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Wonder Woman(NBC) *Spoilers!*

However, if the Kelley pilot does get rejected, I'm hoping NBC (and more importantly, Warner Bros.) won't blame it on the concept/character of Wonder Woman. I'm hoping they'll realize that it could've worked better in different hands, and maybe try to develop a new version.
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It'll probably be for any number of reasons, most of which we'll never hear about. I've heard that the focus groups didn't go well, but why is that? Did they group just think "comic book characters in stupid looking costumes are stupid"?

In which case, it could have been the comic book nature of the character that got it rejected (or that will be the assumption), and then comic book characters will be on the outs and not just Wonder Woman but comic book characters in general will be avoided for TV development.
 
Temis the Vorta said:
In which case, it could have been the comic book nature of the character that got it rejected (or that will be the assumption), and then comic book characters will be on the outs and not just Wonder Woman but comic book characters in general will be avoided for TV development.
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Considering that Smallville is completing an astonishing ten-season run this week, I doubt that a single failed pilot would be enough to convince executives that superhero shows can't work. I mean, sure, executives tend to have short memories, but not that short.
 
Or maybe it's all about the "No Tights" rule - I know Smallville started with the "No Tights, No Flights" rule - the No Flights rule went out the window when Clark was exposed to a red ring (way back when in a season finale). I don't know if they're still going on with the No Tights rule for Clark - other heroes seem to have shown up in costume - I saw pictures of a Hawkman in there.

If so, that would suck for Wonder Woman especially. I think she has a fine costume. And being male, I'm all about the jiggly stuff. So a big :p to Temis.
 
I think Wonder Woman could work kinda like Smallville...if some of the story was tweaked...like making WW a exchange student attending HS...it would follow here "early" years. :lol: She would kinda dress like that new version in the comics...blue jeans, read & white Chuck Taylors, red tops and a blue jacket...maybe sometimes red...she could have a gold eagle belt buckle...even the silver bracelets...it could be all angsty. :lol:

No? :p
 
Temis the Vorta said:
Yet The Cape just failed and that was on NBC. Maybe superhero shows are kids, and won't work outside the CW?
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I dunno, there was this other show about superheroes with powers on NBC that was pretty successful in its first season. ;) That show didn't fail because it had superheroes, it only failed because of poor writing and a lack of planning on the creator's part.
 
They didn't wear crazy-ass costumes on Heroes...and Clark isn't allowed to on Smallville...the suits could be forgiven for seeing a trend here.
 
My goalposts were and still are: "comic book characters in stupid looking costumes are stupid." :rommie: Read a couple posts back there, you'll see it.
 
Why do fans continually look at Smallville's ten year run as something to be celebrated? There is a reason that it has lasted as long as it has on that network and it sure as hell isn't ratings. It's been "eleventh hour" renewed at least four times that I can remember and on any other network the ratings drop would have axed this show. CW didn't even pick up the "Aquaman" pilot and that was decent and "effort was put into that". Just because effort is put into a pilot doesn't mean the studio automatically feels that it has to pick it up for a season. They need to be able to feel confident that it can go for an entire season. From what I've read about the WW pilot for the most part that isn't a case.
 
Admiral_Young said:
Why do fans continually look at Smallville's ten year run as something to be celebrated?
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I had no such intention in bringing it up. I wasn't "celebrating," merely pointing out that network executives would be aware that there was a superhero show that had a long run, so it wouldn't make sense to expect them to assume that it's impossible for a superhero show to succeed. I can describe how I think other people would perceive something without it being an expression of my own opinion.


There is a reason that it has lasted as long as it has on that network and it sure as hell isn't ratings. It's been "eleventh hour" renewed at least four times that I can remember and on any other network the ratings drop would have axed this show.
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Exactly -- four times, not nine times. Even if it's surviving on fumes now, it was a notable success for several years. Even four or five years is a very strong showing compared to most TV series.


Just because effort is put into a pilot doesn't mean the studio automatically feels that it has to pick it up for a season.
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Now, that's a different subject. On this point, I agree completely, and already made that argument earlier.
 
As much as I was hoping to see this, I will admit I did find the whole three identities thing a little odd. And then there's the fact that David E. Kelley has never done this kind of a show before. I know there have been plenty of movie directors/TV show runners who have switched genre's successfully, but I still get nervous when it happens.

I wonder what would happen if someone tried to do something that stayed closer to the comics? I understand wanting to make a show your own, but I think sometimes they go to far away from the comics, and to be honest I'm wondering if that's what happened here.
 
I think superheroes in costumes saving the day just doesn't suit today's TV audience anymore. It's more associated with the fun yesteryear. Today's audience seems more grounded in reality.
 
I could see a costumed superhero show working on the CW or SyFy but I think the new head of NBC, who comes from Showtime, wants to really shake things up and vault NBC from fourth-place loser to a cable-channel-on-broadcast, to appeal to a wealthy demographic with classy shows and finally carve out an actual brand image for NBC that it can be proud of.

NBC has picked up Awake (used to be REM), Playboy Club, Grimm, Smash and Prime Suspect. Taken together, that's an AMC-ish lineup (Grimm is the outlier - I'm very happy to see it, but it doesn't quite have the smart/premium/classy tone of the others - otoh, it's not embarrassing or necessarily silly either).

It looks like Wonder Woman has been shut out, with Deadline reporting that NBC may be done with drama pickups (and apparently very confident that they won't need to scramble to fill time because of an NFL shutout because they haven't picked up enough shows for that and for mid-season replacements too :confused:).

If that's Greenblatt's strategy, it's gutsy. It might blow up in his face, as his cable-ish shows get cable-ish ratings. Wonder Woman's notoriety alone would have gotten attention and maybe decent ratings. I definitely want to see the WW pilot if it's ever leaked online.

Edit: TVGuide's twitter stream makes it official: NBC has passed on Wonder Woman.

Also at Deadline.
 
Temis the Vorta said:
I could see a costumed superhero show working on the CW or SyFy but I think the new head of NBC, who comes from Showtime, wants to really shake things up and vault NBC from fourth-place loser to a cable-channel-on-broadcast, to appeal to a wealthy demographic with classy shows and finally carve out an actual brand image for NBC that it can be proud of.

NBC has picked up Awake (used to be REM), Playboy Club, Grimm, Smash and Prime Suspect. Taken together, that's an AMC-ish lineup (Grimm is the outlier - I'm very happy to see it, but it doesn't quite have the smart/premium/classy tone of the others - otoh, it's not embarrassing or necessarily silly either).
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Oh wow, nice pick-ups. No Reconstruction? That was my favorite. :scream: I hope you're right about NBC's aspiration. They'll never be really that classy though with shows like Trump's Celebrity Apprentice and Biggest Loser.
 
Reconstruction was always a long shot. A Western, maybe with supernatural elements...? I wanted to see it just for Robert Knepper.

They'll never be really that classy though with shows like Trump's Celebrity Apprentice and Biggest Loser.
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They can be classy by broadcast standards but they still have to pay the bills! :rommie: They've also got that American Idol knock-off.
 
JD said:
I wonder what would happen if someone tried to do something that stayed closer to the comics? I understand wanting to make a show your own, but I think sometimes they go to far away from the comics, and to be honest I'm wondering if that's what happened here.
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Well, that depends on how you mean it. Just being faithful to the letter of the original doesn't guarantee a good adaptation, nor does departing from it guarantee a bad one. Shyamalan's The Last Airbender is a rather slavish adaptation of its source material in a lot of ways, and that's actually one of its biggest faults, because it results in an overly compressed and disjointed story, something that dwells too much on the surface events of the storyline and fails to capture the deeper essence of the characters. Conversely, sometimes an adaptation can depart profoundly from its source material and still be brilliant -- a standout example being Blade Runner.

But there's a difference between being true to the letter of the original and being true to its spirit. Bryan Singer has taken enormous liberties with the X-Men characters and continuity in his films, but he had a true understanding of the comics, and his departures were from poetic license rather than ignorance, with the core essence of the X-Men being preserved despite all the changes. The problems come when you get genre adaptations by people who don't understand or respect the genre and are just going by their vague pop-culture impressions. From what I heard about the pilot, I don't think David E. Kelley "got" Wonder Woman. Granted, Wonder Woman's a hard character to "get"; even comics authors haven't found a single consistent way of defining who she is.

Anyway, the point is, I don't think we should overgeneralize here. This specific reinterpretation evidently didn't work, but that doesn't mean no reinterpretation could.
 
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