craiyon logo

A control room with multiple screens displaying network schedules and statistics about Saturday morning programming.

A control room with multiple screens displaying network schedules and statistics about Saturday morning programming.

The growing regulatory scrutiny, increasing competition from cable channels such as Cartoon Network, Disney Channel, and Nickelodeon,[76] as well as video on-demand and streaming services, brought changes to viewing habits that made non-educational Saturday morning programming less viable for networks.[70][107] Throughout the 2010s, the major networks began to schedule factual, documentary- and reality-style series aimed at a teen (13–16 years old) audience to fulfill their E/I obligations, rather than programming targeting preschool or preteen audiences.[107] As they are targeting viewers older than 12 years old, these programs are not subject to the restrictions on advertising in the Children's Television Act.[107][108] ABC (Litton's Weekend Adventure in 2011),[109][110] CBS (CBS Dream Team in 2013), The CW (One Magnificent Morning in 2014; The Washington Post wrote that its replacement of Vortexx signaled the "end" of Saturday morning cartoons),[70][107][111] NBC (The More You Know in 2016; Spanish-language dubs began airing on Telemundo in 2018 under the MiTelemundo branding) all leased their weekend morning blocks to Litton Entertainment to air such E/I programming. Fox entered into a similar arrangement with Steve Rotfeld Productions to produce the STEM-based block Xploration Station for its affiliates, which premiered in September 2014.[70][107][108] NBC argued that its The More You Know block was a better lead-out for Weekend Today's audience than the preschool Voir plus