Next Monday, on October 13th, or Columbus Day at 5 am Central, Hub Network becomes Discovery Family. I enjoyed the Hub Network, and the staff there enjoyed us over here at Geek Alabama. But, the ratings never grew, and Discovery is in the business to make money, here comes Discovery Family, and their promo video.
The schedule for the first few days has been released, and so far, I am very unimpressed! The daytime schedule will involve shows from Hasbro and other classic shows. Prime time is going to be filled with repeats of shows from the other Discovery networks like Discovery Channel, Science Channel, TLC, and Animal Planet. This is the schedule for Monday October 13th, and they are going to just repeat the same thing for prime time over and over again.
@NICKandMORE Discovery Family is the worst thing to happen to kids TV in a while. The new channel looks awful and uninspired.
— ~*~*~*~*~ (@Ann_Takamaki) October 7, 2014
The schedule starts at 5 am Eastern, when the rebrand takes effect.
- 5:00 AM: The Adventures of Chuck & Friends
- 5:30 AM: The Adventures of Chuck & Friends
- 6:00 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 6:30 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 7:00 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 7:30 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 8:00 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 8:30 AM: 101 Dalmatians
- 10:30 AM: 102 Dalmatians
- 12:30 PM: The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of Dawn Treader
- 3:00 PM: Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs
- 5:00 PM: Africa
- 6:00 PM: Africa
- 7:00 PM: Africa
- 8:00 PM: Africa
- 9:00 PM: Africa
- 10:00 PM: Survival of the Weirdest
- 11:00 PM: Africa
- 12:00 AM: Africa
- 1:00 AM: Survival of the Weirdest
- 2:00 AM: Africa
- 3:00 AM: Africa
- 4:00 AM: Africa
Yeah, I think that schedule above is not too good. If you think it’s just a day one schedule, think again. Here is the schedule for Tuesday October 14th.
- 5:00 AM: Jem
- 5:30 AM: G.I. Joe: A Real American Hero
- 6:00 AM: Transformers Prime
- 6:30 AM: Transformers: Rescue Bots
- 7:00 AM: The Super Hero Squad Show
- 7:30 AM: Animaniacs
- 8:00 AM: Tiny Toon Adventures
- 8:30 AM: Friday Game Night
- 9:30 AM: Strawberry Shortcake’s Berry Bitty Adventures
- 10:00 AM: Strawberry Shortcake’s Berry Bitty Adventures
- 10:30 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 11:00 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 11:30 AM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 12:00 PM: Littlest Pet Shop
- 12:30 PM: Littlest Pet Shop
- 1:00 PM: Pound Puppies
- 1:30 PM: Pound Puppies
- 2:00 PM: Sabrina: Secrets of a Teenage Witch
- 2:30 PM: Littlest Pet Shop
- 3:00 PM: Littlest Pet Shop
- 3:30 PM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 4:00 PM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 4:30 PM: My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic
- 5:00 PM: How Do They Do It?
- 5:30 PM: How Do They Do It?
- 6:00 PM: How Do They Do It?
- 6:30 PM: How Do They Do It?
- 7:00 PM: How Do They Do It? (NEW)
- 7:30 PM: How Do They Do It?
- 8:00 PM: How It’s Made
- 8:30 PM: How It’s Made
- 9:00 PM: Extreme Engineering
- 10:00 PM: Buying the Galaxy
- 11:00 PM: How It’s Made
- 11:30 PM: How It’s Made
- 12:00 AM: Extreme Engineering
- 1:00 AM: Buying the Galaxy
- 2:00 AM: How Do They Do It?
- 2:30 AM: How Do They Do It?
- 3:00 AM: How Do They Do It?
- 3:30 AM: How Do They Do It?
- 4:00 AM: How Do They Do It?
- 4:30 AM: How Do They Do It?
The rest of the schedule is not much better. You can expect repeats of other Discovery Communications shows like Cake Boss, Flying Wild Alaska, Time Warp, Extreme Engineering, Factory Made, Quints By Surprise, How Do They Do It, How It’s Made, Storm Chasers, and other shows. At least the Hub Network is promoting the change now, they talked about Discovery Family on their latest promo for the newest Equestria Girls movie airing on October 17th.
Lots of people who have left comments on other sites are calling the new schedule less imaginative and exciting than the one that proceeded it. You are basically replacing the old sitcoms and movies with old shows from Discovery Communications. And sadly, some people have already thrown the towel and said Discovery has already given up on the channel. Just today, we got the announcement that Transformers: Robots In Disguise is going to air on Cartoon Network. It was originally supposed to air on Hub Network, but that is not going to happen, here is the trailer.
https://twitter.com/NICKandMORE/status/519338249719119873
The crazy thing about all of this, is they have been mostly quiet on all of this. There has only been one press release about the change to Discovery Family, and the last thing I got in my e-mail from Hub Network was the promotion of The Haunting Hour. Even on Discovery Press Web, the last thing on the Hub Network page was the promotion of The Haunting Hour. Discovery now controls 60% of the channel, Hasbro controls 40%. At least 12 hours of the schedule is programmed by Hasbro (5 am – 5 pm Eastern). The other 12 hours (5 pm – 5 am) is programmed by Discovery, and so far the schedule is very weak!
From the press release, we will still see new episodes of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic, Littlest Pet Shop, The Haunting Hour, Transformers Rescue Bots, and Family Game Night on Discovery Family. But how long will it take before Discovery Family gets some new and original shows on during prime time? I give them until next Spring, the only way the channel is going to survive and grow is if new shows are developed for only Discovery Family and for prime time. And, I am assuming that the Hub Network Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube accounts will just switch over to Discovery Family, that’s what I think will happen.
And what will happen to the Hub Network website pictured below? My guess, since I have not gotten anything, is it will just switch over to Discovery Family as well.
Look, I think Hasbro will still program a good daytime lineup, but Discovery needs to develop some new shows for Discovery Family, and fast! Relying on shows people have already seen on Discovery Channel, Science Channel, TLC, and Animal Planet is not a good long term strategy. It might be better than the old sitcoms and movies, but every channel you see on TV has new stuff on during prime time, and I hope it won’t take long to see new shows on Discovery Family, because if we don’t see new shows not found anywhere else, turn off the lights, it’s game over man.
Related articles
Categories: Interesting Stuff
Yeah. I gotta agree with you guys. Look, the ratings were already low when it was the Hub, and I was personally impressed with the channel. I found to be like the network formerly known as The Family Channel for the next generation. You remember the Family Channel. The Rev. Pat Robertson owned it before Rupert Murdoch bought it and f’d things up and later Disney bought it and things weren’t all that much better when it became ABC Family. Some things improved, but lately, that channel has become an eyesore. With a schedule like this, they’re beating it over viewers’ heads repeatedly, in a manner of speaking, insofar as them airing reruns of old shows from Discovery and TLC and what not. With Margaret Loesch stepping down as prexy and CEO at the end of this year, they’re gonna be farther gone than anyone could ever imagine. Plus, to add insult to injury, this may very well be the last season of R.L. Stine’s The Haunting Hour. Along with that, Spooksville’s fate has yet to be decided. It’s October as I type this and whether or not there will be a second season of the show remains to be seen. Also, we may never see Family Game Night again. Hasbro will still own 40% of the network, but they just might write FGN off and find another channel to air it, which sucks because it’s a great show. Plus, no more sitcom reruns for the kids of the 90s. I just barely made it into that decade (I’m 20 years old) and saw some shows I haven’t seen in a while or have never seen before in my life. If the network is able to regain their footing by doing this, we’ll all be surprised. They better hire some producers quick to develop new shows. Otherwise, they’ll be headed down south to a point of no return.
Yep, you are right! Discovery Family needs to develop new shows quick, and Hasbro needs to step it up as well. Thanks for commenting!
It’s going to be hard for Discovery to come up with something new when what they need to do is have better variety of show’s then the same old reruns. From 2010 to 2013 as the Hub Network they we’re alright but at the beginning of this year they put show’s like Transformers Prime at 6:30 in the morning heck most of the shows that may Hasbro famous is on at the crack of dawn an at during the day it’s like Littlest Pet Shop, Pound Puppies,Sabrina and Mlp Friendship is Magic over and over again an when Discovery took over they took the sitcoms of an show their regular live shows that you see on normal stations.
Yep, it’s not been not good so far, and I don’t expect things to get better. Thanks for commenting!