Well, this is certainly interesting. Remember when Anger Management triggered that 90-episode renewal upon hitting ratings goals with its first 10 episodes? Fans knew immediately that Lionsgate intended to go non-stop on production in part to keep Charlie Sheen busy (a tactic to keep their star out of trouble,) but they did not know how soon FX would air them. That was up for debate until today when FX blew our minds with a number none of us saw coming.
The cable channel has just revealed that they will be airing 45 episodes a year with almost every Thursday night featuring a new episode for the next two years. That’s right. By time 2015 hits, the world will see 100 installments of Charlie Sheen’s Two and a Half Men follow-up. FX Chief John Landgraf made the announcement earlier today at TCA.
Why do this? The money is in the repeats and FX knows this. They cannot exactly get away with airing the same ten episodes over and over again week after week. The sooner they pump these things out, the sooner they have a reserve stockpile of comedy programming capable of anchoring a mid-day lineup. Now the question we must ask is how many more installments of Anger Management the cable network could want because by time season five comes along, at this pace, the series could be near 200 episodes which is typically when a sitcom goes off the air.
Anger Management begins its revolving door of original episodes on Thursday January 17.