Television's executives, producers, and stars recently wrapped up the summer Television Critics Association press tour.
It's an exhausting (and exciting) pageant of the networks' best current programming and upcoming shows for hundreds of critics and reporters from all over the US (and even some international press) who flock to Los Angeles twice a year for the event.
Each day of the TCA press tour, a network's top boss kicks off the morning by facing reporters in an executive session. Depending on how their network is doing, they'll be celebrated or verbally attacked by the journalists. Then the reporters meet and greet panel after panel dedicated to said network's shows and stars.
In every press tour, certain themes and patterns from the TV world emerge. They tell us about what the industry is wrestling with and give us a snapshot of what's to come.
Here are the biggest things the industry is facing in 2016:
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The call for diversity is louder than ever.
Improving diversity in front of and behind the cameras is an ongoing discussion in the TV business. But it becomes a larger conversation when one of the networks goes against the grain.
While other networks showed off their gains in improving numbers of women and minorities on their shows, CBS was blasted for its all-white and all-male fall slate of shows.
"We need to do better, and we know it," CBS President Glenn Gellar told reporters.
Comedies are having a hard time.
With an abundance of epic, well-made dramas currently filling the TV landscape, comedies aren't finding audiences quickly enough.
Fox, for example, had a dismal time with comedies this past year. It canceled buzzy but low-rated comedies starring Rob Lowe ("Grinder") and Jon Stamos ("Grandfathered") — half of its Tuesday night comedy block— and two other new comedies.
The network's chairwoman, Dana Walden, said the problem is that comedies don't inspire urgency among its viewers.
"People are watching comedies," Walden said. "They are just not watching in a seven-day, with-urgency manner that enables us to monetize them in the current broadcast model."
NBC has been in a multiyear comedy drought and vowed in June that it would give more time to comedies so they can find an audience. Now the network is hoping things are looking up after the success of "Superstore" and its move to Thursday nights.
TV-show seasons continue to get shorter.
With so many TV shows on now and viewing habits changing, networks are examining if the traditional 22-episode season makes sense anymore.
They had already experimented with limited series, which could air while shows are on hiatus. But now they're seeing the advantages of shorter seasons for viewers who don't have the patience and time for long seasons, as well as for big stars and creative talent who don't want to be locked down for a year at a time on one project.
Cable channels have been reaping the benefits of shorter seasons for years, but now the networks are catching on with shows like ABC's "American Crime" and "Secrets and Lies," or Fox's "Wayward Pines" and "Scream Queens."
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