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"Jericho" Fans Send Over Nine Tons of Nuts to CBS
nuts-to-CBS writes "After presenting 'Jericho' fans with a cliffhanging season finale, CBS promptly cancelled the program. The shocked fans quickly banded together, many using CBS' own public "Jericho" discussion forum, and began brainstorming on ways to convince the network to bring back the show for a second season. A plot point in the final episode of "Jericho" involving the expletive "Nuts!" (in reference to an historic conversation between generals) was turned into a campaign to send large quantities of nuts to CBS' NY, LA, and affiliate offices. Fans have sent a total of $26,000 for a pooled campaign hosted at Nuts Online to ship over 19,000 pounds of peanuts to CBS.
Other efforts acquired over $9,000 to publish full page advertisements in
Variety (National Edition)
and The Hollywood Reporter for Tuesday, May 29th. This is expected to become the largest ever fan campaign to bring a television show back from cancellation." There's more about the massive fan rollout below.
CBS created rich, interactive content online to accompany their show "Jericho," in order to extend its fan base
to the Internet-savvy, TiVo-owning generations. Despite suffering through the all-too-familiar mid-season
hiatus employed by many shows, the "Jericho" fan base remained strong throughout the break, partially due to the episodes being posted both for free on the CBS site as well as for purchase on iTunes. "Jericho" returned from the hiatus in the same timeslot occupied by "American Idol." CBS — which apparently still
determines programming primarily on Nielsen ratings — decided to drop the show, regardless of the ever-growing
and loyal fan base. Nuts Online includes live blogging from Jeffrey Braverman, the
company's 26-year old CEO. Jeffrey's company has been shipping up to 5,000 pounds of peanuts a day to the CBS New
York headquarters, and has been using their site to describe his experience along the way. Three other fan sites are documenting the progress:
CBS Jericho Message Board,
Jericho Lives, and
Jericho Rally Point. Fans of Roswell were successful in bringing back their favorite program by sending mass quantities of
tiny bottles of Tabasco sauce."
First off, I'm sure that the people at CBS are enjoying the free lifetime supply of tasty peanuts. Hopefully they'll send back a thank-you card. Maybe one of those new Star Wars Hallmark cards. (After all, it's the least they can do.)
That being said, Jericho went off the air because the show took a wrong turn at Albuquerque. When it first started, the premise was intriguing. A post-holocaust world from the perspective of those who have no idea what could possibly be going on. It makes for a great setup. The first few episodes were even fairly good, with the early problems from the detonation wreaking all kinds of havoc. After that? Things went downhill.
Pretty soon the show was focusing more on love triangles than it was on the fact that everyone was just trying to survive. Emergencies were regularly forced into the story rather than the characters having to deal with realistic difficulties. There was so much that they could be exploring, yet the show was being "the O.C. after the bomb". (Or whatever the latest "pop" show is for stupid teenagers. Anyone remember that scene from Stargate-SG1 "200"? Yeah, that.)
As interesting as it had been, I just lost interest in the show. Checking my iTunes library, it looks like I stopped at "The Day Before". 13 episodes watched, and I just couldn't stand it anymore. So is it really any surprise that Jericho got cancelled?
I realize that many fans are begging for a conclusion to the cliffhanger, but that will pass with time. Remember the show Sliders? Remember how it died in the 5th season with both the main characters wiped out, Wade killed off in a twisted experiment, the reason for sliding gone, and a hokey story about a mad scientist stuck its the place? The show lost its purpose, yet the producers ended the season with a massive cliffhanger in hopes that fan outcry would bring the show back. And after watching the final episode, you do get a feeling of, "You can't leave it there!"
But in hindsight, it's best that it stayed off the air. There was about a zero point zero zero chance that the O'Connell brothers were going to return to the show, and the writing had been of poor quality anyway. If the show had returned, we would have gotten another season of the show's slow and agonizing death. Why? It was best that it was put out of its misery.
(Of course, the show "jumped the shark" in the third season with the loss of John Rhys-Davies, but at least the "finding Earth" and "looking for Ma and Pa" subplot was interesting.)
So I'm sorry to say this, but let it die. It was a nice try, but hopefully a better show will take its place.
I'm sorry but the campaign to save the StarTrek Enterprise series for a 5th year was far larger. This quick search garnered a BBC News story showing over 3million US raised and if my memory serves correctly the fans were close to 20 million before being told that there was no way ?paramount? would run another series without an industry backer. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/4312767.s tm
They will be donated to City Harvest, a New York-based program that takes excess food and distributes it to community food programs for the poor, according to Phil Gonzales, a CBS spokesman. Some of the nuts are also on their way to troops in Iraq and Afghanistan through the Staten Island Homefront Project.
...it was "Nuts!" and not "Crap!"
Watered-down - If a show is good, and gets good ratings, TPTB will require more seasons to be produced, than can be reasonably sustained at the same quality of the current story arc.
Word-of-Mouth - If a show is good, but gets so-so ratings in the begining, TPTB will cancel it before word of mouth can have an effect.
Sabotage - If any show is sabotaged by TPTB then there is no saving it. Examples are playing episodes out or order, or postponing the 2-hour premiere that introduces all the characters, to air as the season finale.
...isn't that CBS cancelled the show, but that it's being axed to make room for New Insipid Reality Show #462 and "Ooh! Pirates!"
The "Tiffany Network," eh?
Sam! If you will let me be,
I will try them.
You will see.
Do you really want these people trying to fix government?
Also, whilst tanning, read a fucking book.
Patriotism is a virtue of the vicious
Also, whilst tanning, read a fucking book. On skin cancer.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo.
Get a grip people, we all have lives outside of this TV show. This is so much more than just about a show. I'm terribly sorry that you did not stick around to see how the show progressed. Yes, Hawkins girlfriend was a very stupid plot, but thankfully she is now dead.
A great majority of the contributors to this campaign are business owners/executives. We are mostly comprised of very intelligent people, such as yourselves, which was why I was originally thrilled to learn we had made our mark here.... until I started reading all of this bashing.
Our movement is to speak out against 'the man' for all of this ridiculous programming. Most especially - REALITY TV. How lame can it get? Jericho is being replaced by a show about 40 CHILDREN, UNSUPERVISED, in New Mexico rebuilding a ghost town. My first thought is that these parents should be shot for allowing their children to take part in such a stupid idea. Jericho was only one of two shows that I watched on network TV. Yes, the other is Lost, come on, did you catch that season finale this week??
The next 'serialized' show that CBS will be bringing out mid season is called 'Swingtown'. Not swingsets or swingshifts, mind you, but a show about swingers in the 1970s. OK, the 1970s was known as the sexual revolution but I have a lot of arguments about this craziness. First, the demographics CBS is trying to reach by canceling Jericho - most weren't even born in the '70s yet! I was born in the early 70s and there is no way I could've been involved in any type of sexual revolution at the time! Who cares what a bunch of disco loving freaks were doing? Second, and even more importantly.... What about the FAMILIES who were watching Jericho. Do you really think that parents are going to want to sit there with their children to watch such an inappropriate show? My gawd! I'm in my mid 30s and wouldn't want to watch such a show with my parents!!
Quality TV is dead. Jericho was original, had a good plot and action. Was not sexually explicit, no excessive language, and aside from the obvious, did not have any graphic violence. It was a wonderful family show. These TV execs have got to get a freaking clue. That is what this movement is about.
Yes, I love this show. It was awesome. I could care less about who Jake ends up with... blonde or brunette... And, I am a woman. I want to know who wins the war. I want to know how the town will survive the next year - six months - whatever. I want to know WHO exactly dropped the bomb. I want to know if Jericho and others will be able to defeat this new government with the messed up flag and the man who seems to be the one behind the dropping of the bomb. I want to know who is on the train. I want to know how Hawkins is going to deal with them in a tank with no ammo. Put the blonde and brunette together, that will grab most of you driveling men. Just send Jake back out there to fight and save his town!
This is why we are sending nuts to CBS. And, as was pointed out above, the nuts are going to various charities. To the troops overseas, to the Bronx Zoo, to the homeless shelters. This has been at the request of the fans sending the nuts, as well as the company that is backing the campaign so fervently, www.nutsonline.com
OK, my last point, I promise. Recently we saw the end ratings for the season of the network shows. I don't recall the link, but it was on the Hollywood Reporter website. CBS renewed the stupid sitcom 'How I Met Your Mother' and it performed MUCH WORSE than Jericho. Don't tell me that this is business. This is plain-ass stupid!
Now if a simple girl from Kansas can fight for America's values and try to squash this nightmare of American Idol, why can't you?