-First, a little background-
There are a few shows on SyFy (Formerly the channel known as 'SciFi', but for some reason wanted to re-brand and confuse a LOT of people) that I really, really like. Eureka, Stargate: Universe (SGU) and Warehouse 13 (also the frakin' most awesomest show EVER: Battlestar Galactiga). These are excellent shows. I've followed Eureka since it was unleashed upon us back in 2006. I finally got the rest of my family into it and we're GREATLY anticipating the 4th season, slated to start this Friday (barring any scheduling hiccups [are you LISTENING SYFY??}).
As much as I like Eureka, and some of the movies they put on, like Riverworld, I hadn't paid a lot of attention to the 'Sci-Fi' channel in a while. Maybe this is why they hate me. Last summer I was especially forgetful and totally missed the re-branding into SyFy. But, when I was in the hospital last fall and winter, my wife would change the station and let me watch some stuff on the seefee channel. I remember dreams about Warehouse 13, which must have been me actually watching the show but I thought I was just dreaming of being a secret agent along side Saul Rubinek. When I went back to check it out this spring, I was amazed. It was REALLY good. I finished the first season just a couple of weeks ago, and was looking forward to the new season. Everywhere I looked there was a review saying how bad-ass it was going to be, etc. man, oh man........ I checked my DVR 6 times over the weekend to make sure it was set to record, because I KNEW that I wouldn't be able to watch it during first broadcast. I checked and re-checked the time slot on both TVGuide.com and the Directv website, just to be sure. you know, normal stuff.
Yesterday I was going nuts. OOOOOHHHHH.... Warehouse 13!! I follow @SyFy [Craig Engler, the SVP & GM of SyFy Digital] on Twitter and he kept posting people saying how great it was and everything. Coulden't wait to fire it up after everyone in the house went to bed... damn. So, yeah. By air time I was eating dinner, and I checked the DVR just to be sure it really was recording. w00t! yes! totally recording that shit. Even checked to make sure it wasn't going to be a 2 hour episode... etc. However, by the time we got the kids in bed and all of that I was exhausted, so read for a bit and went to bed early, falling asleep as soon as my head hit the pillow. Obviously I was not going to watch the premier last night.
~06:30 Today
Woke up a little groggy, but none the worse for wear (I love that phrase). Fed the baby, hit the bathroom, checked some email, made coffee and saw my wife off to work. And I still had about an hour and a half to kill before I'd have to leave.
~07:15 Today
Opened the correct menu on the DVR, scrolled down to WAREHOUSE 13 and hit play. Tail end of a commercial and... WTF??
WRESTLING. There was Wrestling on my DVR. Who? What? You can probably hear the small 'nghngh' sound that barely escaped my throat. PANIC.
Ok, calm down, there has to be a logical explanation. Hit Info button. Yadda Yadda, SyFy Channel, Yadda Yadda, tuesday 8PM, etc... It looks good. BUT WHY IS THERE FRAKING WRESTLING ON MY FRELLING DVR??
After checking the machine, etc to make sure it was ok, I fast forwarded thinking that tehre may have been a minute or two of a previous show, and then WAREHOUSE 13!!
... 8 minutes later... w00t! Warehouse 13!! ok, but seriously, 8 minutes? Fraking wrestling ate into my show by 8 minutes? Who in their right-fucking-mind would run 8 minutes of wrestling into my show?
SyFy
I rattled off a tweet.
"Anybody(@Syfy ) want to explain why the first 10 minutes of #Warehouse13 on my DVR is goddamn wrestling? Hello?"
As of this writing, no one has responded.
Even though my DVR told me that it had recorded for exactly 60 minutes, I figured: "Oh well, I'm sure it will be fine." Thinking, of course, that there had to be a good reason for this. So I sat back to enjoy my show.
**SPOILER ALERT**
**The following paragraph contains information pertaining to the last few scenes of the Warehouse 13 season 2 premier that aired last night at 8 pm Pacific. if you haven't seen it yet, please skip the following paragraph (just one, I promise), and continue with the next paragraph. thank you... Ever So Much.**
-----------------------------------**Begin Spoilers**------------------------------------------
So, I watched the show that I had recorded. the one I'd been looking forward to for some time and was anxious to see what had happened to Artie and Pete and Myka. I was positive (as we all were, I'm sure) that Leena wasn't really a double agent, and that Claudia's name would be cleared. I knew that If Artie had survived the explosions st the end of Season 1 (HE DID!) that he would be able to track down MacPhearson and all would be well. So there I am, on my couch, drinking my morning coffee with the not-quite-silent hiss of the baby monitor in the background... and we get to where HG runs into the Escher Vault wearing the vest that I can't remember the name of... and Myka tricks MacPhearson using the thimble while Pete cracks him over the head. And MacPhearson lays dying when Artie and Claudia come running up. Artie holds his old friend and explains what he saw when he kissed the Phoenix Medallion and MacPhearson is so understandably apologetic about having misinterpreted the whole thing and becoming evil for no reason. This hits me in the chest the same way as Darth Vader's redemption at the end of Jedi, bringing me to not-quite-tears. Then a slow fade to black, where we assume that there will be a short commercial break and then a prologue where we'll find out the answers to all the questions left unanswered...and...
-----------------------------------**End of Spoilers**-------------------------------------------
FRAK!!!!!
No. There is a fade to black, and the message from my DVR that explains to me that the show is over and do I want to keep or delete the file.
What.the.FUCK?
Thats right, the Season 2 premier of Warehouse 13 was offset by about 10 minutes. On Purpose.
I fire off another tweet:
'@Syfy I'm kinda pissed. You're stupid wrestling schedule made me miss the last 10 minutes of #Warehouse13! You happy now?'
[EDIT: after 24 hours since i tweeted that, no on has responded...]
There is only possible explanations for this.
The offset was there to expose as many people as possible to both the Wrestling crap, and Warehouse 13. See, the people who tuned in to watch wrestling are already invested by 8 minutes into the hour, so they might just stick around and see what this warehouse-thingy is all about. And by the same token, the warehouse people will tune in at the time the show is SUPPOSED to start, see wrestling and think," huh, this ain't too bad. I'm SOOOOOO sorry that I called Craig Engler the spineless toady of a failing network." ( These are not my words, but a culmination of how actual sci-fi fans view the decisions of SyFy, through the mirror darkley that is the internets)
Either way this is annoying. The offset its self wouldn't have been so bad if they had let anyone know about it. ie: my satelite/cable company's scheduler. There are ways to do this. You don't just release the air time as "8 o'clock." you say hey, this set of shows is going to be offset a bit, please adjust your schedules accordingly. NBC does this, why can't SyFy? The Tonight show always starts at 11:35 where i live. The scheduler shows this, and if i record it on my DVR it begins at the correct time. There is absolutely NO reason why one channels Tuesday night line up can't be scheduled correctly, or compensated properly by a scheduler.
Any way, i was going to end with some links to other sites that talk about this, but apparently I'm the only one that was affected... WTF? So, to sum up... SYFy hates me. .
updates to come....
** The bulk of the above text was written yesterday, Wednesday 7/7/10, the following was written this morning after considering what is above*****
Look, I understand that SyFy is a business and they are simply looking for better ratings on their shows. I've already indicated that I LOVE their shows and some of their movies. So I'm not against SyFy in any way (except the name.... god it's silly). I actually wish the channel the very best of luck in raising it's viewership and exposing more people to good science fiction.
That said, SyFy pissed me off to no end yesterday when they offset their showing of Warehouse 13. First, I don't like wrestling. I loathe it. It's the most pointless thing in the world to me. Especially American entertainment Wrestling. It doesn't make any sense to me. Maybe if it was Mexican wrestling with the awesome costumes etc...
but I digest.
It just pisses me off that SyFy can have such little respect for actual science fiction fans that they would put wrestling on their channel.
and then offset it so that it interrupts a great show that i was really looking forward to watching.
in the end, I went to Hulu for the last 10 minutes, and had to suffer through 3 minutes of Vodka commercials to do it.
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