Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 7/16/13

WHAT MATTERS:

•  The story of the night was the CW's premiere of Whose Line Is It Anyway? For some reason the CW spin doctor opted to compare it to the network's in-season premieres, which actually makes it feel less impressive. ("Second-biggest premiere in a little under two years!" comes across pretty spinny to me.) Putting it in the context of "CW summer" makes it look even more ridiculous, as this is a network that has literally not done better than a 0.5 from June to August in years. This summer, it's been averaging around a 0.25. Whose Line? matched/beat the combined demo score of their three summer season premieres a year ago: Oh Sit! (0.5), Breaking Pointe (0.3) and The Catalina (0.3). 
• While pre-sold titles often open biggest, they also often drop biggest in the post-premiere weeks, so we will table some of the interesting larger questions for now. (Should they use Whose Line? in the regular season? Will this definitively push the CW back into the comedy game?) If it drops to a 0.7 or something next week, the story changes quite a bit. But I will say I have a hard time imagining that the show's old fanbase saw something noticeably different/worse than the show they remember.

• Elsewhere on broadcast, the MLB All-Star Game posted virtually identical ratings to last year (10.90m and a 3.2 on 7/10/12), while Hollywood Game Night repeated at numbers close to its Thursday original premiere.

• On cable, USA filled in the last piece of its summer sked by bringing back Covert Affairs (0.6) and Suits (1.1). For the former, it continues an astounding fall from grace in the years since its summer 2010 breakout. (The show's four summer premieres have gone 1.6 ->  1.2 -> 0.9 -> 0.6.) Suits obviously did a lot better, matching last year's summer premiere, though last summer saw some great post-premiere build that will be tough for this season to match.

FULL TABLE:

Info			Show				Timeslot		True2
	Viewers	A18-49	Last	LeLa	Rank	y2y	TLa	Ty2y
Extreme Weight Loss	3.45	1.1	+0%	n/a	3/6	n/a	+0%	-4%	1.32
Body of Proof (SR)	2.95	0.7					+27%	-42%	0.91
NCIS (SR)	8.76	1.3					+18%	+24%	1.52
NCIS: Los Angeles (SR)	6.09	0.9					-5%	-5%	1.18
Person of Interest (SR)	6.09	0.9					+6%	-10%	1.17
Hollywood Game Night (R)	3.92	1.1					+16%	-55%	1.29
America's Got Talent Tue	10.06	2.5	-4%	+10%	6/7	-4%	-4%	+22%	2.94
MLB All-Star Game	10.96	3.2	n/a	n/a	1/1	+0%	+113%	+27%	3.66
Whose Line Is It Anyway?	2.92	1.1	n/a	n/a	1/1	n/a	+450%	+175%	1.26
Whose Line Is It Anyway?	2.99	1.2	+9%	n/a	1/2	n/a	+500%	+200%	1.34
Perfect Score	0.91	0.4	n/a	n/a	1/1	n/a	+300%	+33%	0.32
Perfect Score	0.72	0.3	-25%	-67%	2/2	n/a	+50%	+0%	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.
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.