TEN picks new FOX titles
TEN has confirmed Backstrom, Empire and Complications from its FOX output deal.
- Published by David Knox
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TEN has confirmed picking up three shows from its output deal with 20th Century FOX Studios: Backstrom, Empire and Complications.
Backstrom and Empire are both US mid-season shows for 2015.
The output deal is a shared one with Foxtel, which is understood to have selected Cristela, Fresh Off The Boat and Rush.
FOX8 has also started promotions for Reign in August, which was to have premiered on TEN.
Comedic crime procedural Backstrom comes from the creator of Bones, and centres on an unhealthy, offensive, irascible — albeit brilliant — detective (Rainn Wilson) who is brought back from exile to run the Portland Police Bureau’s Special Crimes Unit (S.C.U.).
Empire is described as a sexy and powerful new drama about the head of a music empire (Terrence Howard) whose three sons and ex-wife all battle for his throne. Set to an original soundtrack written and produced by hip-hop hitmaker Timbaland.
Complications is a medical drama from Burn Notice creator Matt Nix starring Jason O’Mara, as  a disillusioned suburban ER doctor who finds himself transformed when he intervenes in a drive-by shooting, saving a young boy’s life and killing one of his attackers. When he learns the boy is still marked for death he finds himself compelled to save him at any cost and discovers that his life and his outlook on medicine may never be the same.
8 Responses
Wondering if there’s any word on the premiere of Backstrom? getting good hype on Twitter..
Empire looks pretty good & I like both Terrence Howard & Taraji P Henson. I will definitely be watching that.
Backstrom looks like an intruiging blend of a Bones type procedural with a touch of ‘House’ dysfunction so may be good if Rainn Wilson can nail it.
Complications seems to have an interesting premise, hopefully Nix can keep it fresh (a-la Burn Notice which was quite good early on but got a little tired near the end).
If they just screen them at reasonable times and don’t jerk them around the schedule like ADHD kids on red lollies then they may have a chance to rate and build an audience.
It’s great Foxtel has picked up Reign. They should also pick up Witches of East End and the remaining seasons of 90210 because Eleven is taking so long to air them.
None of these series look very interesting IMO. I doubt any of them will make it to a second season.
If Sleepy Hollow, the biggest hit on FOX in years, struggled to get more than 500k on Ten’s primary channel, I doubt these will do any better.
Reign is a good series, could have been a hit for Eleven if they kept it and played it in a stable timeslot.
Also, Backstrom was originally made for CBS but got passed on.
Ten is getting increasingly “Murdoch’d”. I’ve long said that ever since Lachlan bought into the company, that this would be happening. Rupert can’t own Ten because of local media laws but this is how he does it by stealth. That said, Fox does have some good content so hopefully the network chooses well.
Any news on Wayward Pines David?
If you are watching Death of a Pilgrim on SBS1 you will notice that it has the character of Backstrom. A great series but at 4 hours and based on 3 novels takes some working out.