TITANS' BIG TUMBLE
Aaron Spelling soap slips in the ratings

A promo ad for TITANS, Aaron Spelling's NBC primetime drama, stated, "If Looks Could Kill, You Wouldn't Last Five Minutes." The question is how long will TITANS itself last? Unfortunately, the show, which airs Wednesdays at 8 p.m. (on the East and West coasts), has been slipping in the ratings. For the week of October 18, the show averaged a 6.0 with a 9 share in 49 metered markets, a noticeable drop sonce the drama's October 4 premiere.
     Last summer, cast and show executives faced mainstream media reporters and critics, many of whom were not thrilled with the series. "It's just fun," Casper Van Dien (Chandler) countered. "It's something that's exciting. There are going to be people who criticize the show because they're negative people. Then there are going to be the people that just go for the pure entertainment of it. You can't always please everybody." Co-star Yasmine Bleeth (Heather) defended the show by saying, "What we're trying to promote is escapism. You want to sit down at 8 p.m. and get away from your everyday life. I think you want to dream about what could be."
     Like being rich? A problem for TITANS is that it airs opposite the game show WHO WANTS TO BE A MILLIONAIRE, on which people actually do become rich! When critics pointed out to Spelling what TITANS' competition was, the TV mogul responded good-naturedly, "I wish you hadn't said that. Everybody is opposite MILLIONAIRE, it seems."
     Should TITANS fail, GENERAL HOSPITAL fans could celebrate: Ingo Rademacher (David) would be available to reprise Jax. And if Jack Wagner (Jack) was to finally return as Frisco, this could be the time.
BY MICHAEL MALONEY