TVSquad

The only way Heroes would ever get on ITV is if it was on one of the digital channels like ITV2 or ITV4. If it takes off I wouldn't be surprised to see a repeat on BBC3 or even the next episode on BBC3 right after it finishes on BBC2 like they used to do with 24. Those were the days. The best way to watch 24 is in batches with no ads.

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The UK Apprentice is great though, plus family guy only airs in Adult Swim type timeslots.

I am downloading this, but hopefully the beeb will air it like they did all those years ago, Sunday at 9pm, before Sky ruined everything and poached it.

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Joel, the only way that Heroes would be more suitable for ITV is if every character was involved in multiple love triangles with one another, and spent their days walking around half naked discussing whom they haven't slept with yet.

BBC Two is the best home for it, provided that they don't dump it in Buffy's old 6:45pm time-slot, which would require copious edits to remove all that cheerleader gore.

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A point of order here. BBC Two is not "government-run". Although it's funded by a compulsary licence fee (one per TV owning household), the government only gets a say every so-often about how much the licence fee goes up by.

This distinction is important because it does mean that the BBC offers a politically-neutral service - especially in news.

Only the BBC World Service gets cash directly from the government, but that too has checks and balences to ensure non-partisan reporting.

Back on track: ITV bought one show to broadcast on their main ITV1 network - Six Degrees. And they've now decided against showing it on the main channel. I can't remember a time when any US show aired in prime time on ITV1. It's a long time ago now.

I fear for BBC Two running Hereoes in a 6.45pm slot, but given the relative success of Torchwood at 9pm on a Wednesday, that kind of slot might work.

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"This distinction is important because it does mean that the BBC offers a politically-neutral service - especially in news."

You're kidding, right? The BBC is very left wing, and if you can't see that then you really, really need to broaden the political spectrum of the news media you expose yourself to. We all remember the BBC reporter (Barbara Plett (sp?)) weeping over the terrorist Arafat, and this is typical of the BBC/Guardian reading mindset. Go here for countless further examples:

http://biased-bbc.blogspot.com/

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I must stand up in support of Adam Bowie and against your adjectival idiocity. You are factually incorrect calling the BBC "Government run". It has a long history of independence. Just because biased-BBC says something does not make it true. Neither is it "stuffy" - although that would have been fair comment 10 or 15 years ago. But there again, your experience of the BBC would appear to be either very limited or at a remove. You apper to see the BBC as one lumpen organisation, somewhere in west London. It is neither.

Most broadcasters in the UK would regard the BBC as a standard setter (whether they be Guardian reading, Telegraph reading or even Mail reading). It makes plenty of mistakes. With about 30+hours of output for every hour of the day, of course it does. Your comment does little for the authority of your blog.
And, yes I do work for the BBC and have done for a long time. And I read the Guardian - and the FT, and the Times and the Spectator - where you will find plenty of BBC alumni. It's a broad church, like too few other broadcasters in the rest of the world.

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Trivia: Italian TV Italia 1 (already home to Smallville and other successful US TV shows such as CSI's thousand incarnations) is said to have bought the rights to the Italian dub which (rumor says) will be aired in the first half of 2007.

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*Remembers how BBC broadcast How I Met Your Mother*

*bangs head against wall*

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And "Arrested Development," and "Seinfeld," and "American Dad!" and way too many others. Note to American TV producers; if you want your shows to survive in Britain, make sure they swear copiously and take their clothes off every five minutes - that seems to be the only way for them to be taken seriously...

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'The BBC is very left wing' - You'v3e been watching too much Fox News if you think the BBC is left wing, though i would not want to say the BBC is entirely neutral - after all, what news programme or journalist can ever be completely unbiased?

To defend the BBCs decision over time slots, the BBC has to put a show in the most appropriate time slot - The BBC only has so many timeslots that it can fill and it can't put on all of the American imports in prime time slots because where are the British TV shows going to go?

American TV shows don't need swearing and nudity to be taken seriously, they just need to be written decently (like heroes) and it always helps if they're not filmed in dodgy soft focus

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