ION Television November/December 2010 Schedule, New Movie Deals; Halloween 2010 Specials and Marathons on TV

Thursday, October 28, 2010

ION Television November/December 2010 Schedule, New Movie Deals; Halloween 2010 Specials and Marathons on TV

This November and December on ION Television, the regular schedule will of course remain the same, but there will be a few stunts and lots of holiday movies in time for the holidays! The regular weekday schedule remains intact with a mix of Ghost Whisperer, Without a Trace and Criminal Minds every weekday from 3pm-1am. With these series, ION Television delivered its best season ever, growing faster year-over-year than any other broadcast or cable network, according to Nielsen Media Research. Propelled by crime dramas Criminal Minds and Without a Trace, ION has posted growth across all key demos, including A25-54, W25-54, A18-49 and W18-49. ION's ratings success, from October 2009 through September 2010, registered record triple and double-digit growth in sales prime, with a 72% increase in total viewers (1,011,000 vs. 588,000).
Back to November and December 2010, we get a few marathons in time for the holidays. On Black Friday, Friday, November 26, ION Television presents a full-day marathon of Criminal Minds from 3pm-1am. We get another Criminal Minds marathon on Christmas Eve, Friday, December 24 from 3pm-1am. The following week, on Friday, December 31, we close out 2010 with a full-day marathon of Without a Trace from 3pm-1am.
Weekends have movies mainly from 1pm-1am, with some filler airings of My Name is Earl and/or M*A*S*H kicking it off. Movie premieres for November and December are: Under Siege, The Quick and the Dead, Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood, Troy, My Dog Skip, and Gridiron Gang. We also get some encore airings of Scarface, Another 48 Hours, The Negotiator, Courage Under Fire, Point Break, Pay it Forward, The Family Stone, When Harry Met Sally, In Her Shoes, Blood Work, and The Fugitive. The holiday movies kick-off Sunday, November 28 with movies A Golden Christmas, Christmas Town, and The Christmas Clause airing throughout December.

In other ION Television updates, part of the network's commitment to expand its schedule with high profile, 'positively entertaining' programming, ION Television has inked multiple deals this month to acquire over 85 feature films. The deals are with leading Hollywood studios including Warner Bros., Twentieth Century Fox, and Sony Pictures Television - making it the network's largest movie buy to date. The newly acquired theatrical titles begin airing this month and will continue to roll out on ION Television's schedule through 2012.
ION Television's largest studio deal is with Warner Bros. Domestic Television Distribution with 44 films. Highlights of the premier package include comedy Starsky & Hutch, with Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson; the sea-faring film The Perfect Storm starring George Clooney and Mark Wahlberg; The Guardian starring Kevin Costner; and Analyze This and its sequel Analyze That with Billy Crystal and Robert De Niro.
The movie titles acquired from Twentieth Century Fox include the critically acclaimed and Academy Award® winning movie for Best Picture Slumdog Millionaire with Dev Patel and Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World, starring award-winning actor Russell Crowe.
The Sony Pictures Television package includes 16 film titles and features Ali, the biographical film of boxing icon Muhammad Ali; the political action thriller Vantage Point starring Dennis Quaid and LOST's Matthew Fox; and the crime drama We Own the Night, starring Joaquin Phoenix and Mark Wahlberg.
ION Television also acquires over a dozen titles from MGM including top films such as Be Cool, starring John Travolta and Uma Thurman; romantic comedy A Guy Thing starring My Name is Earl's Jason Lee; and Into the Blue, starring Paul Walker and Jessica Alba.
The theatrical acquisitions will be part of ION Television's new expanded daypart and late night schedule, now airing from 1PM-1AM on weekends. Additionally, the new titles will build upon network's thriving Big Movie Weekend, which has seen +48% ratings growth from last season.

Halloween is coming upon us this weekend and we need to let you know of any specials or marathons airing. Last night of course featured Halloween episodes of ABC's Laugh On Wednesday with spooky episodes of The Middle, Better With You, Modern Family, and Cougar Town. The prelim ratings for all four were great reaching season or series highs in either total viewers and/or 18-49.
We have mentioned some of these items already in past blog posts, but of course you have the 13 Nights of Halloween continuing on ABC Family, the classic Halloween special It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown airing tonight (and tomorrow) at 8pm on ABC, and the new special Scared Shrekless airing tonight at 8 on NBC. They also have Halloween episodes of Community, The Office and Outsourced following the all-new special. Classic sitcom wise, The Hub has Halloween episodes of Doogie Howser, M.D., Happy Days and Laverne & Shirley tonight starting at 9:30pm. As we mentioned, Nick at Nite has a Halloween episode of Glenn Martin, DDS tomorrow at 10pm and a Halloween episodes stunt on Saturday featuring George Lopez, Everybody Hates Chris, Home Improvement, and Family Matters. TV Land has Roseanne Halloween episodes airing Saturday night from 2-4am and more on Halloween Sunday from 12am-3am. WE tv sees ghosts with Ghost Whisperer on Saturday from 10pm-4am
Our friends at TV Tango has your FULL guide to Halloween hauntings on TV for entire month of October, including marathons, specials, TV movies, episodes, and anything else we could find that might scare you or make you want to carve a pumpkin. Head on over to TVTango as always for your holiday listings!

Sitcoms Airing Tonight

Thursday, February 20

Young Sheldon - "Pasadena" (CBS, 8:00PM ET/PT)
Sheldon visits CalTech for the very first time. Also, Georgie is furious when Mary listens in on a phone call with his girlfriend, and Meemaw tries to cheer up a jealous Missy.

The Unicorn - "The Client" (CBS, 8:30PM ET/PT)
When Wade lands a job for Denny (Donal Logue), a newly divorced, wealthy client, he realizes Denny is only interested in using Wade to meet women. Also, Meg (Nicole Byer) applies her expertise as an accountant to get Wade’s finances on track, and Forrest and Delia attempt to clear the tension between them by having an argument.

Mom - "Judy Garland and a Sexy Troll Doll" (CBS, 9:00PM ET/PT)
Bonnie helps Christy gain perspective as she considers a life-changing decision. Also, Jill fears she’s running out of time to have a baby and consults a fertility doctor.

Carol's Second Act - "Carol's Crush" (CBS, 9:30PM ET/PT)
After Carol’s patient’s transplant surgery is deemed a success, the interns tease her mercilessly about her obvious crush on the surgeon, Dr. Lewis (Patrick Fabian).

Last Man Standing - "Baked Sale" (Fox, 8:00PM ET/PT)
Mike's offer to help Jen with her school's bake sale goes up in smoke; Kyle finds unlikely advice from Joe on where he should enroll in college.

Outmatched - "Dating" (Fox, 8:30PM ET/PT)
When Nicole invites a boy over who isn't ideal boyfriend material, Kay tries to make sure her daughter doesn't end up with a broken heart; Mike attempts to understand Marc's strange crush.

Superstore - "Employee App" (NBC, 8:00PM ET/PT)
Cloud 9 employees experience unforeseen problems with the new Zephra app. Dina's texts lead to animosity, Glenn struggles to deal with a teen craze, and Jonah attempts to prank Garrett to teach him a lesson.

Brooklyn Nine-Nine - "The Jimmy Jab Games II" (NBC, 8:30PM ET/PT)
Competitive juices are flowing as Jake and the squad compete in the second Jimmy Jab Games.

Will & Grace - "Accidentally on Porpoise" (NBC, 9:00PM ET/PT)
Despite her history of transgressions, Grace and her neighbor, James (guest star Matt Letscher), decide to give their relationship one more shot. But when James invites Grace to his job at the aquarium, she endangers his job and a species. In order to help Will deal with his anxiety about becoming a father, Jack takes him to an unexpected place to blow off steam – church. Karen finds herself in a confessional booth, and a visit from Smitty (guest star Charles C. Stevenson, Jr.) makes her reconsider their entire relationship.

Indebted - "Everybody's Talking About the Mental Load" (NBC, 9:30PM ET/PT)
After Rebecca tells Dave she carries the emotional labor, aka the “mental load” of the family, he tries to prove otherwise by having her take care of just Deb and Stew for a few days. They both realize they’ve bit off more than they can chew, especially when Dave enlists his mom to help with Rebecca’s mental load.

grown-ish - "Real Life S**t" (Freeform, 8:00PM ET/PT)
Aaron's student loan troubles come to a head when he looks for a job at the Cal U job fair, prompting him to ask Zoey for help; Sky struggles to come to terms with her recent discovery about Rodney; Jillian tries to bond with Zoey.

Everything's Gonna Be Okay - "Blue Death-Feigning Beetles" (Freeform, 8:30PM ET/PT)
Matilda's whole life forks between success and obscurity on the most important night of her life; Nicholas juggles a house full of people and Penny on screen from her hospital bed in Australia.

Complete TV Listings

Sitcom Stars on Talk Shows (Week of February 17)

Thursday, February 20

Will Smith (The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air) - Catch Will on a repeat of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon at 11:35pm on NBC.
Terry Crews (Brooklyn Nine-Nine/Are We There Yet?/Everybody Hates Chris) - Terry appears on a repeat of Late Night with Seth Meyers at 12:36am on NBC.
Scott Bakula (Murphy Brown/Eisenhower and Lutz/Gung Ho) - Scott stops by The Late Late Show with James Corden at 12:37am on CBS.
Ilana Glazer (Broad City) - Ilana is a guest on a repeat of A Little Late with Lilly Singh at 1:35am on NBC.
Jenny Slate (Big Mouth/Married/Bob's Burgers) - Jenny appears on a repeat of Conan at 11pm on TBS.
Oliver Hudson (Splitting Up Together/Rules of Engagement) - Oliver and his sister Kate are guests on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, so check your local listings.
Da'Vine Joy Randolph (High Fidelity/People of Earth/Selfie) - Da'Vine visits The Wendy Williams Show, so check your local listings.
Nick Kroll (The League/Cavemen) - Nick appears on The Kelly Clarkson Show, so check your local listings.
Jane Levy (Suburgatory) - Jane talks about Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist on The Kelly Clarkson Show, so check your local listings.
Edie Falco (Nurse Jackie) - Edie talks about Tommy on NBC's Today in the 10am hour.
Emeril Lagasse (Emeril) - Emeril gives a cooking lesson to a culinary student who fought back after having a stroke on Rachael Ray, so check your local listings.
Da'Vine Joy Randolph (High Fidelity/People of Earth/Selfie) - Da'Vine talks about High Fidelity on New York Live on WNBC in New York at 11:30am ET.