Memo to the ABC (by way of the Walt Disney Company)

Have you guys learned NOTHING from Jeffery Katzenberg's departure from the animation division of Disney all those years ago? This week ABC once again took its most interesting and original shows and sent them into oblivian. The most recent casualities making the trip to the broadcast TV graveyard - Eli Stone, Dirty Sexy Money and Pushing Daisies.

I have written my opinions on the former two and my particular fondness for Eli Stone. While not a fan of Daisies, I did appreciate it's high concept and execution. All debuted in the torpedoed season of the writer's strike and all had strong enough content to warrant a pass for the season when up against creatively anorexic likes of Private Practice and Wife Swap (both of which remain on and without reason). I wish this was an anomoly, but for ABC it is not. ABC has a torrid history of yanking shows or exiling them to die in rotating timeslots. If they are not a hit out of the gate (think Desperate Housewives) there is no hope for a stay of execution. ABC simply retreats to far less quality entertainment. In the dying format that is broadcast television, you'd think there would be the luxury of patience in seeking out good shows and nuturing them. Lets think, that seemed to work as a formula for Cheers, Seinfeld, Law and Order and Hill Street Blues, but I digress. Figuring out how to use other mediums like the internet to enhance interest seems a logical start. It's worked for LOST. But in a season that has produced no hits from the freshman class and with a derth of any kind of consistent scripted television ABC choses to hatchet shows that deserved better and attempt to mine fields where they had previous success. Just what I need three nights filled with Wife Swap and The Bachelor.

So gone are these three wonderfully flawed but intriguing shows. The only solace is that they stand in good company with the likes of Sports Night, The Nine, Eyes, Cupid and many others I won't go on to list. I have said it before on this blog and I say it again. The likes of Brandon Tartikoff are missed more and more with each passing day as broadcast television writes itself into the oblivian it has sent many of its best shows.