TVSquad

When the San Diego Comic-Con opened its doors to allow every corner of television onto their floors, they weren't kidding. After seeing the roster of panels, I'm surprised the original panel from PBS's Washington Week didn't field questions from guys dressed in Transformer cosplay.

Apparently, Warner Brothers set up a panel for just about every television show that have in development including Patricia Heaton's new ABC sitcom The Middle, making it the most "fish out of water" selection for a panel at the geek confab.

And so did the geeks in attendance. The panel only drew around 75 attendees and studio heads ordered Heaton not to introduce the panel because the crowd was too small.

It seems like a no-brainer that television and Comic-Con would go together like peanut butter and jelly. But TV has actually been a bit slow to the game and viewed their presence at Comic-Con as something that goes together like peanut butter and regular butter (trust me, I've tried peanut butter and butter, and it's not good).

This year, studios have recognized the importance of the annual geek con-fab and are presenting more shows and panels than ever before. There is going to be more TV at the Con than you can shake a stick at, so don't forgot your shaking sticks.

Why so many? Variety reports that studios and networks are recognizing the buzz they can generate at the convention through electronic social networking and good ol' word-of-mouth by showcasing and premiering exclusive screenings of their shows.

Okay, enough already! Personally, I'm glad that the grass roots campaign to save Jericho turned out well, and I think that the Mars candy bar campaign to save Veronica Mars is cute, but a futile attempt (at least according to show creator Rob Thomas). But, when a television studio tells you to sign a petition to save a show that the network didn't seem to really want in the first place you're going a bit too far.

The studio I'm talking about is Warner Brothers Television, and the show I'm talking about is ABC's Traveler. We actually received an email from someone over at WBTV promoting an online petition asking for a second season of the show, which has done okay since its premiere. The petition says that 8 episodes of the show aren't enough and the network should consider bringing the show back for a new season. As I write this there are 513 signatures, which is probably not enough to send to the programming wonks over at the Alphabet Network.