Fox launch a charm offensive to get Fringe fans off the Valium regarding the move to the Friday Night 'death slot'...

Fox, dismayed at our dismay on hearing the dismal news that Fringe is to move to Friday nights (TV's traditional ante-room to the execution-chamber), have responded to the funereal web-gloom by putting together a surprisingly audacious video lampooning the waves of despair about the news - and even quoting those who have been doing the bulk of the doom-saying.

The video uses clips from Fringe interspersed with nay-saying recent quotes from websites and blogs, and promises to 'reanimate' Friday night with Fringe. Fox’s senior VP of marketing and special projects Dean Norris said that the company had the idea to create the anti-propaganda video after the success of the film-style web trailer for the excellent Entrada: “We started getting feedback from the viewers that basically said, ‘How could Fox do something so cool for a show they’re going to kill?’ We started reading these things and said, ‘Wait! We have to address this!’”

Apparently the aim in moving Fringe to Fridays is to actually make some kind of experiment (not the first Fox has tried with Fringe in the last few months) to reform the bad rep of the slot: “We are trying to rebrand Friday, and what we’re trying to do with this show specifically is make it kind of like forbidden fruit...We want that teen demographic that might not be our audience right now to say, ‘That this is a show my parents might not want me to watch — but I’m going to watch it, anyway.’”.

Why can't they do that on Thursdays?

It's clever, but you can understand why such a bold tactic is needed on Fox's part at this point, as SFTV fans have in recent years seen both Firefly and Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles moved to Friday nights shortly prior to the axe falling. My own feeling is that Fox might have tried this particular scheduling-offensive a long time ago and with a much more reliable ratings-earner than Fringe (or, for that matter, any SF or horror-based TV show).

In any case, I admit that I welcome the news that Fringe is to be far more horror-focused after the initial episodes in the new year, and I wish it luck in changing the fortunes of the Friday Night Death Slot. And I like the video. But I still think Fox are as confused about Fringe's future as they have been about where it should go in season three. And if Fox does have a real plan for the show's future, and isn't just playing dice with the Other Universe, I'm still not sure that it's the plan that they're telling us about in this vid...

MTV

IF YOU ENJOYED THIS ARTICLE, PLEASE HELP SUPPORT OUR SITE, AT NO COST WITH ONE CLICK ON THE FACEBOOK 'LIKE' BUTTON BELOW: