the slow-moving
90210 as it is, so I'm not sure two more installments are necessary in that case.
This is great news for fans of the CW's teen soaps, but where's the love for
Smallville and
Supernatural? The action-oriented pairing brings in some of the network's highest ratings, and fans would be ecstatic if a few more episodes were tacked on to their current seasons. My guess is that both of these shows cost more to produce than any of the soaps mentioned above, and it's also possible the writers would have a tougher time coming up with additional plot lines. Both
Smallville and
Supernatural seem to be barreling toward mind-blowing finales, so extra episodes might hurt the momentum.
Proving that they have faith in their current programming crop, the CW also ordered two more scripts of their freshman comedy
Privileged. The series still hasn't been picked up for a full season, but with the network's current obsession with additional episodes it could be inevitable.
- Don Williams, BuddyTV Staff Writer
Source: Entertainment Weekly
(Image courtesy of the CW)