This Season’s TV: Reassessing Our 2014-2015 Predictions

Part of what makes television’s upfront season so exciting is its unpredictability. Although there’s a certain charm in a network doing what it needs to do in order to turn around a bad season, there’s nothing like the excitement that comes from a bubble show pulling out a last second renewal, a seemingly certain renewal slipping down the ranks, or a scheduling move that not even the most ardent of television fan would’ve predicted.

As much as KSiteTV Editor-in-Chief Craig Byrne and ScreenFad Contributing Editor (and KSiteTV Staff Writer/Resident Teen Drama Enthusiast) Shilo Adams love to be right, they love watching things blow up even more. Unfortunately, that enjoyment comes at the hands of the yearly prediction articles, meaning that months of watching the TV rumor mill work and reading the ratings tea leaves essentially go up in smoke. This article in particular serves to recap certain predictions and determine whether your favorite amateur schedulers were correct in what they thought would happen this season.

For reference, here’s the article recapping the predictions for 2013-2014, while you can check out predicted 2015-2016 schedules for NBC, FOX, ABC, CBS, and The CW.

SUNDAY

SHILO: Probably the biggest surprise from our Sunday predictions was how much Resurrection bombed in season two. I thought that a favorable situation could offset the steady drops it faced in season one, but it turns out that summer hiatus just gave people the excuse to drop the show altogether. It was pretty much DOA from the moment season two premiered and arguably, it helped drag Revenge into the cancellation abyss with it. It did show, though, that ABC can still have a big drama launch late in the season; said launch just has to be with the right show.

However, I was right that Mulaney wouldn’t end up doing much. As I mentioned in our Six Questions column, I think John Mulaney could easily have a FOX comedy one day, as his voice is one that gels fairly well with their current comedy identity. But Mulaney was not it and faced almost immediate, almost unanimous rejection from viewers and critics alike, be it due to its format clashing with the rest of the night, the acrid pre-air buzz keeping people from sampling, etc. I will say, though, that FOX allowing the show to play out its episode order, even at 7:30, was something I didn’t expect after the show stumbled out of the gates. I assumed that Bordertown would be called upon sooner rather than later, but something forced the network to push it into this season, the same thing that might have given Mulaney a stay of execution.

Considering the rumor that CSI might be back for the definitive final season neither of its spin-offs got, it looks like you were correct in thinking that CBS wasn’t quite done with the mothership. It seemed like the show was put out to pasture on Sundays, but with the underperformance of CSI: Cyber, the show’s importance to CBS’ identity, and CBS being willing to use the Survivor hiatus to air another drama, we might not have seen the last of CSI, so good job on that.

CRAIG: I do think CSI underwhelmed on Sundays, so I’m very curious to see if CBS does give it a decent send-off.

You described Madam Secretary’s timeslot as “weird,” but it actually did pretty well, and it stayed in its time slot for the entire 2014-2015 season, which is something you said would be “more than likely.” I said that the infusion of Frozen characters wouldn’t do much for Once Upon A Time, but it actually did help the ratings a bit. Brooklyn Nine-Nine seemed to do all right on Sunday nights, though FOX’s scheduling on the night in general was weird – new Simpsons on weeks with no new Family Guys, double-pumping The Last Man on Earth some weeks but not others, etc. I believe they even moved Family Guy to 8:30 a couple of times. Hopefully next season will have more consistency for FOX.