Mighty morphin power players
Oh sure, blame the marketing guy.
These Coppertoned specimens from "American Gladiators" (that would be Titan and Wolf) are strong-arming NBC's CMO John Miller, but they're just joshing around. This photo-op, held yesterday in New York, came shortly before the launch of season two of the competition reality show.
It's only today that everybody finds out how much the two-hour episode stunk up the ratings. One might say: how the mighty have fallen. Marketing's fault?
From a lofty perch of 12 million viewers (and near-instant renewal for a second season), "Gladiators" buckled like a 90-pound weakling with an anvil. Fewer than 5 million people watched (trounced by Brit Brit's second "How I Met Your Mother" guest spot), making that the lowest-rated show of the night on all four broadcast nets.
Since this is the cornerstone of NBC's summer leading up to the Olympics, execs there have to be a bit concerned right about now.
But to stir the pot (and people's emotions), the network has assembled competitors with climb-every-mountain character for this season's shows. There's the guy who lost his leg in a car crash, the former juvenile delinquent, the guy who was born deaf, a Columbine survivor, an Iraq war veteran who was severely injured in combat, a cop who worked at Ground Zero after 9/11.
That's called stacking the deck, in true manipulative reality show style. Wiping a tear and cheering for the underdog works for a lot of shows in the genre ("Extreme Makeover" everyone?) but "Gladiators" strength might already be sapped. We'll let you break the news to Titan and Wolf.
Mmmmm, chocolate Oscar. Not every star will walk away from the 81st annual Academy Awards with a trophy, but if they hit the high-profile Governor's Ball they can have pastry chef Sherry Yard's gold-dusted candy version. Also on the menu from celeb chef Wolfgang Puck is tuna tartare in sesame miso cones, chopped Chino Farms vegetable salad with ginger soy vinaigrette, Maine lobster and caviar. Serve it up! (Getty Images)
AmGlad is going to have to kick it up a notch if it wants to top AmNextTopModel's Lupus/Asperger's/female-genital-mutilation trifecta! Kleenex integration, anyone?
Posted by: becky e | May 13, 2008 at 05:02 PM
i want to order costumes of all power rangers
Posted by: vaishnav | May 21, 2008 at 03:23 PM
Mighty Gay? Is that Siegfried & Roy?
Posted by: Joey Nader | June 02, 2008 at 08:05 AM