- Though Valentine's Day is not one of the bigger drains on overall viewing among the holidays (overall usage was 6% below last Thursday), it has the same kind of general effect as most holidays: it tends to hurt younger and female-skewing shows more than older-skewing ones. The networks that best fit that description are ABC, Fox and the CW, where American Idol, Grey's Anatomy, Glee and The Vampire Diaries had pretty ugly results. Defying that gravity was the red-hot Scandal, though it dropped in finals and also fell back behind its Grey's Anatomy lead-in.
- At 8/7c, ABC had the low-rated series premiere of drama Zero Hour, which will be fortunate if it can get through its order.
- Week two of sans Dan Harmon Community brought another meltdown, this one even steeper than the spring 2012 collapse recalled last week; it was nearly 40% below last week's surprisingly strong start. This drop is big enough that blaming Valentine's doesn't really do it. It was gonna collapse either way. It might be able to hope for a small rally next week, but it doesn't appear "completely safe" is going to be the consistent level. Parks and Recreation was also down significantly, but it was more within the range of what would be expected given Valentine's and the lead-in difference.
- The youngest-skewing CBS show, The Big Bang Theory, was down a little over 10% in the half-hour likely most affected in usage, but the rest of the lineup was as always pretty resilient.
FULL TABLE:
| Info | Show | Timeslot | True2 | ||||||
| Viewers | A18-49 | Last | LeLa | Rank | y2y | TLa | Ty2y | ||
| Zero Hour | 6.38 | 1.4 | n/a | n/a | 1/1 | n/a | +8% | -3% | 1.79 |
| Grey's Anatomy | 8.57 | 2.8 | -10% | +8% | 14/15 | -13% | -10% | -11% | 3.23 |
| Scandal | 8.02 | 2.7 | -4% | -10% | 3/14 | n/a | -4% | +4% | 3.10 |
| The Big Bang Theory | 17.89 | 5.5 | -11% | n/a | 5/16 | +8% | -11% | +8% | 6.41 |
| Two and a Half Men | 13.69 | 3.8 | -7% | -11% | 11/16 | -3% | -7% | +19% | 3.80 |
| Person of Interest | 14.87 | 3.0 | -3% | -7% | 6/15 | +7% | -5% | +5% | 3.01 |
| Elementary | 10.98 | 2.3 | +5% | -3% | 6/15 | n/a | +2% | -16% | 2.60 |
| Community | 2.76 | 1.2 | -37% | n/a | 2/2 | n/a | -37% | -20% | 1.55 |
| Parks and Recreation | 3.18 | 1.5 | -25% | -37% | 11/13 | -12% | -25% | -12% | 2.02 |
| The Office | 4.06 | 2.0 | -5% | -25% | 12/16 | -13% | +25% | +5% | 2.35 |
| Law and Order: SVU (R) | 3.33 | 0.9 | +38% | +50% | 1.08 | ||||
| American Idol Thu | 12.59 | 3.7 | -10% | n/a | 5/5 | -27% | -10% | -27% | 4.52 |
| Glee | 5.13 | 1.7 | -23% | -10% | 13/14 | -39% | -24% | -67% | 1.63 |
| The Vampire Diaries | 2.31 | 1.0 | -9% | n/a | 14/14 | -29% | -9% | -26% | 1.31 |
| Beauty and the Beast | 1.40 | 0.5 | -17% | -9% | 12/13 | n/a | -9% | -33% | 0.51 |
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.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes that have aired so far this season.
y2y - The show's A18-49 rating compared to its rating a year ago.
TLa - The show's A18-49 rating compared to the network's rating in the timeslot one week ago.
Ty2y - The show's A18-49 rating compared to the network's rating in the timeslot one year ago.
True2 - The second edition of True Strength, a metric that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in. PRELIMINARY CALCULATION. For finals, see SpotVault.
(R) - Repeat.
Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.
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.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes that have aired so far this season.
y2y - The show's A18-49 rating compared to its rating a year ago.
TLa - The show's A18-49 rating compared to the network's rating in the timeslot one week ago.
Ty2y - The show's A18-49 rating compared to the network's rating in the timeslot one year ago.
True2 - The second edition of True Strength, a metric that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in. PRELIMINARY CALCULATION. For finals, see SpotVault.
(R) - Repeat.
Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.
More Spotted Ratings in the Index.
6 comments:
Although I wanted it to do better, something feels good about nailing the prediction for Zero Hour.
Ugh. And I thought 0H was decent. Launching a show on Valentine's was worse idea than I thought. On the bright side, there's an honest chance of growth next week.
Add another victim of the Mork & Mindy Curse. I guess I should've seen this coming. Except I was so enthralled by how awesome the ads made it look that I stopped seeing the pitfalls of both the timeslot and the show itself.
As to quality, I can't say whether the beginning and end were "good", but they were fun as hell. That midsection was murderously boring, though.
I wonder how many people, if any, have caught on yet to the fact that Arrow actually beat Vampire Diaries this week...(not that I'm really gonna gloat on it, but I do prefer Arrow by a wide margin)
Oh, one more thing. In memoriam of Zero Hour's failure, here's the list of ABC Thursday @ 8 shows that were canceled after one season or less in the slot, going back to fall 1982:
Last Resort, Missing, Charlie's Angels, My Generation,
The Deep End, Flashforward, In The Motherhood, Samantha Who,
Miss/Guided, Alias, Jake In Progress (don't let that one Monday @ 9:30
ep in 2006 tell you otherwise), Threat Matrix, Vengeance Unlimited,
Nothing Sacred, High Incident, Charlie Grace, My So-Called Life, Missing
Persons, Delta, Room For Two, Pros and Cons, Father Dowling Mysteries,
the 1988 reboot of Mission: Impossible, Knightwatch, Probe, The
Charmings, Sledge Hammer!, Our World, Ripley's Believe It Or Not, Shadow
Chasers, The Fall Guy, Wildside, People Do The Craziest Things, Two
Marriages, Automan, Trauma Center, Condo, The New Odd Couple, Benson,
Amanda's, The Greatest American Hero, Joanie Loves Chachi, Star Of The
Family
And by all appearances, we have the screw-jackery committed upon Mork & Mindy, the last show to run multiple seasons in the slot before or since Ugly Betty.
Since you've included non-scripted shows in the list, there is one show that's lasted multiple seasons in the Thursday at 8 death slot: Wipeout.
A couple of those were incidental, and meant to illustrate that even unscripted has had a rough go in the slot historically. It's also worth mentioning that Whose Line Is It Anyway had a multi-year run in the timeslot, basically putting up mediocre ratings on a much lower budget than stuff like Vengeance Unlimited and Threat Matrix (the shows that bookended it).
I guess I should say that Mork & Mindy and Ugly Betty are the last two scripted shows to run multiple seasons in the slot, to date.
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