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One Critic's List of Must-Renew Shows (And Kill the Pop-ups)
March 8, 2016  | By David Hinckley  | 10 comments
 

Since we’ve hit the time of year when TV networks are well into deciding what will live or die, I thought I might throw out a couple of personal requests.

Can ABC please renew American Crime, despite its lousy ratings?

Can PBS renew Mercy Street, (left) even though it’s expensive and hasn’t completely caught fire?

Can NBC retain The Mysteries of Laura, if only for its dietary defiance?

Will the CW please keep iZombie alive (top), because it’s just plain fun?

And on the flipside, could all networks everywhere please, please, please kill pop-ups?

Anyone who has watched television for more than five minutes, lifetime total, has seen pop-ups. They flash onto the screen, usually on the bottom, for maybe three to five seconds, promoting another show or teasing to the program after this one.

Networks clearly consider pop-ups a good way to remind viewers what else they can watch. I suspect that in many cases, networks also see them as minimally invasive.

Instead of watching a 30-second full-screen tease to Scandal, the viewer just gets the brief reminder in the middle of Castle that this Thursday’s Scandal will be “All-New!”

It sounds harmless, a relatively quiet bit of promotion in a very noisy television universe.

It is neither. It’s annoying. Really annoying.

What viewer of last weekend’s Oscar awards show wanted to see these unexpected images flashing on the bottom of the screen? And then realize they had nothing to do with the Oscars, but were encouraging you to watch some other show later?

It’s not that watching TV shows is like performing open-heart surgery, where you need to focus on the primary task every second. Most television watching lends itself to multitasking: a bit of conversation, something to eat, check the phone for texts.

But all those distractions are the viewer’s choice. Pop-ups aren’t, and noticing them is not optional. It’s like a kid on a bicycle at the perimeter of your vision while you’re driving. You’re going to look and see what’s there.

Only with the kid, it’s a safety issue. With pop-ups, you’ve been distracted for nothing. You’re not watching The Blacklist to have someone figuratively shout from the corner of the room that Shades of Blue is on next.

Nor, by the way, are the broadcast networks the felony offenders here. That distinction goes to cable networks.

My wife used to watch movies on Oxygen, like Pride and Prejudice. She stopped, because while Elizabeth Bennett was walking across the foggy morning fields, bam, the bottom third of the screen would become an animated promotion for The Bad Girls Club.

Now there’s an audience for The Bad Girls Club. My wife knows that and doesn’t mind if other Oxygen viewers want to watch it. She doesn’t. She especially doesn’t in the middle of a show she does want to watch.

So she stopped watching movies on Oxygen, and I would be surprised if she’s the only one. When a pop-up feels like an assault, it’s time to leave the battlefield.

Maybe Oxygen has research saying that people who watch Pride and Prejudice also want to know who’s cursing out whom on The Bad Girls Club. My guess is that in most cases those are two different viewerships, and that the P&P crowd doesn’t want to see modern-day TV girlfights any more than the Bad Girls Club crowd would want to watch Mr. Bingley courting Jane Bennett.

I know this is an age when TV networks want to maximize simultaneous screen information, and it can be valuable. When ESPN runs crawls of updated scores, or CNBC runs crawls of stock data, that’s useful information to most of the audience. A judicious “Coming up on the 11 o’clock news” crawl at 10:47 is fine.

But most pop-ups, sorry, just get in the way.

 
 
 
 
 
 
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10 Comments
 
 
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Kay
The networks are driving viewers to Netflix and other streaming services. The popup ads with the dancing or moving people are especially intrusive. Why watch a program covered with crap when you can wait a few months and enjoy it with nothing over the top of it?

I agree that loud music with a singer over actors speaking makes me stop watching a program simply because I can not understand the actors and it diminishes my enjoyment. There is so much good TV out there and so many ways to watch it. I don't want to put up with shoddy production or popup ads. And I don't.
Mar 9, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
Kevin
Agreed. Pop ups are annoying. The needless background song with a high-pitched (male or female) singer is annoying, too. Can't hear the actors speaking their lines. Stopped watching Grey's Anatomy in season 1 because of the annoying and unnecessary songs in the background while the actors spoke.

Keep Agent Carter, Orphan Black, Halt & Catch Fire, Supergirl, and IZombie. Even though I'm out of these shows' demographics, I enjoy them. Good to see emotionally and physically strong and smart female characters. The ladies of TWD fit this category, too: Carol, Michonne, Maggie, Rosita, Tara, Sasha, & Deanna. Enjoyed Kerry Bishe & Mackenzie Davis as the leads in H&CF's 2nd season..................
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
I have several "favorite TV shows and some of them are on CBS. The problem with CBS shows is that most of their dramas have such loud background "music" (if you can consider loud, overpowering noise when you're trying to listen to an actor or actress speak) that one can't hear the actresses/actors when they speak. Several CBS shows I have "tuned out" because of the background noise and I refuse to even try to listen to those CBS shows.
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
Charles
Truth, and I hope this gets wide circulation. Pop-ups are the type of antics that will drive me to just catch up on series when they hit Netflix or Amazon. Agree with you completely: totally annoying.
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
zeke
Is there a saturation point for marketing? We've accepted renaming stadiums, highways, and more... but it seems they have just trained us to ignore all by overkill!
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
Jerome Kastrul
Thank you for your comments. Pop-ups are very annoying.
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
Gerald Nielsen
Idiocracy is coming true. Surprisingly, PBS blocked about 1/4 of the screen for part of the Downtown Abbey final with a pop-up. Also, why do so many TV sources put one or two ID labels onscreen constantly? These are particularly egregious when the show is often a dark image and the label glares at the viewer.
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
Mac
Closed captioning is a trade off solution. Most captioning is shown on the bottom of the screen,obliterating anything in its path. The problem arises in live news and sports broadcasts when some really useful information(names of the talking heads,on base percentages,etc.) is hidden. In this house,CC is a necessity,though those animated popups can be seen for a bit and,yes,are quite annoying. Like a computer popup,I'm more inclined to stay away from whatever is being flacked,even if it's for a free $500 bill fallen out of Donald Trump's pants(ugh!). When watching WE for Law & Order,stay away from anything broadcast Thursday nights-those lame reality shows(sorry for the redundancy).
Mar 8, 2016   |  Reply
 
 
 
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