NBC Hates Black Comedy

Have you noticed the new hour-long comedy block on NBC this summer. It’s hard to miss. It was an hour of “Mr Robinson” for the first three weeks and now it is an hour of “The Carmichael Show” for another three weeks. These two shows are the only three shows on NBC with minority leads unless you count the Voice or professional sports. It is not that often that you hear of a show airing back to back in this manner. The original plan was to air each show back to back for 6 weeks. NBC it seemed, didn’t trust the quality of either show and decided to burn off the two series.

Whenever a network takes a show and alters the schedule so as to end the season sooner than expected it is called burning it off. Burning off is the low-profile airing of television shows, by scheduling them in less important time slots. Programs are often burned off because the network does not believe in them yet they have to air them to meet contractual or legal requirements. Sometimes the production companies have to run enough episodes to meet the requirements to sell the show in syndication or to a streaming service.

I will be the first to admit that the quality of both of shows is very sub par. This leads me to believe that NBC hates
black comedy. Wait do they hate black comedy because they are burning off the two series or do they hate black comedy because they didn’t put in the resources necessary to make the shows succeed.

You tell me, what do you think about the each show & what do you think about NBC?