Join Greg and Diane every Monday as we debate what’s on our minds. This week: Our thoughts regarding Rogers, Shaw and Bell Media’s 2015-16 broadcast schedules.

He Said:

Make sure you take a peek at Diane’s fall announcement scorecard for her grade on the networks when it comes to Cancon and our thoughts on CBC’s fall schedule.

Overall, I’m frustrated with the amount of Canadian content that Rogers and Shaw have lined up for City and Global. A measly 60 minutes are devoted to homegrown series on City thanks to a second window of Mr. D and original episodes of Sunnyside. That’s it. Mr. D has gotten the short end of the stick in this formula, leading off the night on Thursdays in November and into unproven U.S. import Life in Pieces. Sunnyside has a cushy spot between Bob’s Burgers and Brooklyn Nine-Nine on Sundays in a night of back-to-back sitcoms that Global and Fox have made famous.

Over it Global it’s even more dire because they have exactly zero minutes of Cancon lined up for the fall. Shaw boss Christine Shipton played up the midseason return of Big Brother Canada and newbies The Code and Houdini and Doyle which, again, is just three hours of original stuff amid all of the acquired programs from south of the border. Adding to my frustration, of course, is the fact that Shaw cancelled Remedy only to trumpet U.S. medical drama Heartbreaker. (Two days after Shaw jetted star Melissa George to their upfront, NBC bumped Heartbreaker to mideason.)

Granted, Shaw has loaded up on Canadian content on its specialty channels with unscripted fare like Curse of the Frozen Gold, Battle Factory, Klondike Trappers, Unusually Thicke, The House that HGTV Built, Leave It to Bryan, Chef in Your Ear, Chopped Canada Teen Tournament, Food Network’s Great Canadian Cookbook, First Dates and scripted work in Vikings. That’s certainly more than what Rogers offers on OLN, FXX and FX Canada.

Bell Media comes off like a saviour thanks to putting Saving Hope in the prime Thursday night 9 p.m. slot on CTV, a move that shows confidence in the series. Motive and MasterChef Canada will both be back at midseason on CTV while CTV Two packs Saturday nights with repeats of The Listener, Flashpoint and Motive. On the other hand, Bell Media is playing it safe by sticking with what works on CTV and CTV Two; I wish the upcoming Letterkenny was given a chance to shine on the main networks rather than on The Comedy Network and CraveTV.

She Said:

How depressing is it that the highest praise we can bestow on the major private networks this season is “yay, one of them is giving one of their own shows a decent fall timeslot”? Canadian TV: the home of lowered expectations.

Fall is a rough time for homegrown programs, though, amid the saturation of US shows’ big budgets and big marketing campaigns. It seems we’ve learned time and again that new series have a better chance of a successful launch in winter rather than fall.

Which doesn’t explain why there’s not much to say about the “16” part of their 2015-16 schedules. Motive and MasterChef Canada are coming up this winter and … no, never mind, there’s no “and.”

Global and City still have announced nothing original scheduled for post-Christmas. Only Global used the 2015-16 season announcements as an opportunity to talk about new upcoming shows – The Code and Houdini and Doyle, not yet in production and with no air dates attached, so don’t expect to see them before spring — and that appeared to be a case of misdirection in the hopes people wouldn’t notice they had butkus actually scheduled for 2015-16 in their scheduling announcements so far. The specialty networks are where Shaw has shows, but the mothership network? Nada. 

I expect more development/in production announcements soon-ish, given how thin things are looking like right now and rumours of shows in their last seasons. I also expect Canadian shows may be slotted in ad hoc as US cancellations force a hole in the precious simsub schedules. But when putting on a show for advertisers through upfronts and high season schedules, the private networks are still all about that U.S. product with little to no room for original productions.

There’s a persistent rumour that Canadian productions don’t bring in the Canadian advertising like a U.S. show does. Chicken? Egg? If the networks don’t value them as much, it becomes hard to argue that advertisers and audiences should.

The Canadian network upfront dust has settled and 2015-16 schedules have been revealed. How does their Cancon stack up in terms of quantity, before we’re able to judge much on quality? Let’s take a closer look based on their recently announced lineups for fall and winter:

CBC

• Canadian scripted shows:  9 1/2
• New: The Romeo Section, This Life, Young Drunk Punk
• Returning: Heartland, Murdoch Mysteries, Rick Mercer Report, 22 Minutes, Schitt’s Creek, Mr. D, X Company
• Grade: B+

The public broadcaster’s lifeblood is original programming, making it unique among the major networks. Budget woes mean more creativity, if you can call reduced seasons an example of creativity, but also new arts and factual programming as well as international acquisitions. CBC gets a half point for airing City’s original production Young Drunk Punk; I admire the cooperative spirit that allows both networks to spread out their Cancon spending without the benefit of appropriate specialty channels of their own, like the biggest private networks who can air one show across multiple channels. With additional factual and news programming, including new shows this summer, CBC is the home of hope for a homegrown television lover.

City

• Canadian scripted shows:  1 1/2
• New: Mr. D
• Returning: Sunnyside
• Grade: D+

I’m grading on a curve for this smallest of the networks, and hoping they have more originals up their sleeve despite their minimalist fall announcement. Seed, Package Deal and Meet the Family are dead, but they recently ordered more episodes of sketch comedy show Sunnyside for fall. While Young Drunk Punk will benefit from CBC’s bigger reach, Mr. D may get some new eyeballs but a larger audience than its CBC run is highly unlikely.  A second season of Young Drunk Punk hasn’t been announced yet, and City didn’t take the upfronts as an opportunity to do so.

Global

• Canadian scripted shows:  Zero
• New: Nothing
• Returning: Zilch
• Grade: Is there such thing as an F-?

They recently cancelled homegrown medical drama Remedy while picking up the requisite American medical drama, and Rookie Blue may or may not be ending this summer.  Unless Global rushes their greenlit The Code and Houdini and Doyle into production and finds a cancellation in its simsub schedule during the regular television season, they’re unlikely to have any scripted original shows until at least spring 2016 — on par with their 2014/15 schedule.

CTV

• Canadian scripted shows:  2
• New: Nothing
• Returning: Saving Hope, Motive
• Grade: C+

Original productions on CTV are positively abundant compared to their rival Global — though some credit goes to their increased Cancon spending requirements after Bell’s purchase of Astral. Even then, they have one scripted show each starting in fall and winter, with Saving Hope out of the gate first in a plum timeslot. They still have a produced season of the sadly tainted Spun Out waiting in the wings. Will they schedule it when gaps appear in their simulcast schedule due to U.S. cancellations, or burn it off quietly some Saturday evening, or kill it entirely? Would they be able to kill it entirely without  issues with the funding agencies? Will we hear soon about more new original series for CTV? So many questions, and we can only wait for answers.