Is Bionic Woman Strong Enough to Survive the Writer’s Strike?
The writer’s strike can’t be good for Hollywood executives. After all, show business is just that, a business, and lost profits are never the way to shareholder’s hearts. Unfortunately, greed and incompetence prevent studio executives from realizing that without paying talented writers, there are no scripts to be filmed and put on the air. As a result, can BW survive a long drawn out strike?
Via superheroflix:
We all knew that the WGA strike could be trouble for most of our favorite shows, and we now are having it confirmed. According to an article in The Vancouver Sun which details the economic impact the Writer’s Strike will have on the economy of Vancouver, The Bionic Woman is one of the shows which could be shut down if the strike is not resolved quickly:
Bruce Scott, secretary treasurer of the Teamsters Local 155 whose members work in the film and television industry, said between five and six U.S. television shows are going to run out of scripts starting anywhere from the middle of the month to next January. He named The Bionic Woman, Reaper and Men in Trees as three of them.
Tracey Wood, director of industrial and external relations for the B.C. branch of the Canadian Film and Television Production Association, said the television series The Bionic Woman is on the verge of shutting down because it has no stockpiled scripts. The sci-fi series is shooting at Vancouver Film Studios. She estimates this show alone employs about 100 local people.With less than a dozen episodes shot, a production shutdown could mean that if The Bionic Woman goes off the air, we may never see it return.
I wonder if stories like these are placed by the studio executives to put pressure on the writers of particular shows. By making the strike about specific people and unemployment for a region, studio executives could try to to deflect criticism for their greed and attempt to shift the blame for the strike onto the writers.
BW has survived so much already, I suspect it will survive the strike too.
However, will it survive the downturn in the ratings?
November 12th, 2007 at 8:39 am
[...] ratings season, which ends in three weeks. Shows more affected by the strike, Heroes, Bionic Woman, and Prison Break, are not getting big audiences anyway. Dale sees three big advantages to the US [...]
November 19th, 2007 at 9:24 am
[...] Is Bionic Woman strong enough to survive the Writers Guild of America strike? The negative press against the striking writers has to be a negative PR campaign waged by the studios. [...]