I watched the very first new version of the CBS Evening News, featuring the dual anchors of Maurice Dubois and John Dickerson. It was definitely different than its brethren on NBC and ABC. But was that for the better?
It’s not fair to judge any show on its first episode, but here are a few observations:
-The dual anchors were sitting beside each other, each taking a sentence throwing to a story. It was pretty pointless to have two of them and there doesn’t seem to be any real reason for them to both be there. The set is pretty high tech with tons of graphics being projected onto the wide screens behind them,
-It was a small thing, but anchor John Dickerson continuously held onto his glasses for the whole show almost like a prop, but never put them on once. What does he need them for? It just seemed odd and it was a quirk that annoyed me for some reason.
-As for the news, there were a lot of debriefs and their lead yarn – which started with a story on the new Chinese AI DeepSeek - ended up being about an Asian-born U.S. soldier convicted of leaking secrets to the Chinese. It was quite good and neither of the other two networks had it.
-There were a lot of debriefs with reporters after their stories aired, which took up a lot of time and left less for other news.
-And this was different – in the very first break, they did a kind of split screen as the commercials played, where you could see the anchors sitting at the desk, with one-line headlines underneath and temperatures from various places around the world – including right at the end, Toronto, where you’ll be pleased to know the high and the low for the day was 24 degrees F.
-Speaking of weather, they did throw to meteorologist Lonnie Quinn in a promised high tech weather set, complete with multiple wide screens and a map which he stood on to illustrate winter storms coming.
-After the first pack, it was all Dubois introducing the remaining stories, making you wonder what Dickerson was there for in the first place.
-During each break and during the intro and extro of the show, we got a wide shot of the set, with a floor director making hand gestures at the anchors.
All in all, a good professional first effort, I guess, but why they did some of the things they did I found baffling. It has promise, but there’s no real reason that I can see for dual anchors. And for God's sake Mr. Dickerson, either wear the glasses or lose them altogether. But stop futzing around with them for the whole show.
I'll be sticking with Lester Holt.
