Poll on Arthur

Even though I've never met Arthur and I'm sure he's a perfectly nice man, how could I vote for anything *but* crotchety old fart in that poll? Legendary is winning in a landslide, so no harm done. Great work on the polls, Age. They crack me up.

Have there even been 6674 visits today?

That's what makes Arthur a legend.

Are you insinuating that the poll has been rigged?!?!

What is this world coming to?!?!?!

Props to Grady for being damn funny. The inflection with which he referred to Arthur as the "legendary Arthur Mintz" in yesterday's broadcast had me on the floor.

"Dan's got 148 votes, and Casey's got 378,946..."

How about an "All of the above" response for the poll?

I don't think so. 6810votes/34262 total visits. You can only vote once, and as we all know, the same people visit this site several times a day. Even if every vote was cast by different users, 34262total visits/6846total votes, equals an average of 5 visits per user. I know most people vist here at least that many times per day, let alone, ever. I think it is funny.

Tom Lento wrote:

Are you insinuating that the poll has been rigged?!?!

Gee, ya think so?

Five points for the "SportsNight" reference, JTW.

Beeeej

Such a great show. Can't figure out why nobody watched it.

Could be because the idiots aired it after "Dharma and Greg."

Beeeej

Not sure what that has to do with anything..?

A TV show's ratings depend heavily on capturing a significant portion of the audience from the show that airs before it. "Dharma and Greg"'s audience was not, demographically speaking, likely to be receptive to "SportsNight."

Beeeej

OK, see your point. The other problem is, it was marketed as a sitcom, which it really wasn't.

And the laugh track?

Well, half-hour shows can rarely be classified as dramas on network TV. But you're right--SportsNight was comedy, just not a sitcom. I think it just wasn't ready for network TV, or rather, network TV wasn't ready for SportsNight.

For the curious among you (and there are some very curious among you), actual voting is:

Legendary PA announcer: 85
PA announcer: 31
Crotchety Old Fart: 18

What ever happened to Barlow Ware? He was a legend long before the nasaly Arturo took over. And then there was Bob Julian who subbed for Barlow.

On an entertaining sidenote, Sports Night didn't have a laugh track originally, that was added when it moved to Comedy Central (or so my little brain remembers it). I still feel it was the best never-watched show in history (Sheep in the Big City was a close, hilarious second.)

Sports Night didn't have a laugh track originally, that was added when it moved to Comedy Central

I'm positive you're wrong. ABC execs allegedly ordered the laugh track put in. That was one of the many things that peeved Sports Night (and West Wing) creator Aaron Sorkin off with the network. Eventually, Sorkin won the battle...notice that only early episodes have the laugh track. The 2nd season has none. Comedy Central did nothing to the show but shift the commercial breaks to illogical places.

Just do a google search of "sports night sorkin laugh track" and a bunch of pages come up. Here's a good one: [tv.zap2it.com]

Eventually, some dunderheads at ABC failed to promote one of the best shows to come along in a while, and its death came much too early.

Rich Hovorka '96 wrote:

Comedy Central did nothing to the show but shift the commercial breaks to illogical places.

I thought I was the only one who noticed that.

But that's a time-honored comedy central tradition, isn't it? Cut to commercial mid-scene for no apparent reason, then fail to put a commercial in at the original break point.

Even so, I love comedy central, although I wish they'd kept the rights to MST3K.

Does anyone air MST3K right now? I haven't seen it in a couple of years, come to think of it.

Sci-Fi airs MST3k but only the crappy post-Trace ones from after it moved off Comedy Central.

I was out of the country for the entire run of Sports Night, and only discovered it in reruns on Comedy Central. The fact that it failed while drivel like Survivor amd Millionaire thrived makes me weep for the state of American television. Then I remember that West Wing is phenomenally successful, and hope is reborn.

West Wing, Law & Order, and the Sopranos.

Of course, after having boosted that line from Salon, I'd add that 6 ft under belongs up there too.

Now if I could just get TiVO to stop recording gardening shows.....

Calling "Sheep in the Big City" unwatchable gives that awful cartoon far too much credit.

I'm glad I read your second line before rushing down the page to write my reply. If I didn't have friends with HBO who are happy to have me over every Sunday night, I'd subscribe to HBO just for 6'U.

Beeeej

Before I read John's or Beeeej's message, I I was going to say that the one (and only) good thing to come out of SportsNight's cancellation was Peter Krause being free to be on HBO's Six Feet Under.

And after reading their posts..... well, I said it anyway. It's that good a show.

Yeah... I'm still waiting for Sabrina Lloyd's star-vehicle TV series.

Beeeej

Well, you could view her availability for SN as a good thing coming out of her leaving "Sliders".

Of course, the downside to that is that Sliders jumped the shark when she left.

Piffle! Nothing can touch The Simpsons!