PureDWTS Season 26: DWTS Junior Isn’t Happening, Abbreviated 4-Week Spinoff Instead
Just when I was beginning to get suspicious that we hadn’t heard anything definitive about DWTSJ yet, Tom dropped this tweet:
My thoughts? Given that nobody had heard a peep about DWTSJ since the initial announcement (including most of the crew, whose only indicator that things would be different was a memo sent out at the end of last season stating that they would be needed in the fall of 2017 for season 25, and the fall of 2018 for season 26), I’m guessing they just couldn’t pull together a whole new cast of celebs, pros, hosts, and judges quick enough for the spring season – or, somebody actually raised their hand and said “Guys, this idea’s a bit of a turd.” A 4-week, abbreviated season of DWTS sounds good to me – not sure people will bond with the cast quite as much as they do in a regular 10-week season, but I certainly welcome the break, as spring is when things kick up over at Pure World of Dance.
Part of me also wonders if the budget for American Idol has grown to such gargantuan proportions that they’re having to cut corners elsewhere – hence, a shortened, regular season of DWTS, where they can keep the same pros, hosts, and judges and probably mitigate costs better than undertaking a whole new revamp like DWTSJ.
Update: According to Tom, spring season isn’t regular DWTS – it’s a spinoff of sorts. All I can think of when I think “DWTS Spin-off” was that gadawful Dance Wars show that Bruno & Carrie Ann put on during the writers’ strike back in 2008…
Thoughts?
I was watching that clip someone posted on Twitter saying it’s going to be an “all ____ Season”. All-stars perhaps? People would know the celebs already so the issue of getting to know them wouldn’t be as much of a thing.
Almost sounds like “all access season”, but the sound definitely drops off so it’s hard to tell.
I just can’t believe that American Idol – a show that was cancelled due to abysmal ratings – is considered such a “get” by ABC that they would cancel a season of what is a top 15 show for them (DWTS). Is DWTS getting expensive to produce or what?
Courtney, PH, it’s possible this happened because of Bachelor. Bachelor is doing some sort of spin-off during the Winter Olympics called Bachelor Winter Games.
Either it’s going to run concurrently with the normal Bachelor season, or the normal Bachelor will take a couple weeks off to allow for Winter Games, and then the regular Bachelor season would run long, thus shortening the time for DWTS before the normal schedule for Bachelorette.
I think this could be a perfect chance to do an all star season. I think we all agree 13 weeks is too long for an all star season so having them do a 4 week season would be just enough. I think with the all stars we would already have some type of connection with them better than we would having new celebs for only 4 weeks. I would personally love to see some runner ups come back like Corbin, Hinch or Paige. I think it would be fun to give them a chance to try and win. Either way I like the mini 4 week season over dwts jr.
I’m just happy we get something, whatever it is.
I like your idea of a shorter all-star season, #aa.
I think Disney finds value in Idol because it generated pop artists and song hits for Fox that Disney recording and streaming labels would be glad to call their own.
The Bachelor also doesn’t complete with DWTS for ratings – it’s lower. It does GREAT in the summertime for ABC, but it’s not DWTS.
And they had plenty of time to claim they were going to do a full season of DWTS Jr.
Except it doesn’t, Nukegrrrl. You can count the number of artists with hit records after AI on probably ONE hand.
Four weeks? So, if a contestant survives week 1, they’re in the semi-finals?? LOL! Oh well, it’s better than nothing and/or DWTSJ.
Princess Heidi, they had plenty of time to commit to DWTS Jr., but they announced Bachelor Winter Games sometime last year. It was either after last winter’s Bachelor season or after Bachelorette. I can’t remember.
Ratings aside, the plan is that Winter Games airs in February, likely during that month-long period of the Winter Olympics.
To get a full season out of DWTS in the spring, they’d have to either bump their Tuesday night programming for February to run Winter Games and Bachelor concurrently because Bachelor takes the Monday slot, or they have to shorten the 10-week, 13-episode season of Bachelor, which they’re not going to do.
The likelihood is that Bachelor-related programming ends up being 14 weeks instead of 10 this winter, and that could account for the shortened DWTS format, especially given that Bachelor Winter Games had a formal announcement during one of the last two seasons.
Apologies for this weighty post but I have a theory. For anyone who watches Strictly, this spinoff could perhaps be similar to the format of a Strictly Christmas Special, where six all stars compete in a pre recorded show and a winner gets announced at the end of the show. They combine the judges scores with votes from the studio audience to determine the winner.
So in this case, it could be six different DWTS All Stars compete in each of the four live shows. Each of them performs a dance which is judged, then the viewers at home get a 30-45 minute window to vote online/via phone or however, in which time they can do pro performances/guest singers or whatever. Then at the end of the night, announce the winner and they get a mini trophy.
They could rotate the pros so perhaps each pro gets to compete in two of the four shows. Any pro not competing can be used for any special performances. The only sticky spot would be finding twenty four All Star celebs lol. Maybe they could mix it up and combine All Stars with new celebs who are willing to compete for a one off show. Obviously they would cast ringers and they might possibly get people with more star power as the show wouldn’t take up as much time and wouldn’t be as serious.
If I was an exec producer, that would be the sort of show I’d pitch if ABC asked me to come up with a cheap DWTS show that lasts four weeks. I wouldn’t link the four shows together, I’d have four one off shows in the format I explained above. It’s confusing but I reckon it could work. Ultimately the end game for ABC is to move American Idol to Mondays and rotate it with DWTS, but they need a temporary fix this year while Idol debuts and finds it’s footing, hence this much cheaper DWTS spinoff. Idol has drained most of the ABC budget, they have invested a lot to make it work and DWTS has paid the price.
I think you’re missing the point, Justin. They’ve known all along about the Bachelor crap, yet they committed to DWTS Jr despite knowing that. They analyze their schedules religiously all year long – neither was a surprise that necessitated a cut. Odds are they just realized it was a stupid idea OR they were having trouble finding “star” children.
I personally think that this would be a better time to do an all-stars season, or the all ringer season.
I wouldn’t be interested in the junior version for more than a few minutes, because I could care less about the children of C & D list celebrities. It would also be nice if the regular DWTS could get some real stars for a change, or even B listers.
Yahoo! No DWTS Jr.! Dumb idea making many kids unhappy if they get eliminated, receive rude/very bad critique from judges, don’t win the MBT. I think an all star season for 4 weeks would be a great idea.
I’m more upset that American idol (which should’ve stayed canceled or at least on Fox) is taking away from dwts and making us wait long for a new season. 🙁
What if they’re finally making so many DWTS fans’ dreams come true and doing a season with “regular people” learning from the pros. This would technically be a spinoff because it can’t be Dancing with the Stars if there isn’t any stars. Just a thought.
So, no DWTSjr….oh well at least there this 4 weeks show in the making in the Spring. It will be interesting to try and guess who they choose for celebs (if it is an all-star season).
Heidi, I agree. I don’t know why they are dumping (or making a DWTS season shorter) because ABC is doing American Idol when ratings have always been good. Oh well, I’m just glad there isn’t going to be a DWTS Junior. I don’t know of anyone who was looking forward to that idea.
Julia, I love the idea of a All star thing.
M8, I would love an all star season in the way you explained it. Awww this is getting more interesting by the minute.
Who was in charge of finalizing the spring schedule? What a mess!
If we are stuck with only 4 weeks (4 episodes?) of air time available then a mini All Stars might work. At least it’s something.
Feel like ABC’s stepchild tho’. They are more concerned with blocking for everyone else & expect DWTS fans to just accept whatever’s left.
Not feeling the love.
I would rather see this than DWTS Jr, so I might tune in. If it is an all-star season, I would prefer it to be like a second chance season for people that didn’t win and were great dancers. I don’t need to see champions win again, and I hated the mix in season 15.
My first thought was that, with a four week season, they may be angling to get some wider-known celebrities that can’t/won’t commit to 3-4 months of practice/competing.
Love that there is no jr version. Guess that is why they’ve been so mum about it.
I wonder if this has any correlation to Julianne’s “meaningful” return. I know she is doing a sitcom but maybe this mini thing is something she is doing as well. I’d love for her to be back on even for 4 weeks.
I really hated the all star season so I hope they don’t do anything with that.
Too much to hope for a c-bro free mini season? Please no fam involved. That would make it fun.
I am delighted that a Junior show isnt happening. 4 week All Star might be interesting if they could entice Derek, Mark, and Julianne to dance. That Won’t happen and if I have to put up with th e C Bros. and fam….
How I would love to see Katherine Jenkins dance again, and Nastia…
I don’t think so, Molly. Her meaningful return is a dance, and she’s reading more scripts.
She’d be crazy to do DWTS over a film in any case, what with the state of female actresses in good roles past a certain age.
Thanks PH, I must have missed the special dance information. And I agree about movies (or anything really) over DWTS.
Still going to hope for a fam free mini series though. Hopefully Tom won’t burst my bubble tomorrow night when they explain about it.
What about this for 4 one hour shows:
Week one 6 male celebs dance & we vote.
Week two 6 female celebs dance & we vote.
Week three the top 3 males & top 3 females dance & we vote.
Week four the top 3 couples dance, we vote.
Hoping there is a Tues finale planned to wrap this up.
Done.
If they planning to create a four week long competition then that format sounds good to me Carol. I think each show would have to be two hours long though. So if the shows were live, that gives us enough time to vote.
I wonder if this little online voting window they seem to be doing in the Tuesday finale, is perhaps a little test to see if it is feasible for the future? Because it would be ideal if this week season involves viewer voting and results being revealed on the same night as the performances.
*four week season
I’ve alway wondered if a shortened season would bring in a more “A-list” cast who cannot take that much time away from a movie or tv-show.
I don’t know-4 weeks sounds awfully quick and it’s supposed to be a ‘spinoff’ of DWTS? ???? First thing that came into my head was when Tony Dovolani and who was the other pro? pros? They mentored young dance couples-it was sort of like a mini-competition. That’s what popped into my head anyway….
If they have a 2 hr slot, you could add more couples. 8 or 10 even, or do 2 dance per show. Still half both men and women then get it to 3 or 4 couples for week 4 with a results show Tuesday.
More dancing/less package is actually attractive for me.
This could be done. The main drawback would be fewer dance styles done per couple. (Hence the smaller/proportional MBT) The advantage as stated already, would be to attract busy stars who couldn’t commit to 12 weeks & all that publicity stuff.
M8 the voting could remain exactly the same, by phone or on ABC.com.
What would change is how they notify the couples who is going on & who is not. That would need to be the Tuesday after the show aired. And maybe post it on line, report to magazine style shows for the viewers.
This could work…
I wonder if this is a tester “season” for a more permanent DWTS Junior. They should just name it DWTS Disney and perform to Disney songs every week. LOL
I think a two hour show for six couples would be fine Carol. Each couple gets a full 1.45 minute long routine the way it should be which would take up the first hour and a bit of the show Then have a 30 minute window for viewers to vote, during which time they can have any pro performances, special guest singers etc. Then at the end of the night reveal the results of the vote. In the UK they can reveal the results of a vote on the same night as the performances, no reason why the US can’t do that as well.
If they don’t pretape they will have to do this mini version after the tour which concludes mid March, so it could air towards the end of April into May. It would be nice if they brought in some new pro blood for this version too. My guess they will only use stars with dance experience so the learning curve won’t be as great, maybe runner ups in previous seasons. Also might be easier to get celebs because the commitment won’t be as long. This may be a win win.
As an aside, the Olympics only “ruins” two Mondays: 2/12 and 2/19, and I’m not sure if the atomic bombs (figure skating) are airing that day or not (b/c of the time zone issue).
[…] to wait a whole 9 months for a regular season of DWTS to kick back up again. Lord knows what this spinoff, mini-season we’re getting in the spring is going to be […]
@ Princess Heidi #10: but it’s some pretty big fingers on that one hand! And think of all the little Kellie Picklers that Disney-ABC would love to create on AI, then put on DWTS, then have as the host of their holiday specials…
If NBC is broadcasting the figure skating events live, only the 19th would be affected.
I like the idea, and it will only be athletes competing. I like the idea of All stars.
Also the tour is longer until March 18, 2018 which could effect it, and American Idol is back which that could be why it is four weeks and the tour is longer.
I would put a shit ton of money on it that the TV show is NOT going to be tinkered with due to a tour. That’s a fairly ridiculous idea, considering all that goes into scheduling a TV show. The tour is likely longer because they thought they were doing DWTS Jr. which would mean none of our current pros would be needed in the spring.
My guess they will be doing the show in April or May and doing tour and/or DWTS JR this summer. That sounds like something TPTB would love since it would keep people talking about DWTS until their next regular season and avoid them having to compete with Idol.
At Chayse#24, the idea of better known celebrities sounds like a good idea