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Wednesday ratings breakdown: Thoroughly 'Modern' ABC
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Winners and losers from Wednesday night's ratings, including some strong numbers for a pair of comedies on ABC and some surprisingly soft ones for a veteran drama on NBC:Winners: "Modern Family" and "Cougar Town." Their total-viewer counts fell slightly in the final same-day nationals -- "Modern Family" went from 12.74 million to 12.6 million, and "Cougar Town" dropped from 11.44 million to 11.28 million. But both are still very healthy numbers for a network that's trying to re-establish its comedy brand.
The best news for the network is the fact that the two comedies grew significantly in adults 18-49 from the "Dancing with the Stars" results show that preceded them. "Modern Family" scored a 4.2 rating in the demo, up from 3.3 for "DWTS," and "Cougar Town" improved further by snagging a 4.4. That's an indication that a good number of younger viewers -- the ones networks pay a premium for -- made a point of tuning in.
Loser: "Law & Order: SVU." The series averaged better than 10 million viewers a week last season and a 3.7 in the 18-49 demo -- both of which were far better than the 8.36 million and 2.5 the show pulled Wednesday. Yes, it was airing on a new night at a new time, and the competition was a little stiffer than it had last year, so some drop was to be expected -- just not as big as this.
Winners: CBS cops. "Criminal Minds" and "CSI: NY" each opened with better than 15 million viewers and drew their biggest audiences since early last season. "CSI: NY" won its time period by more than 6 million viewers.
Loser: "The Beautiful Life." It's almost piling on at this point, but "TBL's" second episode barely broke the million-viewer mark for the night. It got beat by a repeat of "Magic's Biggest Secrets Revealed" on MyNetwork TV.
Incomplete: "Mercy" and "Eastwick." Neither show posted great numbers -- "Mercy" drew 8.38 million people for NBC and "Eastwick" 8.5 million for ABC -- but neither one stunk up the joint either. I'm curious to see how they do in the next couple of weeks in time periods where they're at least different than the competition. "Mercy" is the only drama on at 8 p.m., and "Eastwick" is a lighter drama alternative to "CSI: NY."
Right where we left it: "Glee." It's becoming clear that while "Glee" isn't a hit, it's established a decent-sized (and young) niche, and FOX appears happy with that. Its ratings this week (6.64 million viewers, 3.1 in 18-49), with everyone else in originals, were almost identical to last week (6.69 million, 3.2), and the show won its hour in adults 18-34 and teenagers.
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TV ratings: ABC comedies, CBS dramas strong Wednesday
Ratings breakdowns: Monday | Tuesday
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Eastwick was on ABC not NBC.
He said Eastwick was on ABC
did you see the time I posted that? Obviously they edited it since...duh
"Eastwick" was unwatchable...just simply not interesting.
If you say so
If you say so
If you say so
Actually Rick, advertisers as a whole do NOT pay a premium for 18-49 viewers.
Here are figures that a blogger on the old board dug up at TV Week:
"CBS' reliance on steady shows has helped the network win more ad dollars than its rivals, Advertising Age reports.
The network drew about $4.03 billion in ad dollars from Sept. 1, 2008 through May 17, 2009, more than ABC's $3.67 billion or NBC's $3.02 billion, the trade paper says, citing figures from TNS Media Intelligence."
I was flabbergasted at how in line with overall audiences those numbers were.
Before I read those, I thought that there was a slight bias towards 18-49 (mostly caused by movie studios' insane reliance on 25 and under) but there really isn't.
the whole 18-49 Demo nonsense is really only PR spin.
Otherwise, all new shows have an "incomplete". Bionic Woman and Sarah Conor started with decent but unimpressive openings like Cougar and Modern, but the proof was in the subsequent weeks.
Given how bad a lot of the new shows looked thanks to the networks sacrificing quality for the allure of video, I am not optimistic for most of those shows.
On the same topic, Eastwick actually looked very nice and Paul Gross is an awesome actor. The rest of the cast is a lot more iffy so it's hard to tell if Gross and great production values can win the day by themselves.
I'll make a daring prediction too that CSI Miami is going to keep eroding quickly as the switch to video has killed the look of the show which, frankly, was one of the few reasons left to watch it.
Yeah, but no, but yeah, but no, but yeah, but... as long as I get my Gossip Girl
The Beautiful Life is probably my favorite new show of the season. It's so much more watchable than Melrose Place. I wish they would switch timeslots. I know that it wouldn't save the show, but maybe it would save it a little bit longer.