UGLY BETTY (ABC)
Why Friday? In order to get exactly eight shows on every day, I had to get a little... creative at times. Yes, out of Ugly Betty's four seasons, it only aired about half of one on this night, and it was its lowest-rated run ever. But there's another reason; Betty was originally slated to air on Friday in its first season. An audible by ABC led to a pairing with Grey's Anatomy on Thursday, which probably benefited both shows.
See (who saw) how it all began: Betty began pretty big, with 16.32 million viewers and a 5.0/14 in the demo on 9/28/06, a number that exceeded many expectations for the show. In week two, the drop was just 10% in the demo to a 4.5. It would spend its first seven episodes and 13 of its first 16 episodes above the 4.0 mark, so the show held up well.
The best of times: The series premiere was a series high for the show, but perhaps the strongest run of episodes for the show was about midway through season 1, when it had five straight episodes with a 4.4 demo or higher from 1/11/07 through 2/15/07.
The worst of times: It was pretty much downhill from that point, though; after a month off, it returned on 3/15/07 with merely a 3.5 demo and posted low to mid 3's for the rest of season 1 and early season 2, then dipped below a 3.0 late in season 2, then took another plunge late in season 3 to around the 2.0 mark. This prompted the move to Friday. Friday moves inherently cause a ton of audience loss, little of which was recovered when the show got sent back to Wednesday for its final run late in season 4. Its lowest point was a 0.9 demo on 11/27/09.
Then vs. now: It's kinda par for the course for serialized dramas, even the successful ones; the audience loss is substantial. The season 4 average is only barely over a third of the season 1 average, and comparing the show's best run (mid-season 1) with its worst run (early season 4 on Friday), it's nearly a three-quarters drop. The show lives on with a syndication deal on TV Guide Channel, but the first-run results had dipped way too low for ABC to stick it out for another year of syndie eps.
Adults 18-49 info by season:
Historical-adjusted ratings by season:
| Seas | Year | A18-49+ | Label | Now15 | y2y | Lo | Hi | Premiere | Finale |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2006-07 | 105 | solid | 1.77 | 74 | 133 | 133 | 96 | |
| 2 | 2007-08 | 92 | marginal | 1.54 | -13% | 67 | 118 | 118 | 85 |
| 3 | 2008-09 | 78 | marginal | 1.31 | -15% | 57 | 110 | 110 | 63 |
| 4 | 2009-10 | 48 | flop | 0.81 | -38% | 32 | 60 | 50 | 60 |
| AVERAGE: | 81 | marginal | |||||||
| CAREER: | 323 | utility | |||||||
For more on The War of 18-49, my look at the history of primetime TV's veteran shows, see the Index.
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