Posted 9:54 AM by Gene

And speaking of CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED, LALA accounts the perils and trepidations attendant thereto:

It's true that in recent weeks the cable networks have been filled with new, critically acclaimed series, including FX's legal thriller "Damages," Lifetime's home-front soap "Army Wives," USA's spy drama "Burn Notice" and TNT's crime show "Saving Grace." But no matter how they fared individually, as a group these big-ticket shows didn't generate any overall growth for cable. Among both young adults and total viewers, ad-supported cable networks were up a measly 1% this summer compared with last year.

Nowhere are the risks more evident than in the strange case of AMC's "Mad Men," a costly, meticulously detailed period drama about the advertising industry during the early 1960s. Critics rhapsodized about everything from the writing to the production design. The network gave "Mad Men" a huge PR push as its first major original series.

Yet the show's ratings have been mediocre at best. Among young adults, "Mad Men" was outperformed by, to cite one also-ran, VH1's "Scott Baio is 45 & Single." [!!!!!] And overall, AMC's prime-time numbers slipped 15% this summer, to about 1.1 million total viewers.

And this RENAISSANCE of CRITICALLY-ACCLAIMED programming will be bulldozed by the network reality shows for the mob before the TVs! But the mob obviously can't tell the difference, which means in all likelihood there isn't much of a difference, critical acclaim notwithstanding. Which may also explain why the mob keeps getting smaller.