We’re about a month into the new fall TV lineup, and while there are some shows that have not yet premiered, there looks to be a clear standout in the bunch with NBC’s naked-tattooed lady drama, aka Blindspot. Over the past three weeks, the series has maintained a top spot with an average viewership of about 9.6 million each week.
Starring Jamie Alexander as Jane Doe, the story follows a mysterious woman with no memory of her past. Her tattooed body leads to the discovery of her identity while also unraveling a complex mystery in the process. According to Deadline, these stats have led to the achievement of Blindspot being the first freshman series to get picked up for nine more episodes, which will bring the season to a full 22 episodes.
This goes down as another win for Greg Berlanti and puts NBC in pretty great shape thus far, but the same can’t be said about Fox…
The network’s Minority Report series premiered to less than stellar numbers and reviews. Just a few weeks into the show’s freshman season, Fox has decided it’s already time to trim down their initial order of 13 episodes to only 10. This isn’t a good sign for the TV reboot of the 2002 movie, but also shouldn’t be a surprise. The premiere, according to the Hollywood Reporter, only brought in 3.1 million viewers and by episode three, has dropped to about 2 million.
The formula of networks banking on a familiar IP, as Fox did with Minority Report and CBS with Limitless, is something that has shown to pay off for everyone involved, for the most part. Network CEO Gary Newman (not the ’80s new-wave musician) explained this stance by saying, “I think having familiar IP is an advantage, and yet you’re held to the same standards as with everything else you do. Even if none of those shows ends up working, you won’t see us shy away from rebooting what we think is great IP.”
This trend is definitely not going to slow down anytime soon as small-screen adaptations of Uncle Buck and Rush Hour will premiere in the coming months while projects based on Taken, In The Line of Fire, Lethal Weapon, Training Day and more are in development.
As for Minority Report, Fox is sticking to keeping the fledgling sci-fi drama in its Monday night time slot. At least, for now.
