Gaspin's Strategy for NBC: Be More Like USA?

New executives always get a chance to put their imprint on a network, and it looks like Jeff Gaspin -- newly in charge of NBC -- has his own template in mind.

 Namely, be more like USA, the cable network with which NBC Universal is enjoying so much success.

In an interview with The Wrap, Gaspin said of his vision for NBC in regard to the decision to drop "Southland," "The way we need to rebuild NBC is with broad, somewhat blue-sky, somewhat more optimistic programming. And unfortunately a show like 'Southland' didn't fit that bill."

That sounds a whole lot like the "blue-sky" attitude that USA has adopted with series like "Burn Notice" and "Royal Pains," along with the recently well-reviewed "White Collar."

The only problem with this strategy is that NBC has conspicuously tried "blue-sky" itself, without much to show for it. Indeed, the pile-up of failures under the old blue-sky approach include "Crusoe," the "Knight Rider" reboot and, if you're willing to go back that far, something called "Hawaii."

Of course, it all boils down to execution -- and timing -- as to whether shows work or not. But my experience has been that series tend to dictate a struggling network's direction rather than the other way around -- that is, when something surprisingly succeeds, that breakthrough often leads a network down a path that it hadn't necessarily intended to follow. (In recent TV history, see "Housewives, Desperate.")

My sense of the "Southland" decision, by the way, is a whole lot simpler than what's been discussed. As a new set of eyes in the process, Gaspin looked at an expensive series that the network was throwing into a dead-end timeslot on Friday night and probably asked, "Why are we doing this again?" My only quibble with the move is that NBC should have delayed the show, waited for an inevitable opening earlier in the week -- say, in place of "Trauma" -- and given it a second shot there. Even if the cop drama had failed, it wouldn't have sent a "Quality doesn't live here anymore" message to the creative community as well as the show's admirers.

Gaspin is a very savvy executive and might very well be right with his "blue-sky" analysis. For now, though, such a forecast is going to have to wait until a lot of clouds clear over NBC.