Demos Year-to-Year, May Sweeps 2012 Week Three Winners/Losers

As usual with my year-to-year posts, at the end of each week I take a look at the biggest gainers and losers among adults 18-49. I stick to only original-vs.-original comparisons for these lists.

Top 5 year-to-year show losers
1. Cougar Town (Tu 8-9pm vs. W 9:30-10pm) -50%
2. America's Next Top Model -50%
t-3. Dancing with the Stars Mon (M 8-9:30pm vs. M 8-10pm) -43%
t-3. The Cleveland Show (Su 7:30-8pm vs. Su 9:30-10pm) -43% 
5. Nikita (F 8-9pm vs. Thu 9-10pm) -43%

While DWTS has been on the fringes of this list all season, it got even worse this week since the episode was just 90 minutes long and it had to face a similar-skewing America's Got Talent. Otherwise, this is a fairly familiar group of faces (get used to me saying that in this last full-strength week of the season), with three of them undergoing major timeslot downgrades from this time a year ago.

Top 5 year-to-year show gainers
t-1. Shark Tank +31%
t-1. Mike and Molly +31%
3. The Big Bang Theory +29%
4. Primetime: What Would You Do? +25%
5. How I Met Your Mother (M 8-9pm vs. M 8-8:30pm) +19%

Once again, almost everyone on the list has been here in the last few weeks, although Primetime: What Would You Do? had a big bounce-back and is showing some late-season muscle alongside Shark Tank. With CBS' sitcoms all wrapping up this week, there should be quite a few new faces in the fourth and final week.

Top 5 year-to-year timeslot losers
1. Nikita vs. Smallville (CW, Friday 8-9pm) -67%
2. Fashion Star vs. The Voice (NBC, Tuesday 10-11pm) -65% 
t-3. The LA Complex vs. Hellcats (CW, Tuesday 9-10pm) -60%
t-3. Cougar Town vs. Dancing with the Stars (R) (ABC, Tuesday 8-9pm) -60%
5. Supernatural vs. Smallville (CW, Friday 9-10pm) -50%

Again, lots of familiar faces. However, the CW's lineup did much worse than usual on a year-to-year basis since it went up against that big two-hour finale of Smallville last season.

Top 5 year-to-year timeslot gainers
1. America's Got Talent vs. Chuck/The Event (NBC, Monday 8-10pm) +160%
2. Smash vs. Law and Order: Los Angeles (NBC, Monday 10-11pm) +57%
3. Once Upon a Time vs. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition (ABC, Sunday 8-9pm) +53%
t-4. Revenge vs. Happy Endings x2 (ABC, Wednesday 10-11pm) +43%
t-4.  Off Their Rockers vs. Minute to Win It (NBC, Wednesday 8-9pm) +43%

As expected, NBC was so incompetent on Monday in 2011 that even an arguably disappointing Got Talent premiere was able to easily top the charts and also lift an even more disappointing Smash to the number two position. Once Upon a Time makes it onto the list for the first time this May, but it's been just outside the top five each week and has been crushing Extreme Makeover's ratings all season long.

Here are this premiere week's daily posts, in case you missed any:
Thursday | Friday | Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday

Previous recaps from the corresponding week: 2010 | 2011