First Two Weeks, Man Up!

MAN UP! (ABC)

WEEK ONE
The series premiere of ABC comedy Man Up! averaged a 2.4 demo and 7.78 million viewers at 8:30. That's a pretty bad premiere performance considering its lead-in Last Man Standing got a 3.1 demo. That put its retention at 77%, even with overall PUT levels increasing in the 8:30 half-hour. Its 2.01 TRUE was one of the lowest of any big-four newbie this season and the lowest on ABC.

WEEK TWO
In week two, Man Up! dropped a typical-ish 17% to a 2.0 demo. Perhaps its best excuse for this performance was that Last Man Standing also took a dip (to a 2.8), but it still added up to a dropoff in retention (now 71%). The show could be ABC's weakest scripted show as early as next week with Pan Am and Body of Proof lingering in the upper 1's.

PROGNOSIS
The week two drop could've been worse, but the reality is that the premiere rating had very little (if any) wiggle room, and now there's really no wiggle room. Unless the show drops another huge chunk, it might stick around for a few more weeks, but given the big drops out of Last Man Standing, it appears pretty clear this is not going to be a long-term option for ABC. I'm saying no season two and no extension.

"First Two Weeks" is my look at... the first two weeks of a new scripted broadcast show's ratings. I also line all of these numbers up to do an objective analysis in what I call "the system."