A18-49+: The Sitcoms, Dramas and Unscripted Post

The A18-49+ theme posts combine all of the individual season info in one specific category, allowing us to line up the last ten seasons of collective Live+SD ratings declines on a relatively apples-to-apples basis. In future seasons I will update these pages with the new season numbers.

Today brings the sequel to perhaps my favorite post on the blog last year, "Quantifying the Return of the Sitcom." That was the post that I think really proved how much value there was in the whole A18-49+ project. I also did an unscripted edition. For most of the theme posts this year, the idea is that there won't really be any value in returning to those old posts. However, I still recommend those, as they have a lot more info on individual shows than this one.

This year, I'm building on those ideas with even deeper numbers. I classified every single big four series that's gone into a regular season "league average" under one of four categories: "Sitcom," "Drama," "Unscripted" and "News."* Now I can look at the strength of these categories in their entireties, rather than just the top shows. I've also got some very interesting stuff on how much of the non-sports series real estate each of those categories takes up.

*- "News" is a very quick way of describing this category, but what I really mean here is "low priority schedule staples." Most of them are indeed newsmagazines: 60 Minutes, 48 Hours, Dateline, Rock Center, Primetime, 20/20. But I also included three notable series that I don't think most would consider "news": Cops, America's Most Wanted and America's Funniest Home Videos. This is done to cover the full gamut of unscripted series in low-viewed timeslots that roughly tend to decline at the league average rate.

Previously:
New Shows
Networks

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Put 'em All Together:

Ratings:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2001-02	122	104	98	72
2002-03	116	97	127	66
2003-04	100	96	141	66
2004-05	82	113	116	61
2005-06	77	111	120	60
2006-07	84	107	119	58
2007-08	98	101	112	61
2008-09	101	100	116	63
2009-10	101	99	116	61
2010-11	110	94	121	61
2011-12	117	95	114	59
2012-13	104	94	120	65
2013-14	101	94	118	71
2014-15	107	95	120	70
2015-16	100	96	117	77
2016-17	108	92	123	79
2017-18	112	92	122	74
2018-19	103	92	123	76

To expand on something in the 2003-04 section, it's worth noting that the volume of originals aired on weekends tends to have an impact. For one, dramas are always going to be inherently disadvantaged, because there are always a lot more of those on weekends compared to sitcoms. Generally the drama numbers would be about seven points higher if we exclude Friday/Saturday episodes.

2016-17 saw another significant swing from drama back toward comedy, with big expansions on the two strongest comedy networks (ABC/CBS). Though American Idol went out of the mix, Fox mostly just replaced it with scripted stuff, and very healthy seasons from most of the staples meant the average for the remaining reality staples was also on the upswing.

Real Estate:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2001-02	21%	44%	14%	21%
2002-03	19%	42%	19%	20%
2003-04	21%	41%	19%	20%
2004-05	16%	41%	26%	17%
2005-06	16%	45%	23%	15%
2006-07	11%	48%	26%	15%
2007-08	9%	40%	38%	12%
2008-09	11%	49%	28%	12%
2009-10	13%	45%	30%	12%
2010-11	14%	43%	30%	13%
2011-12	16%	41%	30%	12%
2012-13	19%	40%	29%	12%
2013-14	20%	44%	27%	9%
2014-15	15%	50%	24%	11%
2015-16	15%	51%	24%	10%
2016-17	17%	51%	21%	10%
2017-18	17%	50%	22%	10%
2018-19	17%	49%	25%	10%

As mentioned on the Networks post, Fox's departure from reality programming has been staggering, and it is most of the reason why the reality real estate fell to its lowest level since the very early years of Idol. And the aforementioned ABC/CBS comedy expansions saw a couple points go into that total. Overall, this adds up to an unprecedented imbalance between scripted and unscripted programming; after many years of about a 60% unscripted/40% scripted mix, we are now getting closer to 70/30.

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2001-04: Reality Rises and Rules

Ratings:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2001-02	121	104	98	72
2002-03	116	97	127	66
2003-04	101	96	141	66

Real Estate:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2001-02	21%	44%	14%	21%
2002-03	19%	42%	19%	20%
2003-04	21%	41%	19%	20%

The way the league average was put together in 2003-04 was pretty unique, and it's nice that we're able to glimpse the end of the previous era. As I mentioned at some length in the 2003-04 recap, perhaps most important was that there were still non-burnoff scripted hours being broadcast on Saturday, namely CBS' The District (46) and Hack (39). Combine this with ABC's TGIF and this season's scripted averages are more deflated than any other by the weekend numbers. (Taking just the Sunday to Thursday numbers, dramas and sitcoms would both average 106.)

However, this still looks like it was probably the tail end of reality TV's golden age. While reality is still a huge deal today, it is much more about a select few strong veteran shows taking up a ton of real estate. But 2003-04's American Idol (268/255) had not even hit its prime yet. 2003-04 was a land of young shows and great depth in the unscripted realm. NBC had the breakout of the season, The Apprentice (241), along with shows like Average Joe (158/132) and Fear Factor (143). Fox could throw practically anything after American Idol and strike it big, from My Big Fat Obnoxious Fiance (198) to The Simple Life (142) to The Swan (108). Survivor (199/211) and The Bachelor (159/129) were stronger than they are today. Many of these shows had burned out entirely within a couple years, but the land was still quite fertile in 2003-04.

Another reason for that huge 142 number for "Reality" is that much of the "filler" we see in that average today counted in the "News" average back then. Filler was much more a newsmagazine game, from ABC's Thursday edition of Primetime (68) to CBS' 60 Minutes II (53) on Wednesday. Over the next three years, many of those options would slow filter away in favor of more traditional cheap "reality."

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2004-06: A Dramatic Explosion

Ratings:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2004-05	82	113	116	61
2005-06	77	111	120	60

Real Estate:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2004-05	16%	41%	26%	17%
2005-06	16%	45%	23%	15%

Starting with 2004-05, the relatively balanced world of sitcoms and dramas got thrown way off-kilter. On the drama side, the multi-pronged breakthrough class of 2004-05 did a great deal of the lifting. Of course ABC's big three of Desperate Housewives (263), Grey's Anatomy (199) and Lost (170) are most fondly remembered, but even if you threw all those out and just took the top drama on every other network (Medium (135), CSI: NY (131) and House (130)), it'd have been a great year for new drama. The networks' reaction? MOAR DRAMA. The percentage shot up to 46% in 2005-06, then peaked in the years surrounding the writers' strike at just under 50%.

While the drama was reloading its stables, the sitcom took a huge double whammy. First NBC lost Friends (300) and Frasier (114) after the 2003-04 season, and they subsequently saw their comedy presence pretty much die out. CBS lost Everybody Loves Raymond (155) after 2004-05, and while they held up a little better because they had their next anchor Two and a Half Men in place, Men was not immediately as strong as Raymond, and there were a couple rough years for them as well.

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2006-09: Sitcom Real Estate Bottoms Out, but A Rally Begins

Ratings:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2006-07	84	107	119	58
2007-08	98	101	111	61
2008-09	101	100	116	62

Real Estate:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2006-07	11%	48%	26%	15%
2007-08	9%	40%	38%	12%
2008-09	11%	49%	28%	12%

2005-06 was as dire as it ever got for the sitcom in the last decade. And the networks clearly responded in 2006-07, shrinking the percentage of sitcom real estate all the way down to 11%. It went down even farther in 2007-08, though that was because of the writer's strike; the drama to sitcom ratio was about the same. And even though there were clear signs that the form was rebounding in 2007-08 (in particular, the sitcoms returned from the strike so much better than the dramas), it took the networks a little while to adjust accordingly. The real estate makeup in the year after the strike was virtually the same as in the year before it. From 2006-07 through 2009-10, new dramas were consistently outnumbering new sitcoms nearly two to one. (For comparison, in the last two years it's been much more even: 38 dramas vs. 30 sitcoms.)

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2009-12: A Sitcom Reinvestment and Resurgence

Ratings:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2009-10	101	99	116	61
2010-11	110	94	121	61
2011-12	117	94	114	59

Real Estate:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2009-10	13%	45%	30%	12%
2010-11	14%	43%	30%	13%
2011-12	16%	41%	30%	12%

In 2009-10, the sitcom real estate percentage finally began swinging up. The effect wasn't immediately felt in the overall rating averages, but it was clearly a very important year as ABC launched its new Wednesday lineup with Modern Family (135) and The Middle (81), while CBS was building The Big Bang Theory (188) into something special after Two and a Half Men. NBC (kind of) got its act together led by The Office. It all peaked in 2011-12 with the return of the megahit scripted program as Modern Family (214), The Big Bang Theory (210) and Two and a Half Men (210) all broke through the barrier.

Reality programming also had a bit of a resurgence as shows like American Idol and Dancing with the Stars hit their ratings prime and took up more and more real estate.

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2012-19: The Sitcom Bubble Bursts

Ratings:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2013-14	101	94	118	71
2014-15	107	95	119	70
2015-16	100	96	117	77
2016-17	108	91	123	79
2017-18	112	91	122	74
2018-19	103	92	123	76

Real Estate:

Year	Comedy	Drama	Reality	News
2013-14	20%	44%	27%	9%
2014-15	15%	50%	24%	11%
2015-16	15%	51%	24%	10%
2016-17	17%	51%	21%	10%
2017-18	17%	50%	22%	10%
2018-19	17%	49%	25%	10%

In "Quantifying the Return of the Sitcom," my advice to the networks was to continue increasing the investment in sitcoms. They did just that, but the results trend went sharply in the other direction. I knew it'd been a bad year, but the extent of this year-to-year drop still surprised me. It's not like there was some huge loss like a Friends or a Raymond, but comedies practically reverted to their 2008-10 levels. It makes some sense when you consider that, monstrous The Big Bang Theory (249) excepted, almost every returning sitcom dropped by more than the league average. NBC's department totally fell apart thanks to a disappointing final season of The Office (101), and Fox sophomore New Girl (109) slumped big time in its effort to anchor a two-hour block. Perhaps a lot of the returnee struggle owes to the fact that the new sitcom slate was disastrous. NBC, the heaviest investor in new comedies, canned every single one, while CBS reacted to its horrible slate by pretty much sitting out of the new comedy game.

2013-14 felt like another terrible season for sitcoms, but that doesn't really show up in these category averages; comedies went down just a point, from 103 to 102. This was despite every single network getting weaker in comedies (a couple of them much weaker), and the total volume of sitcoms aired going up. So what gives on the 103 -> 102 thing?

The key is in the network real estate counts. Specifically, the strongest comedy network (CBS) added a sitcom hour in 2013-14, while the weakest one (NBC) barely aired half as many comedy hours as last year. This made a seismic difference, enough to nearly cancel out the general weakening. And though there were more success stories in 2014-15 (especially ABC Wednesday), the trend was again exaggerated as even more low-rated hours were shed in 2014-15.

For additional yearly/theme recaps and more on A18-49+, check out the A18-49+ Index.