'Supergirl' and more: The CW announces its fall 2016 schedule

The CW recently announced its schedule of programming for next fall, with “Supergirl,” the superhero show that aired on CBS, appearing on the CW schedule for the first time.

It is a schedule that finds the CW’s superhero programs spread across almost every night of the week, while critical favorites like “Crazy Ex-Girlfriend” and “Jane the Virgin” remain on the network’s calendar.

“Supergirl,” which ran for one season on CBS and will now air on the CW, will appear on Monday nights along with “Jane,” while the hit superhero show “The Flash” will air on Tuesday along with “No Tomorrow,” a new program about a woman who is afraid to take chances yet becomes enamored of a man who lives a wild life because he thinks the world will end soon. 

Wednesday nights on the CW will include the superhero show “Arrow” and the new show “Frequency,” which is based on the science fiction book by Toby Emmerich (which was also adapted as a movie in 2000) and tells the story of a father and daughter who team up to investigate a crime after finding out the daughter can speak to her father from the future.

“Legends of Tomorrow” and the long-running program “Supernatural” will air on Thursdays, while “Girlfriend” and “The Vampire Diaries” will occupy Friday nights. 

“Supergirl” is getting a lot of attention for its move to a new home and CW president Mark Pedowitz recently spoke about the network choosing at first not to air “Supergirl.” 

“It’s now moved to The CW, where it should have been in the first place,” Mr. Pedowitz said. 

The CW occupies an interesting place in the current TV landscape. The network is the home of critically acclaimed programs – “Jane” won the Golden Globe for best comedy and “Girlfriend” actress Rachel Bloom won the Golden Globe for best performance in a TV series, comedy, or musical – yet those behind the shows seem to create content working with slightly different expectations for viewership than do creative teams at, say, networks like NBC or Fox. 

Earlier this year, the CW renewed every show it had on the air (and “Reign,” a historical drama which was then on hiatus). “Containment,” a show which has since been canceled by the network, had not yet debuted at the time. The network had already made the decision to end “Beauty and the Beast.” 

“Not all renewed series have done particularly well ratings-wise,” Deadline writer Nellie Andreeva noted at the time of the renewals. But “Girlfriend,” for one, “is a critical darling,” Ms. Andreeva wrote. 

Yet the CW often bides its time with low-rated programs. After the CW renewed “Girlfriend,” Emily Yahr of The Washington Post noted that “if any channel knows the value of word of mouth over numbers, it’s the CW. Catering to a younger crowd, the network realizes its target audience is likely to hear about the show months later from a friend or a Facebook link, and then binge-watch the whole thing online or on-demand. As a result, CW executives tend to give promising freshmen shows time to prove themselves.” 

Is there a downside to keeping critically acclaimed shows like “Jane” on the air? Indiewire writer Sam Adams worries that some of these shows can’t extend their initial plotlines. 

“The shows' tone, and their premises, are so specific that they leave precious little room to evolve,” Mr. Adams writes.