Ron MacLean surprised me at the start of the latest edition of brioux.tv: the podcast. The Hockey Night in Canada anchor and host of Battle of the Blades (airing Thursdays on CBC) was asked, as is every guest, just why the heck he was talking to me on the podcast. I ask this each episode
You’d think the election was in Canada. On Thursday, an overnight, estimated 1,978,000 Canadians watched the final US presidential debate live on CNN. That will top 2 million and be the No. 1 show in English Canada for the week by the time the Live+7 overnights are tallied. Canadians not watching the one hour and
Tonight, Thursday, Oct. 22, marks the sixth season premiere of CBC’s Battle of the Blades. “I’m just sick that it’s also the night of the presidential debate,” says Ron MacLean, back as host of Battle of the Blades (a job he’ll share this time with singer-actress Keshia Chante). “I don’t know how you don’t watch
Thanks to the phenomenal ratings success of The Big Bang Theory, CTV owned Thursdays for a decade plus in Canada. Before that, Global owned the night for their own long winning streak. While scheduling and linear are no longer everything, as long as there are advertisers, Thursday nights are still a key battleground. Despite the
CBC did the smart thing once again by getting their new fall offerings out in front of the import onslaught due this coming week. That being said, on the main CBC network at least, there was a fairly tepid response so far against less-than-formidable competition. Keep in mind, of course, that all of these shows
A lot has changed in the half century since The Brady Bunch was one of the new fall shows of 1969. Or has it? Despite Netflix and what looks to be about a dozen other streaming services constantly spitting out content, September is still the month when old shows return and new ones try to
Blades battlers Shae Lynn Bourne and Anson Carter Remember the CBC? The Canadian public broadcaster has coasted along with reruns since around the time the Leafs were eliminated from the Stanley Cup. No network can afford to take the summer off anymore but that’s exactly what CBC did. With the surprise exit of former programming
What happened to Sundays? Zombies stole our shows!Instead of juicy network dramas like Desperate Housewives, the night is now mostly comprised of reality shows and cartoons. The Amazing Race is still dominant at 8 on CTV, and The Simpsons still draws in the demos on Global after nearly a quarter of a century, but it