Quote Originally Posted by AnakinFlair View Post


I get the budget will take a hit (though I do wonder how big the budget is now). But as long as the actors are willing to come back (do they currently film in Canada?), I'm sure the CW will find other things in the budget to slash. VFX will take a hit, and S.T.R.I.P.E. won't be seen as often. They will focus more on characters with less flashy powers- so more Sportsmaster, less Icicle.

For all the hand-ringing I'm hearing about how bad the show will look or be on the CW, remember that The Flash has lasted for 6 seasons so far, that that is an FX heavy show at times. Supergirl has done pretty good as well, at least to my eyes.
From what I read a few months ago they spent 22.4 Mill on the 13 episodes. Thats about 1.7 million an episode. In actuality less since the pilot always cost more than any normal episode (set, and custume production all of which gets reused in later episodes).

The cost per episode of Arrow and Flash has always been 1.5- 2 million per episode. So Stargirl is already consistent with a CW budget.

Ratings wise they've been getting between 900,000 to 1.2 million viewers per episode. This mind you is on a show that airs on another platform before them. Based purely on the chatter on forum sites it appears that the numbers watching it on DCU are pretty close or not far behind those of the CW viewership. I base that on the amount of discussion after DCU air and after CW airing. Some sites like reddit have a live discussion thread for both and the numbers talking on the DCU live discussion arent far behind those of the CW. Add to that both here and on a few other comic sites I visit the number of users joining in after the CW airing is only marginally more than those after DCU airing.

So basically it costs about the same as the other CW DC shows do per episode but has the potential to give a 50 to 60% better viewership numbers (which translates into more revenue because you can charge more for adds during it.

That mind you is without the revenue either the production house or CW (if they pay totally for its production) can generate from further licensing. It will be aired here on fox 8 on the foxtel network starting the week after the finale airs. Which means next year (hopefully) I can drop the sunscription for my VPN, DCU, and the cost of maintaining a US account that I can pay for the latter with and the internation transaction fees for transfering to it just to watch it (every other DC show as well as the Marvel Hulu shows etc already airs on Fox 8, usually after the first season within days of airing in the US)

Without making any changes to budget it is potentially thier best current earner.

I read in one story that the premier of Stargirl got thier best premier numbers since Who's line is it anyway's debut in 2013

I suspect that is why it is CW exclusive next year. They probably did a deal to ensure they have exclusivity to get the better numbers. To do so they likely would have had to commit to a certain level of production budget.

Think about it, your the guy from Berlanti productions who negotiates the contracts with those who buy your companies productions. You currently have two media services in the same country paying for the rights to a show. There is only one reason why you sign a deal to give one of them exclusivity, that is IF that one offers to pay AT LEAST what you currently get from both. People having been talking about how SG dropped when it moved from CBS to CW. The Difference is that CBS was no longer willing to pay as much as they were for the show because the ratings were dropping. In that situation the new buyer has the power (demand and supply, only one demanding the show with its previous co tractor not willing to pay what it was, vs two currently paying for it so for one to get it equals they pay more)