Writers Guild Strike in the USA = Top Gear on the major networks?

I'm not Takumi

Well-Known Member
Joined
Feb 13, 2007
Messages
727
Location
Hawaii
Car(s)
Toyota AE86 Corolla
So the Writers Guild in the USA is threatening to go on strike come Monday.

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/sto...x?guid={0A457691-C83B-4115-92BC-D1D66507EA7F}

This means most, if not all scripted shows and movies will be put on hiatus. And that means Reality Shows might proliferate.

But would it also mean that Foreign Shows might get picked up? Could we theoreticlly see Top Gear or Final Gear get onto a major network?
 
Doubt it. They'll just show reruns.
 
As Clarkson always says, with the unusually way the BBC funds themselves it wont happen. I mean first, Top Gear is a one hour show with no ads so it would have to be edited like the Top Gear American version on Discovery was. Also there is the Music issue which makes (for me) watching the American Top Gear a pain.
And then you have to clean up all of Clarksons anti-American comments or your going to see Senator's demanding we rename fish and chips to Freedom Fish and Chips.
 
Doubt it. They'll just show reruns.

Theirs a limit to what you can rerun before it goes stale. Plus IIRC, the '88 strike actually gave Cable and VCR's a boost in sales. So reruns pretty much would do squat, given we have VideoOnDemand, Internet, and DVD's.

I'm kinda kicking the idea where the studios have no more reruns to slap out, and soemone has the bright idea to actually import Foreign shows to fill the void.
 
There are a lot of options here. If this Strike lasts for 5+ months, networks will run out of scrips for prime-time shows by January-February, but all of em have Reality shows in production + reruns + smth in development.

Worse for late-night talk shows like Jay Leno's Tonight Show or Letterman's. They will run out of scripts by tuesday.

Basicly Top Gear has a very slim chance but i wouldn't count on it. This strike, if it's going to last, will actualy be a good chance for networks to try something new.

P.S. Doubt this strike will last longer than 3-4 weeks, probably even less than 2 weeks. In 1988, five and a half month strike cost the industry about 500 million $, nowadays the figure will be 10 (ore more) times bigger.
 
Last edited:
There are a lot of options here. If this Strike will last 5+ months, networks will run out of scrips for prime-time shows by January-February, but all of em have Reality shows in production + reruns + smith in development.

yeah, but reality can go only so far. Plus I doubt many of the normal networks want to do something on Strippers and Sex fiends. Plus Dog Chapman got canned for saying n*****s.

Worse for late-night talk shows like Jay Leno's Tonight Show or Letterman's. They will run out of scripts by Tuesday.

And The Daily Show and The Colbert Report and SNL.......

Basically Top Gear has a very slim chance but i wouldn't count on it. This strike, if it's going to last, will actually be a good chance for networks to try something new.

Yeah, that would be a freaking' longshot.
 
Not a chance. Expect more "reality TV" because those don't use writers. In fact, it was the first writers strike which I blame for all of the reality TV cruft we are now subjected to. The only up side to this strike was that WGN (a national cable and satellite TV provider here in the US) picked up a great Canadian comedy called "Corner Gas" in anticipation of the strike. Corner Gas has been running in the Great White North for 5 seasons. And, it is funny without having to resort to using a laugh track!
 
I was wondering how the hell someone was going to make the Writers Guild strike relevant to Top Gear....ok, its a really shaky idea at best, lol.

Unless the OP has some hidden inside info on the US entertainment industry that the rest of us aren't aware of.
 
I hope all the current SNL writers strike too, then they can fire the whole lot.

But I don't think we'll ever see Top Gear over here, or at least not up to the par it is in the UK. On top of what has already been said, count the car commercials shown in a hour long TV show. Car manufacturers have had US auto magazines by the balls for decades whats different with US TV shows? Ford spends an awful lot of advertising bucks with the Discovery channel. I still wonder if that's why they cut the run after one season?
 
I was wondering how the hell someone was going to make the Writers Guild strike relevant to Top Gear....ok, its a really shaky idea at best, lol.

Unless the OP has some hidden inside info on the US entertainment industry that the rest of us aren't aware of.

Fine, I wonder if the writers strike means we're gonna get Torchwood here? There, ya happy?
 
Car manufacturers have had US auto magazines by the balls for decades whats different with US TV shows?

which magazines? and be warned, if you say Car and Driver i will come to your house and eat your children
 
don't worry, if they do the same to what happened to torchwood here you'll end up with it on at all different hours of the evening (changing weekly)

Though 1080i 5.1 :D
 
Top