Grading Fall Television’s Hits And Misses

Photo Credit: CBS

Wisdom of the Crowd — D-

If FOX’s APB failed, it is weird to think that CBS thought that Wisdom of the Crowd would be a success in the fall. Telling the story of crowd-sourced crime solving, the series was highly improbable and weird. It didn’t help that Jeremy Piven was accused of sexual assault and harassment forcing the network to pull the show early to try and save face.

The bad publicity coupled with a truly terrible series makes for a bad combination at the network. It has you wonder why CBS even threw their name behind something so bad, especially when they’re usually quite talented at picking out shows. At least cancelling the show could give someone else a better opportunity to shine instead of this train wreck of a series.

It’s not as if the show was a critical success that got bludgeoned by Piven’s personal life. It received overwhelmingly negative reviews which tarnished its reputation early on and had most viewers tune out quickly. Despite Piven arguing his innocence, the increasing amount of women coming forward has only made the show more difficult to watch.

Even though the ratings have been steady and modest, they’re not good enough to make up for the poor publicity. CBS consistently runs into trouble with their lack of female characters, and cancelling Wisdom of the Crowd could give the network the opportunity to snage a different kind of show. Is there anything worse that they could try out while that show continues to fail in the eyes of viewers? My guess is that there will be a new fall show in this time slot next year.