Of all the places in the world to produce TV shows, the USA is the most notable for sheer quantity alone. For sheer quantity viewer-wise, one of the most popular shows in American history has been soap opera Dallas.
In the UK, the channel generally considered the ‘laughing stock’ of the main 5 channels is freshly Viacom-owned station Channel 5, and while the status may change under new stewardship, for the timebeing gets the lowest ratings of the UK’s traditional free-to-air terrestrial channels. Though their decision to host Dallas episodes is still a good one for American broadcasters TNT, the fact that Channel 5 are now moving the show’s timeslot may not be well received with the cable giants.
After airing just three episodes of the revived drama’s third season, the British channel have decided that Dallas isn’t working out in its present Thursday night 10pm timeslot, and are moving it to 12am Wednesday mornings as of this week, citing low viewers but relatively high DVR viewing as the reason the change can be afforded.
A Channel 5 statement on the move read: “Channel 5 is the home of some of the hottest drama straight from the US. Sadly Dallas hasn’t been performing as we’d hoped, with all evidence showing the audience preferring to record the series rather than watch it live. As a result we’ve moved the show to a late-night slot so that people can record the series and watch it at a time convenient to them.”
To rub salt into the wounds for the show, Channel 5 have announced that the first programme to take Dallas‘ place in the schedules will be a repeated documentary called My Violent Child, broadcasting on Thursday 25 September. Unless Channel 5 viewers remain taken to watching Dallas on-demand, will Dallas themselves get violent with the news that they can no longer proudly proclaim ‘Thursday nights, Channel 5′, or is their proud franchise‘s revival starting to extinguish?