Today, my fall preview looks at Monday 10/9c, a battle of three crime dramas. I've got one of them threatening to do about as well as the other two combined, at least early on.
ABC
In the 2007-08 season the slot was primarily occupied by seemingly deteriorating The Bachelor along with failed sophomore October Road. Three different shows aired in the slot in '08-'09, first the final season of law drama Boston Legal, then reality sleeper success True Beauty, then crime newbie Castle, which has had OK results especially out of two-hour Dancings. It returned to the slot for all of 2009-10 and was competitive with CSI: Miami at times, and at other times not, and it's back for fall 2010. It averaged a 2.58 demo in 2009-10 originals.
CBS
CBS plugged CSI: Miami here in September of 2002 and got a very good eight years out of it in this hour. But last year was easily its weakest, both in terms of raw numbers and especially when considering that it had its strongest lead-in (The Big Bang Theory) in several years. That rough going has prompted CBS to try a new crime drama in Hawaii Five-0, a reboot of the 1970s show.
NBC
For NBC it's been a rough ride in the timeslot, as has been the case in many of its 10:00 hours. The list of failed Heroes lead-outs in this hour is a long one: Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip, The Black Donnellys, The Real Wedding Crashers, Journeyman, My Own Worst Enemy, and the final NBC run of Medium. In the 2009-10 they started off their weekly strip of The Jay Leno Show here and after its midseason axing it became the final resting place for long-running Law & Order. In fall 2010, it goes from being the "post-Heroes slot" to the "post-The Event slot," and the first effort of that era will be U.S. Marshals crime drama Chase.
CABLE NOTABLES
Of course, ESPN's Monday Night Football will dominate even its broadcast competition. History's Pawn Stars may not do quite as well as during the regular season, but its 2.0+ demos from this summer could very easily be competitive with a couple of the broadcasters. On the scripted front, TNT brings back Men of a Certain Age for a second season on November 29.
PREDICTIONS
Hawaii Five-0 - 3.64 average, 5.0 premiere - Had a lot written in this space, ultimately decided to do a separate post.
Castle - 2.38 average (-8% from last year), 2.3 premiere (even)
Chase - 1.83 average, 2.5 premiere - A lot of people are saying this show will hitch its cart to The Event and succeed or fail based on what happens with that show. I'm perhaps ludicrously predicting The Event succeeds, but then I'm saying Chase probably doesn't. I think the crime drama competition will squeeze it out.
WHAT I'M WATCHING
I'll try out Hawaii Five-0 and Chase. Looking forward to Men of a Certain Age in late November. You?
For more, see my 2009 post on the hour.
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