Ugly Betty (season 2)


The second season of the American comedy-drama television series Ugly Betty started on September 27, 2007, in the United States and Canada and including a long, mid-season hiatus ran until May 22, 2008. The second part of the season began airing April 24, 2008.
Due to the fan base gained in the United Kingdom, the show's British broadcaster Channel 4 bought the UK rights to season 2 so they could begin airing it only a week later than the US. Due to the Writer's Strike of 2007, Ugly Betty went on a hiatus in Britain after the airing of episode "Bananas for Betty". Channel 4 announced that Ugly Betty would return towards the end of 2008. When it returned to British television on September 5, 2008, it received 2.93 million viewers, according to overnight figures, which is a strong figure for Channel 4. This season was originally set to last 20 episodes, but due to the 2007-08 Writers Guild of America strike, it was shortened to 18 episodes.
Season 2 was the last to be produced in Los Angeles before it was confirmed that the series would move to New York City to complement its setting in the next and last seasons.

Cast

All of the main cast from the show's first season returned for the second season, with the exception of Kevin Sussman. In addition, Christopher Gorham and Judith Light were promoted from guest star status to the main cast.

Starring

Singer Mika contributed a track to the show. The song, "Big Girl ", a top-10 single in the UK, was used as the promotional theme for the second season, but with altered lyrics to say "Hey Betty, you are beautiful" in the song's chorus, along with a music video featuring the cast. This was the second time a Mika song had been featured on Ugly Betty, with a remix of "Grace Kelly" having already featured in "Punch Out".
After four episodes of the second season of Ugly Betty had aired in Australia, the Seven Network noted that special guests Victoria Beckham, Lindsay Lohan and Naomi Campbell would be guest-starring in the near future. However, Australian viewers only saw Beckham and the others were not seen until the season finale aired. After several weeks, "Giving Up the Ghost" aired on July 2, 2008. Ugly Betty was then put on hiatus and the Seven Network announced they planned to show the rest of the episodes after the 2008 Summer Olympics. After only one episode, "Bananas for Betty", was shown on August 28, 2008, Ugly Betty was cancelled for no apparent reason. After several complaints for not finishing the season, the show went back to air on December 2, 2008, where it aired twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays, eventually only airing the show on Thursdays. The final episode aired on Thursday, January 15, 2009.

Episodes


Notes:
  • Season 2 was originally slated to have a total of 24 episodes, but due to the Writers Guild of America strike, it had 18 episodes with the last five written and produced following the strike's end.

    DVD release

release of Ugly Betty Season Second, subtitled "Brighter, Bolder, Bettyer", would be September 9, 2008 in the United States and Canada. All 18 episodes were included in the set, along with additional bonus tracks.
Among the features:
  • On Set With The Besties
  • The Suarez Tour
  • Wihelmina Slater: Love to Hate Her
  • Las Pasiones De Telenovelas
  • I ♥ Betty
  • Bettly Bloops
  • Deleted Scenes

    Ratings

United States

United Kingdom

Ugly Betty was aired on Channel 4 on a usual time of Fridays at 9.00pm. These figures are official ratings released by BARB.
Episode #TitleAirdateViewers Channel 4 weekly ranka
24"How Betty Got Her Grieve BackOctober 5, 20072.821
25"Family/Affair"October 12, 20072.1118
26"Betty's Wait Problem"October 19, 20072.199
27"Grin and Bear It"October 26, 20072.1119
28"A League of Their Own"November 2, 20072.1918
29"Something Wicked This Way Comes"November 9, 20072.0424
30"It's a Nice Day for a Posh Wedding"November 23, 20072.4218
31"I See Me, I.C.U."November 30, 20071.9228
32"Giving Up the Ghost"December 7, 20072.1622
33"Bananas for Betty"December 14, 20071.7528
34"Zero Worship"September 5, 20083.128
35"Odor in the Court"September 12, 20082.1211
36"A Thousand Words Before Friday"September 19, 20081.8322
37"Twenty Four Candles"September 26, 20081.6627
38"Burning Questions"October 3, 20081.730
39"Betty's Baby Bump"October 3, 20081.6531
40"The Kids Are Alright"October 10, 20081.6330
41"Jump"October 17, 20081.6830

a Ranks are for Channel 4 weekly, not for overall TV.
The gap between "Bananas for Betty" on December 14, 2007 and "Zero Worship" was taken for three reasons:
1. Channel 4 was originally scheduled to take a three-week break at Christmas and resume episodes in January; this hadn't happened.
2. The 2007-2008 WGA strike meant only three episodes were left after the last episode, so Channel 4 decided it was pointless to resume them for just a couple of weeks in late January unless there were no more episodes to be produced. The WGA strike was resolved in February, so Channel 4 had promised viewers the series would return later on in the year with new episodes, but had no idea of when to return them, as the next six months was already filled.
3. Channel 4 decided to wait until September after Big Brother 2008 had finished airing, as the episodes took up approximately 100 minutes of airtime on a Friday night, which filled Betty's slot. Prior to Big Brother, March–May was filled with the whole first season of Dirty Sexy Money, which occupied Betty's slot whenever it was not on, and moved accordingly. Betty made its return to Channel 4 on Friday 5 September 2008 between the two season finale episodes of Big Brother. Unlike Desperate Housewives' 3rd-season premiere, Betty's timeslot for that week was not changed as the first show finished at 9pm and resumed with episode 2 at 10pm, meaning that Betty could return to its normal slot. Episodes played straight through into season 3 without a break, and viewers who were desperate to see the next episode of the show could see it one night earlier on a Thursday instead of a Wednesday in its usual 9:00pm slot on E4. T4 then introduced weekend encore sessions on Sundays which replayed that week's episode from 1:30 pm–2:30pm.

Soundtrack

Despite never having a physical or digital release a soundtrack of the series. This music was used during the second season of the series.