NBC hasn't been able to celebrate much this season, but it's trying its best to make the most of a grim fall 2011 development season -- the highlight of which, ironically, appears to be Grimm. The network is touting the new drama series, which premiered two weeks ago, as "Friday's #1 New Show." Well, maybe. Sort of...
First of all, that's a fairly meager achievement anyway. On Fridays this fall, almost all the series on the network schedules are returning shows. The only other "New" show, in fact, is A Gifted Man on CBS, which airs at 8 p.m. ET. Grimm, on NBC, is televised at 9 ET.
So merely by showing up, Grimm is destined to win either the gold or the silver. It reminds me a bit of those late-night TV ads, a few decades ago, that touted Zamfir as "the world's #1 pan flutist." I wondered then, and still wonder now: Who's #2?
But in the case of A Gifted Man vs. Grimm, the championship belt is far from uncontested.
Last week, in its second telecast, Grimm drew an estimated 5.9 million viewers (down from its premiere tally, the week before, of 6.5 million). The same night, on CBS, A Gifted Man drew 8.39 million -- almost 2.5 million more viewers than Grimm.
So how, other than in a land of make believe, can NBC claim that Grimm is "Friday's No. 1 Show"? Because in the 18-49 demo, Grimm claims 1.8 million viewers. A Gifted Man, over on the more advanced-age CBS network, claims only 1.2 million.
So Grimm, in two outings, has beaten the only other new series in the field on Friday night -- according to one specific measure, at least.
But wait, as they say on TV -- that's not all!
Grimm also has the critics behind it. Well, kinda. Once again, victory can be claimed only when looking at things with a very narrow focus.
The current on-air NBC promo for Grimm, after celebrating its #1 status, quote from some of its "rave" reviews. The first few come from actual print and online publications, whose praise is, as quoted, highly qualified. The Hollywood Reporter, for example, is quoted, in full, as describing Grimm as "scares and thrills."
That's it. In context, the review credited the show as having "a lot of scares and thrills," so the pull-out quote isn't misleading. But it's not as exuberant, say, as the other quotes in the NBC promo -- but look who, and where, they comes from.
Twitter feeds.
"Perfect blend of suspense, comedy & horror," says @!Lovelacewigs -- which is nice. It's also nonexistent, according to Twitter. The closest to that account is @lovelacewig, a business that makes wigs in Houston, TX.
Not exactly what I'd consider the Pauline Kael of TV advice. But if you need more rave reviews, NBC supplies them: other Twitter posts, from @ayden2408 and @Horngate -- the latter of whom sums up Grimm in "One word Fantastic!"
Thanks, Horngate. I'll take that under advisement.
I can sum up NBC's promo campaign for Grimm in one word, also.
"Unbelievable!"
And I mean that literally...