Monk joins the MeTV lineup beginning Sunday, July 18
Monk teams with Columbo for a dynamic detective duo!
Love good mysteries? It doesn't take a detective to find them. Tune in to Sunday evenings on MeTV starting July 18 for two of television's greatest sleuths.
Columbo moves to a new time at 6PM | 5C, as we start from the very beginning with 1968 pilot film Prescription: Murder. Then, at 8PM | 7C, stay tuned for two hours of Monk.
Like Lt. Columbo, Adrian Monk has his quirks. After a reclusive three years following the mysterious death of his wife, the former San Francisco Police Officer emerges as a private detective, though hobbled by a number of compulsive habits and phobias. Tony Shalhoub (Wings, The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel) starred as Monk for eight seasons of the detective series. The role earned him three Emmy Awards for Lead Actor in a Comedy Series, and five further nominations. Yep — he was nominated every year the show aired!
Monk notably featured guests stars John Turturro (who also took home an Emmy for his appearance as Monk's brother), Jason Alexander, John Favreau, Howie Mandel, and country legend Willie Nelson. Speaking of music, Randy Newman also won awards for his memorable theme song.
Be sure to start from the very beginning and watch the two part premiere, "Mr. Monk and the Candidate," on Sunday, July 18 at 8PM | 7C.
341 Comments
Bye-bye Mash!
I don’t pretend to have sat around the MeTV conference room table discussing the merits or not. So nobody needs to read any further!!
Just couple of guesses:
Weigel has easy access to H&I programming. Easy on the budget. Remington and Hawaii Five-0, maybe not so much, availability and budget wise. But MeTV wanted to freshen to freshen up the summer lineup.
There hasn’t been a show MeTV has introduced so far in the history of the network that hasn’t earned it’s such of protest! A select group of people had a fit about cartoons taking an hour away from Westerns on the weekend. But cartoons have settled in nicely.
MeTV probably checks (first) with advertising to confirm Monk is doing well enough in its own marketplace. If it IS, that’s the key to borrowing it.
Mannix, Canon and Barnaby Jones is a stellar lineup for the night-owl’ers, and DVD savers. Viewers can’t have every preferred show airing in Prime Time! It'll never happen.
Finally there’s going to be overlap, that’s just how it works.
The day they touch/disturb/move the ST franchise from H&I as it's running nightly, they lose half their viewership. And as a supporting digital channel, it couldn’t pay for itself quickly enough. Which might cause the network / channel to be dropped in many places. But they've also got a really nice lineup of action/adventure dramas.
Our market already lost Decades when CBS sent it packing.
There’s a library of great action/adventure dramas out there! They just can’t get them all. The ideal would be rotation, but I don’t think that works for the sponsors. Or they would’ve done it. The NBC Mystery Movie was excellent; good comments still come in about that series.
Nothing changes your opinion, that is to be respected, but it never hurts to consider a few other factors. Essentially Monk took the place of an extra hour of Gilligan. I don’t know what they’ll do with the additional hour beginning next week. But am sure other viewers have figured it out, already.
(wink!)
What’s next? Replacing the Brady Bunch with Modern Family??
But Seriously, If you don't like it? DON'T WATCH IT!
The best shows being referenced are claimed (aired) by other networks. It’s also a matter of budget versus revenue. There’s a balance. MeTV has proven track records identifying viewer habits. There's a reason why MASH led into Columbo. Both very nostalgic. So this “change” has shaken everyone up. Because it's about entertainment, and viewers feel like they're missing something else.
The bottom line is, they reduced GI from 3 hours (the time it was supposed to take for their tour) to 2 hours. Which you would think, would be plenty of time to spend on the Minnow anyway!!
Not everybody has MeTV plus H&I. And others are annoyed that their lineup for the evening is being interrupted. They don’t WANT to switch channels even for an hour!
Just a thought ….
Good thing I own the complete Quincy, M.E. series on DVD, because that's what we will be watching on Sunday nights for the foreseeable future.