They cut it down to half an hour after only a few weeks, putting an episode of Spatz in its place.
I have vague memories of Telegantic Megavision, but I can't remember INJS at all. But then I was below its target age group. And the massive different in target age between the two shows probably has a fair bit to do with why they flopped.
What was with the commissioning of teen centred shows around that time? Massive, Its Not Just Saturday and The Noise were all very odd for the CITV slot in my opinion. Something that Nigel Pickard must have thought too. Yes CD:UK could have been aimed at a teen audience but they did cover pop music as much as indie and rock.
:-(
A former member
Nigel Pickard wasn't at ITV when there were on Screen, he was still at Family channel/Challenge TV, it wasn;t until 1998 when he went to ITV, and made improvements.
That's my point, that he must have thought that that sort of programme wasn't good for the slot and so commissioned SM:TV, though the commission of SM:TV could be said to have been of similar ilk when recollecting early editions.
In 1985, when I devised Knightmare, current demography (breakdown by age and other factors) of childrens’ ITV viewing spread from 6-15. By 1994 (the last year of the Dungeon), it was predicted to be 6-10. Older children and of course, adolescents and adults could watch, but their viewing figure contributions were regarded as insignificant (even ignored).
Dawn [Airey] believed (as did Anna Home at the BBC), that the games-playing audience (9 upwards) was migrating from TV to video games or niche market satellite, and that their departure represented a battle already lost. Thought-provoking interactive products like Knightmare might well win awards, but could not reverse that trend.
The utter mess and incoherence of the ITV Saturday morning lineup during this period is no doubt what smoothed the transition for L&K from Andi & Emma to Zoe & Jamie. Looking at some of the clips here there just wasn't any competition. Most of them were just titles in the Radio Times to me when they were on, this is the first I've seen of any of them.
The logic of the setup can't be faulted: start with the kiddies at 9.25 with Telegantic Megavision, move to older kids at 10.30 with It's Not Just Saturday, and then (potentially) older than that in The Chart Show at 11.30. In practice it just puts people off and pigeon holes the audience, and L&K managed to keep them all fairly happy across the three hours.
For me (I was 11/12/13 during this period) it was the pace of change and unfamiliarity that put me off - at least they stuck with What's Up Doc for a few years. Between 1995 and 1998 they just didn't stick with anything (with perhaps the exception of Scratchy & Co, the clips of which online confirm my feeling at the time that it was pretty dire).
Yes, Scratchy & Co was the only 1995-98 ITV Saturday show that got more than one series. Though as has been said, WOW did actually do reasonably well- it was axed due to budget cuts, not ratings.
Yes, Scratchy & Co was the only 1995-98 ITV Saturday show that got more than one series. Though as has been said, WOW did actually do reasonably well- it was axed due to budget cuts, not ratings.
Indeed, I think F1 was the reason why, Scratchy & Co was dirt cheap to make apparently, and it was favoured more by LWT. I'm not sure if it is still online but there was a good interview with Simeon Courtie about WOW and the reasons why it was axed.
Yes, Scratchy & Co was the only 1995-98 ITV Saturday show that got more than one series. Though as has been said, WOW did actually do reasonably well- it was axed due to budget cuts, not ratings.
Indeed, I think F1 was the reason why, Scratchy & Co was dirt cheap to make apparently, and it was favoured more by LWT. I'm not sure if it is still online but there was a good interview with Simeon Courtie about WOW and the reasons why it was axed.
Yes, from what I've read it was F1 too- ITV had to get the money to pay for it somewhere, so they took it from the Saturday morning budget. Not just Scratchy & Co, but everything else that came between WOW and SM:TV, Tricky and Mashed, were just as dirt cheap. SM:TV was the first proper full scale studio Saturday show on ITV for 2 years! Scratchy & Co & Mashed were in tiny studios with no audience, and Tricky was animated (though was live!).