The CW's The Vampire Diaries spin-off The Originals actually aired for the first time on Thursday, but I'm not counting that as the premiere since it was apparently mostly a repeat of the backdoor pilot. Its first totally original episode came on the next Tuesday, when it brought almost all of that Thursday audience over. It averaged a solid 0.9 demo, tying as the third-biggest show of the CW's week (with Wednesday pair Arrow/The Tomorrow People). Given it faced two of broadcast's biggest dramas (Agents of SHIELD and NCIS), this was a pretty good showing.
WEEK TWO
In week two, The Originals was the first of three straight 8/7c CW shows to take a huge uptick, improbably rising by 22% to a 1.1. At the time, it was actually bigger than the previous week's episode of mothership The Vampire Diaries, though TVD ended up having its own uptick later in the week. It tied Arrow as the network's second-biggest show in 18-49 last week.
PROGNOSIS
This show brought over so many characters from the mothership that it seemed like a solid bet for success, but based on last week's uptick and the relatively positive reviews, it looks like it might have potential to do even better than I expected. There's no doubt that it at least has the self-starting capability to justify the CW leading off Tuesday with it. Renew.
"First Two Weeks" is an ongoing experiment to see how often a new scripted show's fate can be predicted by the very earliest data. Here are the picks and lineups for every show this season.
