Spotted Ratings, Thursday 5/24/12: A Minor Music Series

WHAT MATTERS:

• ABC began the summer in very disappointing fashion as Duets proved it is indeed possible to create something less than a big hit in the singing competition genre. The show was routed head-to-head by the So You Think You Can Dance premiere and didn't even manage good-for-summer numbers. ABC rounded out the evening with Rookie Blue, down a couple ticks from last season's premiere, which doesn't seem that bad since its lead-in was surprisingly much weaker than last year.

• As for SYTYCD, it didn't exactly shine either as it came in 27% below last season's premiere, a year-to-year drop that's pretty reminiscent of most returning music competitions this season. This one was predictable considering how sharply the show dropped over the course of last summer. That drop had led Fox to cancel the second weekly airing of the show for this season. So Fox and ABC will both hope that separating these two shows will be beneficial, as SYTYCD airs only on Wednesdays starting next week.

• On cable, ESPN's final game of the Heat/Pacers NBA playoff series (3.0) comfortably topped all the broadcasters. TBS had a decent-looking start from Men at Work (1.3), which retained almost all its 9:30 The Big Bang Theory lead-in (1.4), but the second Men episode (1.1) took a somewhat worrisome dip at 10:30.

FULL TABLE:

	Viewers	A18-49	Last	LeLa	Avg	Rank
Duets	6.76	1.7	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1
Rookie Blue	6.09	1.4	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1
The Big Bang Theory (SR)	8.27	2.3
Rules of Engagement (SR)	6.12	1.7
Person of Interest (SR)	7.90	1.4
The Mentalist (SR)	7.84	1.5
The Office (SR)	2.26	0.7
The Office (SR)	1.86	0.7
America's Got Talent (R)	3.82	1.2
Awake	2.87	0.9	+29%	-8%	-18%	6/13
So You Think You Can Dance	6.26	2.4	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1
Perez Hilton All Access	0.81	0.3	n/a	n/a	n/a	n/a
The Vampire Diaries (SR)	0.56	0.2

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.
Last - A18-49 percent difference from previous episode.
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.

(R) - Repeat.
(SR) - Summer repeat. (for shows not currently in season)

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

More Spotted Ratings in the Index.