Weird is good. Weird is fun. Kids like weird.
If YTV has a mantra as its enters its 10th year as Canada's prime children's destination on the television dial, that could well be it. Weird is where it's at.
And it's not that today's kids actively seek out programs that are offbeat, says Peter Moss, YTV's vice-president of programming and production. They know what they like, and what they like just happens to be, well, weird.
"Everything that kids find attractive is weird," Moss said yesterday from YTV Canada's Toronto headquarters. "It's got us following them, rather than the other way around."
The decade-old, home-grown broadcaster isn't sticking solely to alien invaders, vampire slayers, vats of goo and things that go bump in the night as it officially launches the new fall season on Monday.
Where the average cable specialty channel might have 50 shows total in its lineup, YTV is rolling out 57 new programs alone, with a grand total of 120 titles in the fall schedule.
"We're looking for the offbeat, we're looking for the new, and we're looking for the stuff that will tickle the kids' imaginations," said Moss.
That includes such sought-after kids' fare as Animorphs, which debuted last night (each Tuesday episode repeats Saturdays at 6:30 p.m., Cable 14 and 22). Produced by the makers of the current YTV hit Goosebumps, Animorphs tells the tales of five teens who are granted the ability to shape-shift into animals to stave off an invasion by mind-controlling alien slugs.
Sounds weird. So it must be cool.
"This is a series that we've had more e-mails and faxes and calls asking, 'When are you going to put on this series?' " said Moss.
In the fickle world of children's TV, when last year's hit could be this year's late-night space filler, the attention to the whims of its young audience isn't just a courtesy at YTV - it's a necessary component of the station's success. And something it does well, indeed.
"We so dominate the kids' market; it's an enviable position to be in," said Moss.
It's this position that has allowed YTV, over its 10 years, to trigger $515 million worth of spending on the production of children's programming while nearly doubling its audience along the way, from four million viewers in 1988 to 7.6 million today.
That kind of power in the marketplace gives YTV the ability to co-develop many of the Canadian shows it airs, like the brand-new Shadow Raiders (Wednesdays at 9 p.m. and 12:30 a.m.)
Created by Vancouver-based Mainframe Entertainment, the computer animation whizzes behind mega-hits ReBoot and Beasties, Shadow Raiders sets a new high mark for the globally lauded production company, said Moss.
"That level of computer-generated animation is just stunning," said Moss.
Other highly anticipated shows joining the YTV schedule this fall include MTV's Beavis and Butt-head spinoff Daria, about the smart and cynical classmate of the gruesome twosome; Blue's Clues, the highest-rated show for preschoolers on the U.S. kids' channel Nickelodeon; and Canadian exclusive Dumb Bunnies, the newest animated offering by the venerable Nelvana Enterprises.
Being the highest-rated specialty channel for the entire two-years-and-older audience doesn't give YTV the option of resting on its laurels, though. Especially when the face of television itself could change drastically over the next 10 years.
"We've got to continue to develop not only through the television side, but also through the Internet, in the community, through the branded merchandise ... any way the kids relate to us," said YTV president Paul Robertson.
"Television is more like fashion than anything else. The kids' idea of what's cool can change very fast."
