Might CBS still save Jericho?
- April
- 7
According to the New York Times, CBS Paramount has “held talks” with cable provider Comcast regarding Jericho.
This is along the lines of the deal that NBC announced last week that it had struck with DirecTV to keep Friday Night Lights on the air for at least one more season. The satellite television provider will subsidize the production costs and in exchange will get the right to air it first.
Here’s how FNL got saved:
From NBC’s perspective, “Friday Night Lights” did not draw enough of a crowd to be continued. On average, about 6.1 million people tuned in to it this season, but fans were loyal enough to send thousands of mini-footballs to NBC to lobby for the show.NBC knew it needed a partner, and an opportunity arose in January when Eric Shanks, the executive vice president for entertainment at DirecTV, struck up a conversation with his friend Ben Silverman, the co-chairman of NBC Entertainment. DirecTV licensed the rights to the “first window” of the show, meaning that DirecTV subscribers will see the new episodes four months before the broadcast audience.
Of course, I’d hate it if I had to wait four months to see new episodes, but I’m thinking DirecTV would wager it’ll get some new subscribers this way.
The difference with Comcast is that it’s a cable provider, and you still can’t choose your cable company in most areas. Where I live, it’s Cablevision. When I was in Arizona, it was Cox. I’ve actually never lived anywhere served by Comcast (except maybe in my poor college days when I didn’t subscribe because I couldn’t afford it, but I don’t even know what cable companies served Chicagoland or Louisville).
But that’d still be better than nothing, eh?


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