Last year I commented o­n CTV fall schedule in this article. Here's my review of the past season.

If you remember, I told you that CTV would offer a jam-packed schedule, overbuying programming in the process. This past television season CTV left many programs off the schedule. CTV aired o­nly o­ne episode of "The West Wing" although it will restart airing it o­n Sunday, June 6th at 8 ET/PT (check ctv.ca for you local schedule). Lots of programs bounched arround the schedule as CTV tried to maximize the number of hours it similcasted with the originating US networks: "Law and Order" was never o­n at the same time from week-to-week, sometimes new episodes aired o­n Mondays at 9 ET/PT, Wednesday at 8, 9 or 10 ET/PT, or o­n Fridays. Acquired American programs were stuffed into the schedule weekend afternoons including 4 comedies from ABC, "Charmed" and "Alias". [Good news for viewers is that ABC's "Hope & Faith" is moving to City-tv this Fall.]

This season, Sunday evenings were filled with high impact programming. After realizing that "Desperate Housewives" was a breakout hit CTV juggled their schedule to similcast "Housewives" with ABC at 9 ET/PT moving "Law & Order: Criminal Intent" arround the schedule to 7 ET/PT or 10 ET/PT varying from week-to-week.. CTV lucked in with "Grey's Anatomy" and CTV scheduled it from the start for the 10 ET/PT timeslot. CTV lucked in this year when it aired its five award shows that they were able to air the pre-empted new episode in the following week or two.

On Mondays, CTV aired a variety of programs. o­nly noteworthy "Medium" and "CSI: Miami" were sucessful. For most of the season, Monday was a filler night were CTV was able to drop surplus programming that CTV was unable to similcast.

Until "American Idol" returned in January, Tuesday will be filled with o­ne hour of Canadian content. CTV missed airing about half of episodes this season of "According to Jim" and "Scrubs". "The Amazing Race" became Tuesday's Amazing hero for CTV.

Wednesday was overflowing with programs, CTV had to shift tons for programs to other days including Law and Order, Alias and Wife Swap while placing the West Wing o­n hiatus for 8 months. "Lost" and "CSI:NY" were hits for CTV.

"Must See Thursday" was better than ever o­n CTV. The O.C. began regular simulcasts when its new season began in November. Thursday veterans, CSI: and ER, rounded out night.


This summer we are seeing CTV catch up o­n "Veronica Mars" and previously mentioned "The West Wing". (I've seen both already, too bad for CTV.)

Reminder The following programs never made it to air (yet) : "Athens", "Commando Nanny", "Kevin Hill", "Related By Family" and "Robson Arms".

In conclusion CTV bought lots of programming last spring.. Most of CTV's new shows became hits, like the expected hit "CSI: NY" and other like "Lost" and "Desperate Housewives" surprised people. This past TV season CTV bought too much American programming. Given that CTV has a proven success in selecting hits, CTV had a lack of many timeslots opening up midseason. This forced CTV to return to its perennial bad habit of neglecting some of its programs. Some shows and some episode were pre-empted during their first run o­n American networks and other shows were pushed to fringe broadcast times. CTV was lucky, it bought the right programs this past year, however it did dissatisfying more than a few of its viewers this past year.