Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 2/28/12

WHAT MATTERS:

• It's that time of year again; American Idol returned to Tuesday, dominated the evening, and clobbered Fox's previous Tuesday average. But the new year-to-year paradigm for Idol was maintained; this number was 33% below the year-ago Tuesday telecast.

• A diminished Idol had a smaller-than-usual effect on the rest of the field, although I feel it's worth noting that NCIS lost ground for the third straight week and has now come down nearly 20% from the 4.2 it pulled on the first Tuesday of the February sweep. Lead-out NCIS: Los Angeles, though, bounced back big from last week's awful showing, then Unforgettable followed up with a new series low to cap off an extremely mixed evening for CBS.

• Last April, Parenthood had a huge spike in its season finale to clinch a renewal that was already (in my opinion) pretty safe anyway. This season, the finale got another spike above its typical 1.6/1.7 level in 2012. I'm not as 100% on the renewal this year, but that can't hurt.

FULL TABLE:

Info				Show				Timeslot		TRUE
	Viewers	A18-49	Skew	Last	LeLa	Avg	Rank	Tavg	Lead
Last Man Standing	7.50	2.2	38%	+0%	n/a	-16%	14/18	-10%	n/a	2.06
Cougar Town	4.30	1.6	48%	-6%	+0%	-9%	3/3	-21%	-27%	1.38
The River	4.04	1.5	47%	-12%	-6%	-27%	4/4	-41%	-6%	1.41
Body of Proof	6.83	1.4	26%	-7%	-12%	-20%	15/16	-28%	-7%	1.31
NCIS	18.20	3.5	25%	-3%	n/a	-12%	16/17	-12%	n/a	3.46
NCIS: Los Angeles	15.85	3.1	25%	+15%	-3%	-6%	13/17	-7%	-11%	2.89
Unforgettable	9.93	1.9	24%	-5%	+15%	-20%	17/17	-19%	-39%	1.61
The Biggest Loser	5.70	2.0	45%	-13%	n/a	-12%	9/9	-6%	n/a	1.87
Parenthood	5.16	1.9	47%	+12%	-13%	-2%	11/18	-5%	-5%	1.79
American Idol Wed	16.11	5.1	40%	+0%	n/a	-19%	7/8	+58%	n/a	5.13
Hart of Dixie (R)	0.82	0.3	47%	+0%	n/a	-13%	5/10	-58%	n/a	0.21
Ringer	1.15	0.4	44%	-20%	+0%	-43%	14/15	-37%	+33%	0.40

KEY (click to expand)

Viewers - The total number of viewers (age 2+, in millions) that watched the program.
A18-49 - Adults 18-49 rating. Percentage of US TV-owning adults 18-49 watching the program.
Skew - Percentage of the total audience that falls in the 18-49 demo.
Last - A18-49 percent difference from previous episode.
Lead - A18-49 percent difference from lead-in program.
LeLa - A18-49 percent difference between the show's lead-in and its lead-in for the previous episode.
Avg - A18-49 percent difference from the show's average demo for previous original episodes this season.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes that have aired so far this season.
Tavg - A18-49 percent difference from its timeslot's previous original entertainment average this season.
TRUE - True Strength, a metric that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in. (Note: these are PRELIMINARY TRUE calculations. Finals come next week.)

(R) - Repeat.

Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.

More Spotted Ratings in the Index.