Competition Becomes Fierce for Sunday Variety Shows

Rather than being TV variety shows in Sunday, the programs became similar to 4 hour long blockbuster movie. All of which are different by the fact that it’s only ‘real.’

 

Public TV Sunday variety shows have now become close to 4 hours long. From 4 to 8 in afternoon, KBS, MBC, and SBS’s ‘Sunday variety shows’ is making a domination. KBS 2TV [Come Back Superman], [One Night Two Days], MBC [A Real Man], SBS [Roomate], and [Running Man] are broadcasted in 3 public TV channels. All of these programs doesn’t even have commercials during thier break so it is like watching 4 hours of blockbsuter variety movie.

 

But with this golden time of 4 to 8 ‘o clock, each broadcasting stations are having a ‘emotional battle.’ It’s like ‘We never wanted to do it but other broadcasting stations doing it so we have no choice.’ In this saying, ‘other broadcastings’ indicate KBS and ‘we’ indicate MBC. In July 27th, MBC decided to start their variety shows at 4′o clock, airing 10 minutes early. Their stance is that ‘KBS did it first so we are doing it too.’ SBS didn’t extend their broadcasting time still but blamed KBS for Sunday variety’s shows’ long time.

 

For MBC and SBS’s ‘KBS blaming,’ KBS responded “The broadcasting time is not important. The most important thing is entertainment.” To be more specific, audiences will never watch the extended program if it’s not entertaining enough.

 

It should be the staff’s honest feeling to broadcast all their efforted program takings. In fact, it’s obviously true that ‘Observation variety shows’ like SBS’s [Roomate] tend to have lots of recordings to broadcast. Also considering the amount of commercials of each broadcasting time, they can earn reasonable revenue too.

 

However, fighting for this extended 10 minutes has to be something to ponder about since Sunday variety shows are now icon of each broadcasting stations. If you extend 10 minutes earlier, will audiences continuosly watch that program? TV remote controls are present to shift channels. Including the cable channels, numerous channels are existing and if their current program is boring, they can just change it.

 

The thing that the broadcasting stations should prioritize is not ‘We have to do it first and do more than anybody else.’ It should be ‘How are we going to secure audiences’ eyes?’ Reporter: Moon Wan-sik Translator: Yoon Pyung-hae