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New Set designed by Jack Morton

Broadcast primetime TV is a mix of stale sitcoms, tons of stale and stupid reality shows, the same washed-out crime dramas (i.e., CBS's THREE FBI: "Insert Here" shows, multiple NCIS shows, multiple CSIs) and the same washed-out medical dramas. Then they jump the shark, add relationships to the shows instead of focusing on the premise of the program. The Good Doctor used to be about an autistic savant doctor. Now, it's about his relationships with women and the relationships between other doctors/nurses at the hospital. Grey's Anatomy - same thing. The Goldbergs keeps going even though the 'kids' are now in their early-to-late 20s. I don't know how they do, the show has jumped the shark since the loss of George Segal and Jeff Garlin's departure. Abbott Elementary isn't that bad, on the other hand, and nor is Ghosts on CBS, but sitcoms for the most part have no life to them anymore. And yes, political messaging has destroyed many of these primetime shows. They just can't seem to have an unbiased plot on a drama or sitcom anymore - it has to show activism in some way. Game shows - you can't seem to find any contestant on any primetime or daytime show (except maybe Jeopardy!/Wheel) that isn't on five energy drinks' worth of caffeine. The Price is Right is one of the biggest examples, but even the last few primetime shows (The Wheel, Beat Shazam, Press Your Luck) are like this too... Late night TV shows have also declined to new lows. Same jokes about former President Trump EVERY NIGHT on every single show. We get it, I can't stand him either, but he's no longer POTUS. Surely is there anything else to make fun about? Segments are mundane and cookie-cutter compared to previous hosts (Leno's Headlines, Craig Ferguson, Geoff and Secretariat, Carnac on Johnny Carson). They have little to no creative value to viewers. I love Bill Maher, but I don't watch any other late night show. That ship sailed when Letterman, Ferguson, and Leno retired. Even the soap opera fans are noticing extremely poor writing and the lack of nuance on Y&R, B&B and General Hospital, compared to 20-30 years ago. Days already went to Peacock (to die, probably). It looks as though the rest of the soaps are also on life support. Do NOT get me started on cable TV. What was entertaining (Cubs games and Bozo on WGN, great movies and Night Tracks on TBS, Cartoon Express on USA etc.) has become a wasteland of binge-watching repeats, zillions of commercials (of which Limu Emu gets at least 1/3 of the airtime), and reality shows that keep getting worse by the year. TruTV aired 'Jurassic World' last night. The channel for live, rolling court coverage and analysis is now running not just hours of Impractical Jokers, but also MOVIES. What gives! Nickelodeon = zillions of SpongeBob repeats with oodles of commercials. Food Network = tons of food competitions, very few how-to cooking shows. Where art thou, Essence of Emeril, Barefoot Contessa, etc.? TWC spends all night running Highway Through Hell repeats (and all day on weekends) and once in a while, they will shove those away if there's major tornadoes. The ghosts of Dr. John Hope and Dave Schwartz haunt the studios, I bet. What was Chuck Roberts and Gordon Graham on Headline News 24 hours a day has turned into WEST WING repeats. Oh, and a zillion Forensic Files showings. Might as well call it TNT2 at this point. TLC's constant reality garbage, same with Bravo, USA, MTV, Discovery Channel. GSN's constant Harvey Feud repeats, too! Isn't he on a few other cable channels...TVLand maybe? Honestly, I'd be fine only getting ESPN, ESPN2, and a few other sports networks a la carte. The rest of cable TV is garbage. Yes, that includes CNN/FOX News/MSNBC. Honestly, I stopped watching TV for the most part after the start of the pandemic. And for the most part, except for some sports, and maybe the local news, I haven't come back. I would rather watch a classic movie or Seinfeld repeat than 95% of what's on TV nowadays. RANT OVER.

A look at what’s to come

There used to be fun to TV in the afternoons, where people did live shows and there wasn't a news story to be found. Now the fun is limited to the last part of the newscast and met/sports anchor interplay, and with even Jerry and Steve in reruns now, it's either bad court shows, news, or repeats of sitcoms only palatable to older audiences, and the newer tolerable sitcoms are absurdly easy to access in full and commercial-free (or with saner commercials) on streaming services. Only three game shows (and one, Family Feud, doesn't even get near a 1/10 of an entendre and makes me embarrassed to watch) are left, and it seems except for PBS, broadcast, cable and streaming have unilaterally decided that all kids watch is Fortnite and play Roblox and refuse to put money into any children's content (the Saturday morning E/I Hearst 'for kids...but really old people' racket doesn't count), and David Zazlav showed his true hand by culling every bit of kid's content from HBO Max and ready to cut Cartoon Network to the bone. Don't get me started on the refuse that is the Discovery networks, or alleged movie channels Sundance and IFC carrying not one independent film. I'm sure cable providers actually want to cut useless filler like MTV2, TruTV and 4 of the Discovery networks, but the big companies are like 'oh, you don't want Yellowstone or the NCAA tournament? Or SpongeBob? Welp, then you don't get CBS or Nick because you don't want to carry a diminished TV Land!' Big events get held hostage because of small networks which started as 'special interest', but now carry nothing but reruns.

Very "LA" response to KTLA - reminds me of an Entertainment Tonight set

I know CBS dealt with delays and such, given the magnitude of these changes, I wished they would've had longer window (at least three weeks) to promote these changes on the air, instead of three days before implementation. They could've aired some "coming soon" promos the week before Christmas.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm one of the majority of folks that stream an awful lot. I watch very little broadcast TV. I stream my favorite CBS shows on Paramount Plus. I stream some ABC shows on Hulu too. However, I do long for the days of old-school TV news. Where I'm educated and informed without a lot of sensationalism, partisan politics and negativity. I wonder how many local stations are adapting to the idea of streaming local newscasts, where everybody can watch the news at their own convenience.

It really would’ve helped if they’d actually promoted the damn thing instead of waiting for the 11th hour to do it. It made sense to move most of the local news to a station that actually gets ratings, but the branding is going to be confusing, and is counter to what CBS is doing in the rest of the country. Not even WCCO, arguably their most successful station, is going to get this treatment (I know it’s because of the radio station, but still). Is CBS so damaged as a brand in LA that they have to put the KCAL name on everything? That set does look fantastic, though. I’ll give them that.

I think the block that used to be "The '90s Are All That" which eventually became NickRewind was the only reason TeenNick existed in the first place. It was the saving grace for the channel when everything else around it just screamed "A channel that exists only for filler." Even NickRewind succumbed to decay in its final year or so, to the point that the block - which was what got me interested in the '90s and the '80s in the first place - was a sad shell of its former self. Now, TeenNick is the home of "Henry Danger" and "AFV" reruns. Sad, but not surprising, considering MTV has basically inserted itself into a pattern of show "Ridiculousness" almost entirely on loop when nothing new is on, pretend to care when a new episode of a show other than "Ridiculousness" is on, and repeat. No music-related programming at all. This is what television as we know it has come to. Back in the day, you'd have a wide variety of programming to choose from on a wide variety of channels. Now, it's reruns, reruns, reruns. It's crass and exploitative shows posing as inside looks at child pageants or dance teams. It's actively spitting in the faces of viewers who long for the days gone by and showing no remorse for it. It's true crime dramas when there are already too many of them to go around. (Apparently, we haven't learned our lesson with oversaturation, which is what caused The Great Video Game Crash of 1983.) Channels have lost their plot altogether. No care or thought is put into making a good programming lineup anymore. And somehow, TCM remains the shining example of a channel that actually cares about its viewers in the modern age (a trait that has become all but extinct now). Rewind TV, Antenna TV, and MeTV don't count, since they are diginets, but they also show more care than just about the entirety of cable barring live sports.

Corporate greed. The companies want to force cable companies to give in to the bundle. Are there any viewers of the binge-watch Henry Danger repeats on Teen Nick? It wasn't long ago that MTV2 was devoted to alternative music programming, and Teen Nick used to have reruns of GUTS and Double Dare among other classic kids game shows...ahem, it used to be Nick GaS. Even their '90s Are All That' block of Rugrats, Kenan & Kel, etc. seems to have gone away.

And one would think an abundance of choice would make tv better but it's had the exact opposite effect. Something left out of my earlier essay, lol. Cable channels rerunning the same thing ALL day long. I'm looking at you Rediculousness MTV, or SpongeBob Nickelodeon. Does Rediculousness even do that well in the ratings to be rerun that often? I wouldnt even mind an endless array of cable channels playing movies if said feature was inline with it's niche. Example: a movie like Notorius (about the music industry) on VH 1.

You hit every individual nail on the head. It's like sometime in the 2010s, exectives just forgot how to produce good tv. Jimmy Kimmel is the cheif suspect. I thought the nonstop Trump coverage would've died after the election, but Kimmel continues to go on and on. Find material outside of "orange man and red party bad" EVERY night. Saw that too!! Soap writers seem to be ignorant that repetitive poor writing and not just changes in viewing habits have lead to the genre's collapse. The only reason those shows retain an audience is viewer loyalty. It's sad what's become of kids tv. Back in the day even my adult family members could sit watch and enjoy because the writing was smarter and didn't dumb things down for children. All kids in my family look at now are Co Co Melon, and watch other children play with toys and video games on YouTube. Don't get me started on just how and low bar some of the kids YouTube content is ex: Dobby ASMR. Gone are the days of Cartoon Network Fridays, saturday morning Disney and Nick Jr reruns on ABC and CBS, good shows on Nickelodeon, or actual new Sesame Street episodes on PBS. Big events like Fairly Odd Parents tv movies or deep shows like Avatar the Last Airbender would be hard to find today. Children's television seemed to fall off somewhere around 2012-13. That was around the time Victorious ended on Nick and Good Luck Charlie ended on Disney. Since then, both networks have failed to produce a consistent class of hit shows. What sucks is that despite the lack of programming, they won't rerun the old stuff (and not in a decent time slot if they do).

And may I say also, that sports wasn't always all the hype and extreme graphics (and gobs of them) and loud music all the time; when I was a boy, for instance, a young man by the name of Jim Nantz was in Studio 43 in New York at the CBS Broadcast Center for CBS Sports doing a halftime show called The Prudential College Football Report-- this was, IMO, a studio show in its purest form (just scores, highlights, and many a time a short feature story/interview on a headline story in college football as of that Saturday). The title of it was an original too-- now, it can't have that originality (it has to be the generic Halftime Report, with one of many sponsors).

Old-school local TV news is just about gone. Small markets have dropped news departments like flies, and those that remain are surviving on spit, chewing gum, and advertising. In my over-100 market, It's a wonder that my CBS station (KIMA) still has two locally-based newscasts and Sinclair hasn't taken a wrecking ball to the 1950s studios in Yakima. KNDU/NBC has gone 'NonStop Local' eliminating any type of local flavor to the name of the newscast and to its personalities. They are one step into the grave and one step closer to moving towards a permanent semi-satellite of KHQ. It's a ticking time bomb for small markets and for any mid-market over #50, I'm afraid. mrschimpf - At least the Weekend Adventure shows are relatively high-quality. They claim to target ages 12-16, but in reality my 60+ year old mother is watching them. Too bad Rock the Park was canceled, as I enjoyed that program. It's filler that could easily become infomercials (i.e., Weekend Marketplace), so I am happy about that. Yes, for the most part, that's the life of a typical middle-class American child. Fortnite, Roblox, and lots and lots of sports practices/games. The days of kids getting up to watch Ninja Turtles and Bugs Bunny has long past. If anything, they are playing soccer or little league games and/or getting on Fortnite early on a Sat AM. Even 20 years ago, there were Saturday cartoons on broadcast TV albeit most for E/I credit. Select Nick and Nick Jr. programs were on CBS, Kenny the Shark and Tutenstein were on NBC, and Disney Channel programs aired on ABC. Not to mention Fox Box/4 Kids TV. Why bother when a 7-year-old can find his favorite 'Plankton tries to steal the secret Krabby Patty formula' episode of SpongeBob on Netflix! That plot has been repeated ad nauseum for the last 20+ years on the show. Lastly, I would like to know how NCIS has any relation to the Sundance Film Festival (Sundance Channel) or how Two and a Half Men is related to independent filmmaking (IFC). Anybody? Anyyyyyy-body? (crickets)

Nailed it. I’d love it if we could get stuff a la carte too, even though that’s never going to happen. Outside of live sports, I barely watch TV. I get my fix from streaming, a little bit of social media, and YouTube (which costs absolutely nothing). Local news too, but even that doesn’t require traditional TV anymore (unless your station owner acts like they’re in the 1990s.)

You know it's bad when networks (like NBC & ABC) are moving shows to their online service (DOOL to Peacock, DWTS to Disney+) and moving digital content to replace it like NBC News Daily and Top Story with Tom Llamas. Fox O&Os and affiliates are virtually all-local during the day aside from 1-4 pm and overnights depending on the station and timezone. KVVU in Las Vegas has virtually achieved this and several other stations aren't far behind them. The other networks (their affiliates) want a piece of this and that's why we had the rumor of the 10pm hour going away. I'm surprised the networks didn't do this years earlier when they cancelled most of their soap operas, instead, replacing them with talk, news and game shows. Even the game shows have taken over ABC. Even the ones that may precede the primetime lineup that have been syndicated since the beginning of time (even going back 40-ish years). News and Sports have little repeat value to them, that's why they're all over the networks. Cable TV may as well be dead in the water since it's the "bundle" that's holding it all together, even if all of the content could live on it's own streaming service. If this had happened back in the 40s like the movie industry, it's vertical integration all over again.

I don't know how much this article has merit and how much of it is political slant, but there is no question that network TV is losing viewership. There's very little I find on that's interesting and unlike the TV shows of the olden days, it's just too much effort to follow anything anymore. I liked the way old TV shows were better. It was down and dirty and entertaining at the same time. Plus, you knew who all the actors were, even the character actors who would step out of Hollywood on occasion to be guest stars on the shows. Anyway, just thought I'd pass this along. https://donsurber.blogspot.com/2023/01/tvs-awful-year.html

I think the more confusing thing (at least for me) is why they aren’t calling it “CBS News Los Angeles.” I get that KCAL gets viewers and KCBS doesn’t, but when the whole point is to unify the branding and put CBS News at the forefront, this doesn’t exactly help. You’d think they’d at least do what KPIX is doing and cobrand the newscasts, but they’re not even doing that. I haven’t seen any mentions of CBS News Los Angeles outside of the website and references to the streaming channel. It’s all “KCAL News.” On the last CBS2 Morning News, they introduced the entire KCAL morning team. At one point, one of the anchors said something to the extent of “it’s a little confusing, we’re trying to get used to it ourselves.” When even the on-air talent is confused by the arrangement, and most viewers won’t find out until tomorrow because of a lack of promotion, I don’t think they’re setting themselves up for success. I like the overall strategy given the ratings mess at KCBS, but I don’t like the implementation so far.

It's not about cost-cutting, it's about more effectively using the power of owning two stations. By putting different and better programming on both stations, they can sell ads on both stations. Right now, they're trying to sell ads on a newscast nobody watches on one station, and infomercials on another. There's no guarantee that people will start watching right away, but there will now be more reason for viewers to linger on both of the stations CBS owns, and it's at least a more compelling sell to potential advertisers.

Still think it’s silly to run CBS Mornings (east coast feed) on KCBS 4am-6am. Just simulcast the local newscast on both channels from 4am-7am and then exclusively on KCAL from 7am and on. That’s the best way to build ratings for it. The argument that KCBS is in the basement ratings wise and that’s why we are moving the newscast to KCAL doesn’t quite hold. What’s switching channels going to magically do for ratings?

It makes sense KCBS has been in the basement since the 80s. It was time for something new. Plus thy still have 6am simulcast.

This is a brilliant set. I can see the cues taken from the CBS Times Square set and Studio 57 in NY. I wonder if the CBS Evening News/Weekend News will use this on days when they broadcast from LA.

Meteorologist Stephanie Mead posted this last week. If you look past what she is wearing, it looks like weather is back in studio while news is still in the newsroom. Based on the background, they are probably keeping their current graphics package.

I always wondered why one of the local stations didn't format itself as an all movies Channel. Do it like they used to do with a local host, somebody entertaining or witty, maybe have viewrs call in to rag on the movie or have a sidebar where people can make comments like a lot of the YouTube podcast type shows. I know there are movies only diginets, but that live factor is missing. Watching movies with a local host has to be better than what's on most independent stations these days which seems mostly to be Court shows and Oprah clones. I think that's kind of what I'm getting at. The entire broadcast industry used to have plenty of fun. Now that it's all corporate, I don't know if they even have it in them to be able to give us fun. That seems more like something that would come naturally to the local owner, but not to some corporate suit.

It literally has inspirations from the CBS Mornings set in New York, like the wide display at the top and the line accents.

I stream, cast or airdrop everything these days. Very rarely do I watch TV (in the traditional way) or listen to the radio even. There's just too much content spread across too many platforms. I too long for the days on old-school local TV news were stations would truly compete with each other. Hard-hitting investigative stories are pretty much non-existent and even big events like election night lack the excitement it once did.

As the article suggests, cord cutting isn't the sole issue. Cable networks seem to be clueless that they've abandoned their niches in favor of saturated content: reality shows and sitcom reruns. MTV & VH 1 don't play music videos anymore, TLC lacks educational content in favor of Honey Boo-Boo, and umpteen channels show Friends. Not to mention the original content channels produce seems watered down compared to their old offerings: examples BET, Disney Channel, Nickelodeon, and Cartoon network. Audiences aren't that dumb. Add to that, the heavy handed political messaging in shows. Viewers can tell when something is poorly written or cookie cutter and will turn away. Broadcast tv is stale, it's current lineup of shows lack imagination compared to scripted streaming offerings. Finally, we all know the problem with cable news. Sensationalism, hyper partisanship and toxic journalism that seeks to get eyeballs and reactions from viewers, rather than educating and informing them. With these poor choices, it's no wonder audiences are turning away from television.

Jesus Christ, he's anchored the 11 for nearly a year, and IT'S THE HOLIDAYS.

KCAL News Mornings I suggest you look at KCAL's ratings & CBS 2's ratings before making statements. KCAL is perceived differently in the community despite its duploy. If you lived in Los Angeles, you'd understand.

New meteorologist from WHDH in Boston. I wonder if anyone is leaving or she's becoming a sixth full time meteorologist. I can't see them having 6 full time meteorologists and Mark McGinnis as the part time fill in. I can see Greg Dutra joining GMA weekend and Jaisol taking her spot and Mark McGinnis continue his part time fill in gig.

I agree 100%

I don't understand why, however. What is the conflict / elimination of competition issue there? Not to mention that Forum is a quality company. Reminds me of when WBNS and WTHR got approved in 60 days. Maybe my theory that Tegna has some pull with the federal government might not be that far off.

Does anyone know why the stations chose Jan 5 for the premiere? Jan 9 would be better start date since it's a new work week. It would be better for their promos, with the 9s.

I don't get why Paramount Global doesn't move some of their lower-watched, nothing but reruns channels like MTV2, Teen Nick, Nicktoons, and MTV Classic to Pluto TV. We know the way retrans works is that all the big conglomerates want ALL of their channels carried on a provider, and if not, channels that people actually watch will get blacked out. Paramount and WBD seem to be the worst when letting minimally watched channels survive. Even NBCU has shut down channels that had almost no viewers. I think MTV2 and MTV Classic have long been among the lowest rated channels overall.

Two comments a little off topic. 1) Surprised I didn't hear the "Nationwide is on Your Side" tones at the beginning or end of the newscast. It was part of the WNCI top of the hour ID for many years. 2) That news set looks very similar to the one WTVN/WSYX had. WSYX had a more streamlined version, though.

And here is a shining example of that, IMO: this WATE TV-6 Live Eyewitness News evening edition from 1986 (from that ABC station in Knoxville, TN), for Monday, March 31, 1986.

Here's another thing: producers, even those co-owned with the linear networks, have been moving their best/most experimental/biggest budgeted shows to streaming-only, mostly leaving the broadcast and cable channels with their scraps. Even then, the vast majority of those scraps are put on streaming services the next day, disincentivizing viewers from watching it live. It's pretty telling that Yellowstone, which doesn't stream, free or otherwise, until a few months later outside of an authenticated TV app, is one of the only scripted shows to get any significant live ratings in recent years

As an aside, you know it's gotten bad when you're actually excited for the fact that over on B&B, Brooke and Taylor finally both kicked Ridge to the curb. The writers must've finally taken notice that we're sick of watching these two now-grandmothers battling each other over that man. 30+ years of it was more than enough.

Rabbit ears analog was way better. I preferred the static over scratching and glitching from digital.

So much of TV news is just political propaganda. It comes from either party operatives or their deep state sources. Maybe it was always this way, but it has never been more obvious that most of it is propaganda. I've completely tuned it out, which I probably shouldn't be doing, but what's the point of watching right-wing, deep state or left-wing Pravda on the tube anymore? It's just talking points repeated over and over again doing the whole Joseph Goebbels thing of repeating lies over and over again.

Well, the full video of the graphics usage is out with CBS NEWS Bay Area used as an example.

I blame the treatment of content as disposable as why TV is going down the drain.

The promotion on this newscast has been confusing. Will this also air on KCBS during the morning slot as well? Meaning will this be the only newscast for both KCBS and KCAL?

The original cast reacts to Barbara's passing. I would love for the OG cast to return with Whoopi as moderator. Have the show not just be about politics all the time, but older women's perspective on life.

It’s the right decision IMO. I know they haven’t made changes to week 18 so far, but I really wouldn’t blame the NFL if they postponed those games too.

So my question is, how will the sets be utilized? Will everything originate from the new set only. Is the new set for mornings and the KCBS set for evenings. Or will it continue as the new set for KCAL only and KCBS continues with their current set?

20/20 with Hugh and Barbara always came on after the TGIF lineup. That was Friday nights during the 1990s.

Breaking a bit of the fourth wall here, but we commissioned updates of Advantage from WC in 2019. They frankly were not great. Sometimes you just need to go in a completely different direction.

And previous listings suggested December 5th. As the holidays approach, I think we can safely assume that the program will not fully debut until January, unless credible info suggests otherwise. A suggestion for all users- since the launch date as moved several times, and it's all led to needless speculation, I'd recommend that we only post dates that are officially announced by the station, though probably not from their online guide. Press releases and anchor postings, ONLY, please.

On the one hand, they’re carrying on the recent Nexstar trend of wasting a newer and perfectly serviceable set (see: KXAN, WTTV, and especially KDVR). On the other hand, the Nexstar set they had until now looked a bit old when it was new. Not to get too off-topic, but all things considered, McCoy has taken surprisingly good care of WISH. They’ve added a number of reporters, and they’re even airing HBCU Football this season. Of course, a network affiliation would greatly help matters, but they’re working with what they’ve got. Hopefully McCoy puts the same investment into the new set.