WALKING DEAD GETS OFF TO A RUNNING START

AMC’s The Walking Dead came back to life on Sunday, delivering 12.3 million viewers, the most viewers ever to tune in to the zombie tale. The result for the cable-TV series’ season debut was particularly impressive given the fact that it aired opposite the Grammy Awards and nevertheless attracted 6.8 million viewers in the 18-49 […]

PTC WANTS WALKING DEAD RE-RATED

Cable outlet AMC’s The Walking Dead has been averaging more than 11 million viewers per episode — an audience bigger than what most broadcast shows attract. It has also caught the eye of the Parents Television Council, the Christian watchdog group that has long battled the broadcast networks over sex and violence in their programs. […]

WALKING DEAD WALKS BACK TO DISH NETWORK

AMC and its Cablevision sibling networks will be returning to the DISH satellite network following the settlement of a breach-of-contract lawsuit by Cablevision against DISH over the now-defunct Voom HD service. Cablevision had sued DISH for more than $2.5 billion after DISH dropped the service. The settlement calls for DISH to pay Cablevision $700 million […]

SEASON DEBUT OF WALKING DEAD SETS RECORD

Signaling cable television’s increasing robustness in its competition with broadcast TV, the third season of AMC’s The Walking Dead drew 10.9 million viewers Sunday night — a record for a basic-cable dramatic series. Perhaps even more impressive was the fact that 7.3 million — or 67 percent — of the audience was in the key […]

AMC THEATRES IMPOSES DRESS CODE IN WAKE OF SHOOTING

The AMC theater chain on Friday banned face-covering masks and “offensive” costumes at its theaters in the wake of the shooting at a Colorado theater where The Dark Knight Rises was being shown. The theater’s action came after eyewitnesses told of seeing the alleged shooter dressed in black and wearing a mask and body armor […]

EMMY NOMINEES ANNOUNCED

This year’s Emmy awards nominations were something of a rerun in their own right. Like last year, AMC’s Mad Men garnered the most nominations for a dramatic series — 17 — and ABC’s Modern Family for a comedy — 14. Not a single show airing on the four major networks was nominated in the drama […]

SHOULD “STRIKING” CABLE NETS ALLOW THEIR SHOWS ONLINE?

Viacom, which is engaged in the equivalent of a strike against DirecTV, and AMC, which is engaged in a similar action against DISH, are taking two opposite approaches to the Internet during the current crises. Viacom, whose channels went dark on DirecTV earlier this week, has pulled its shows off the Internet in an apparent […]

IS ONLINE VIDEO CANNIBALIZING CABLE TV?

Online video sites like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon and iTunes that offer older TV episodes — including whole seasons of some series — are likely hurting cable TV channels that also offer some of the same shows, according to Anthony DiClemente, media analyst at Barclays Capital. MediaPost‘s MediaDailyNews.com quoted a note to clients from DiClemente in […]

CHINESE COMPANY BUYS AMC THEATER CHAIN

China’s flirtation with Hollywood took on the aspects of a full-scale marriage as one of its biggest exhibitors, Dalian Wanda Group, agreed to buy AMC Entertainment, America’s second largest theater chain after Regal Entertainment, for $2.6 billion in debt and equity and an additional $500 million to be used principally for renovations. The New York […]

MICHIGAN MOVIE GOER SUES OVER THEATER CONCESSION PRICES

A young moviegoer in the Detroit suburb of Livonia has gone to court to fight a policy by AMC Theaters in that city to bar movie patrons from bringing in snacks, purchased outside the theater. Joshua Thompson has filed a class-action lawsuit seeking not only an end to the policy but a refund for all […]

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