Big News: Ugly Betty Premiere Will Be 2 Hours!
June 10, 2009 by Tom
Check out the news from The Futon Critic: Ugly Betty will begin season 4 with a 2-hour premiere!
Interestingly, Betty’s season premiere will air on October 9th at 9/8c, a week or two after most of the network’s other premieres. The first regular showing after the two hour episode will be Friday, October 16.
I wonder if the two hour episode will be two episodes back-to-back. I’m guessing this is the case – this, along with the back-to-back 2-hour finale episode, makes up a little for the episodes lost during the WGA strike. This puts the show that much closer to being eligible for syndication.
If that’s the case, (not to look too far ahead), the chances of renewal for a 5th season are higher, especially if the ratings don’t tank any further.
In related news, I noticed from the same release that Dancing With The Stars is having a three-night premiere, with two of the episodes being 2 hours (holy cow!)
But, back on Ugly Betty, now it’ll be a lot of fun to start speculation about what’s going to happen, who the guest stars will be, and what kind of tone the show will take in season 4.
It’s just great to have a date to look forward to!
Image: Splashnewsonline.com
Technically, two-hour episodes have to be considered two separate episodes, even if they have one title that is designated as “Part I” and “Part II”. Double episodes have to be edited in such a way that they can air separately once a show goes into syndication. I don’t think that our two-hour season finale that we just saw a few weeks ago was necessarily intended to be a two-hour event. Those episodes were probably conceived as two separate episodes, thus the two different episode titles and no “Part I” and “Part II” designations. I would imagine that ABC is counting them as two separate episodes, that way if they were to (God forbid) decide not to pick up the “back nine”, this two-hour premiere would be counted as two episodes from the standard initial order of thirteen episodes.
Yay!!! 2 hours of UB!! I’m wondering if they are having a two hour episode to make up for the later premiere date.. I agree with Sir Lizard thst it will probably be 2 separate episodes like the finale.I’m guessing the first hour will address the issues in the cliffhanger..Daniel dealing w/Molly’s death/the mystery who Wili saw/Claire & Cal’s “adopted child” (altho that issue will probably be on-going for a while)/Betty at her new editor’s job & the aftermath of her break-up w/Matt & dealing with him as her new boss..Then the second hour will be some other things going on & possibly some of the same issues from the first hour.. esp. w/Betty..
Okay so I am super excited for the premiere of course. BUT (and its a big one) why is it that they are moving it to a Friday? They are setting the show up for failure. The demo audience for this show will most likey be out and enjoying their weekend. Sure they could watch later but then the show will have low ratings and get dropped. This really sounds suspect to me. What do you guys think?
soo xcited! I just ♥ ugly betty!
I so love Ugly Betty…even if they moved the airing night, I would still watch it. As long as I have my DVR I won’t miss anything
CAN’T WAIT!!
No ugly betty tonight. Something is soo not right. The DVR said it recorded UB, but when i looked at the channel listing – no UB! When i ran the show that was recorded … NO UB! What happened????