Jericho: Cultural Learnings

Myles at Cultural Learnings has a post today on 10 shows to watch in 2008. You guessed it; today is Jericho.

The post is very well done and Myles didn't start out as a big Jericho fan.

"And they might have found their entrance into the minds of television viewers, as the Writers’ Strike has allowed Jericho to be emerging at a time when CBS will have little else on their schedule. By the time February 12th rolls around, CBS will be dipping into their corporate sibling Showtime for content, and a majority of their original programming will be gone. As a result, Jericho will be better able to capture the attention of the viewers it so desperately needs to survive.

However, I don’t think this is a story about survival or desperation - even if the series debuts to disappointing ratings, it won’t be enough to take away the real impact of this story. Whether the new episodes of Jericho garner ten million viewers or ten thousand, its return will signal a new era for television. In the creation of social networking sites like Hey! Nielsen, or in future campaigns and correspondence when a series is canceled, there is a new respect forming between the people who make television and the people that watch it.

But this obviously doesn’t extent to the networks, or the producers - the continuing Writer’s Strike is the reason for the (Hopefully) in the title of this event. Jericho fans, like so many others, have made it clear that it is not the studio heads who they thank for Jericho’s return - it is the people who created the show, the writers who made it possible and the people who brought the series to life. While we will all enjoy Jericho’s return in February, I also hope that it shall coincide with an end to this strike. Because, if not? Nuts to you, Producers."