Fox gives ‘The Mindy Project’ a full season; nearly the same for ‘Ben and Kate’

Fox may not be pulling in some earth-shattering ratings for their Tuesday night comedy block, but they are apparently not willing to give up on it just yet. As a matter of fact, the network decided on Monday to give a go-ahead for “The Mindy Project” as well as “Ben and Kate” to effectively receive full-season orders. For the Mindy Kaling comedy, the order is a full 22 episodes that you see with any other traditional show. Meanwhile, “Ben and Kate” has a slightly smaller order in 19, but this is still an overall figure that the cast and crew has to be rather thrilled with.

In a statement, here is what the network’s programming head in Kevin Reilly had to say about the move:

“Ben and Kate and The Mindy Project have everything we want to stand for in comedy: smart writing, hugely appealing casts and comedy that feels contemporary and real, which is why we’re confident they will continue to build on what is already an appointment comedy night for young, influential audiences on Tuesdays.”

The real irony here in Reilly’s statement is the word “appointment,” since both of these new shows have struggled to place ahead of any of the other big three networks in the ratings. However, Reilly clearly wants to give these shows (which are both rather funny) time to grow and build an audience with word-of-mouth, and it is nice to see a network have some confidence in their programming. Then again, this move was also probably motivated in part to “The Mob Doctor,” whose atrocious ratings will probably have it be the first show out the door for the network in a matter of a week or tow.