Sci-Fi Storm

So the shock should be over now. No surprise that the finale of Lost had the highest ratings for the night and was the highest rated episode in two years – but it may not have been as high as some expected. Perhaps some of the thunder was lost by the finale of Celebrity Apprentice given that Brett Michaels’ medical problems have been big news. But anyways, there is much to talk about, and I’ll start off some discussion points below. Feel free to chime in. But BEWARE – there are spoilers below, so if you haven’t watched yet, what are you waiting for?!? Come back later…
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Just in: as expected, Chuck and V have been renewed, with the expectation of 13-week orders each for now. Flash Forward, however, appears to be not so lucky.

Update: Heroes has also been canceled, although there may be some sort of conclusion later on.

The ratings for V improved 14% this week with the strong lead-in from Lost, perhaps lifting it from the renewal bubble that a lot of shows are hanging around – including its sibling Flash Forward. So perhaps one of ABC’s serialized SF shows can survive to fill the Lost void?

If you were hoping for another flash, think again…ratings for Flash Forward dropped 19% this past week to 4.7 million viewers, and could signal the end of this show when the season concludes.

The finale for Lost on May 23rd was already clocking in at two hours, but ABC has now added another 30 minutes after the episode completed post-production. The show will now run from 9:00-11:30pm ET, and push back local news and the “Aloha to Lost” Jimmy Kimmel special.

I haven’t watched it yet as I was out trying to prevent Lake New England from encroaching further into my house, but I’ve seen from friends on Facebook that many Lost fans were not happy that ABC kept putting up a big red “V” and a countdown clock during the show, blocking some key information. It also didn’t help that the Boston affiliate ran a crawler about the weather situation, blocking the English translations…but even producer Damon Lindelof wasn’t happy. Update: Stephen Colbert had a funny take on it…see below.
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ABC.com, which already offers all the episodes of Lost, but now Season 6 episodes will include full guest commentary, starting with Daniel Roebuck (Leslie Arzt). Read on for the details.
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Co-creator David Goyer is stepping down as showrunner of FlashForward to concentrate on feature films and directing. He will remain involved in the show, however. No successor has been named yet, even though the series is in mid-production.

At least they are coming back, for now…ABC has announced that Flash Forward will return on March 4th, and V will return on March 30th. Flash Forward will avoid the Winter Olympics completely, and then it is planned to run it straight without repeats.

Perhaps its a bit of bad timing, but these things never bode well, no matter what the networks say – ABC announced that Flash Forward production has been halted for a week that has supposedly been “built in to the show’s schedule,” according to a network representative. But if that was the case, why announce it? Especially since it just had its lowest ratings yet and the co-showrunner exec left?