In with the old TV for holidays

Wouldn’t you think it would be important during the holiday season for the TV networks to provide us with original episodes of our favorite TV series? That way we wouldn’t have to spend evenings chatting with the loved ones who had gathered from near and far to be with us, which could only lead to talk of politics or the comparing of various children’s scholastic achievements -- both very dangerous to family harmony.

And yet every year at this time, as we gather around the TV set with the clan, it’s just one *&$%#! series rerun episode after another.

Networks insist it’s because the so-called HUT levels are lower now than at any other time of the year. That’s “homes using television.” And yet a quick look at the numbers shows that the level doesn’t actually nosedive.

“If you look at the research, you don’t see a really significant drop, more than 5% or so, other than Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve,” one industry insider conceded.

Still, the exec acknowledged, the networks play Scrooge with their original episodes at this time of year, adding, “It has become a little bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy ... being used to not seeing originals, [viewers] don’t look for them.”

The networks are, in fact, hoarding original episodes for January and February, when television viewing hits its highest levels of the year.

Those are “nesting” months, one TV exec explained: Lousy weather and completely blown holiday shopping budgets force people to stay home more. Plus the sun goes down earlier. January also has all those football games, and February is a sweeps month and now includes the Super Bowl and the Oscars.