Fox shifts ‘Touch’ back in favor of Gordon Ramsay, ‘Kitchen Nightmares’

The folks over at Fox continue to surprise us time and time again. When we first heard that the network was delaying the start of Gordon Ramsay’s “Kitchen Nightmares” on Friday nights this season, we thought it was so that they would have it ready to go as a replacement for the surely-soon-to-be-canceled series “The Mob Doctor” on Mondays. However, it turns out now that their plan all along was to just delay the chef’s visits around the country to the November sweeps (or close to it), and put another show on the backburner for now.

Basically, the plan for Fox goes as follows. Beginning on October 26 (baseball pending), the network will premiere “Kitchen Nightmares” at 8:00 p.m. Eastern rather than “Touch” before “Fringe.” As for what is happening to Kiefer Sutherland and company, the show is getting pushed back until some point in midseason, which is where it also happened to air during its first season. We hardly see this move as a vote of confidence for the show, but you could also make the argument that Fox is perhaps keeping it around as a contingency in case their other upcoming scripted series “The Following” flops like “The Mob Doctor” is, that way they do have a full season of something else to air on Monday nights.

Ultimately, the good news for “Kitchen Nightmares” is that they could air it at any time on any day of the week, and it would still find a way to get viewers. Ramsay is a beast for Fox, and his unscripted series over the summer actually fare better than “Bones” does in the actual season.

What do you think about this move, and do you think it is bad news already for the future of “Touch”?