When the CW first came together, Friday wasn't much of a problem; they simply threw on the solid-rated WWE's Smackdown! franchise, which UPN had moved to Friday starting in 2005. The CW parted with that franchise two years later, and it may have been a good financial decision, but from a ratings standpoint the night has (almost) never been the same since. Smallville and Supernatural both cycled through the night for a couple years and actually made Friday one of the network's best nights (especially the year they aired together), but otherwise Friday has been a dumping ground for repeats and low-priority stuff.
WB Friday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | Avg | |
| 2001-02 | Sabrina the Teenage Witch | Maybe It's Me | Reba | Raising Dad | 30 |
| 29 | 25 | 38 | 28 | ||
| 27 | 33 | ||||
| 2002-03 | What I Like About You | Sabrina the Teenage Witch | Reba | Greetings from Tuscon | 32 |
| 29 | 29 | 40 | 29 | ||
| 29 | 34 | ||||
| 2003-04 | Reba | Like Family | Grounded for Life | The Andersons | 31 |
| 38 | 28 | 31 | 27 | ||
| 33 | 29 | ||||
| 2004-05 | What I Like About You | Grounded for Life | Reba | (repeats) | 32 |
| 28 | 30 | 44 | 26 | ||
| 29 | 35 | ||||
| 2005-06 | What I Like About You | Twins | Reba | Living with Fran | 29 |
| 26 | 29 | 34 | 26 | ||
| 28 | 30 | ||||
UPN Friday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | Avg | |
| 2001-02 | (movies) | 24 | |||
| 24 | 24 | ||||
| 2002-03 | (movies) | 17 | |||
| 17 | 17 | ||||
| 2003-04 | (movies) | 19 | |||
| 19 | 19 | ||||
| 2004-05 | Enterprise | (repeats) | 25 | ||
| 32 | 18 | ||||
| 2005-06 | Friday Night Smackdown! | 36 | |||
| 36 | 36 | ||||
CW Friday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | Avg | |||
| 2006-07 | Friday Night Smackdown! | 39 | |||||
| 39 | 39 | ||||||
| 2007-08 | Friday Night Smackdown! | 42 | |||||
| 42 | 42 | ||||||
| 2008-09 | Everybody Hates Chris | The Game | America's Next Top Model Fall (R) | 21 | |||
| 21 | 25 | 18 | |||||
| 23 | |||||||
| 2009-10 | Smallville | America's Next Top Model Fall (R) | 27 | ||||
| 36 | 18 | ||||||
| 2010-11 | Smallville | Supernatural | 40 | ||||
| 42 | 39 | ||||||
| 2011-12 | Nikita | Supernatural | 26 | ||||
| 21 | 31 | ||||||
| 2012-13 | Nikita | America's Next Top Model Fall | 20 | ||||
| 16 | 24 | ||||||
| 2013-14 | The Carrie Diaries | America's Next Top Model Fall | 20 | ||||
| 16 | 23 | ||||||
| 2014-15 | Whose Line Is It Anyway? | America's Next Top Model Fall | 27 | ||||
| 32 | 22 | ||||||
| Avg | 30 | 28 | 29 | ||||
2014-15 Update: The real interest on the CW Friday in 2014-15 was the winter run of Hart of Dixie (24), which somehow was actually up in raw numbers from the previous mostly-Monday season. They're gonna hope for a similar miracle from CBS Studios survivor Reign, which averaged just a 23 in the post-Vampire Diaries slot last year.
See here for more explanations/disclaimers about Schedules Plus.
9 comments:
I think Bones will be, by far, their best Friday performer. Masterchef's numbers aren't real because they have aired exclusively in the two months with the highest viewing levels while the denominator will include the entire year depreciation. It did well but IMO not better than Bones (which by the way is deflated here by that initial 1.2). I think a Bones/Masterchef Jr. lineup would be great for them next year if Masterchef can have longer seasons.
I actually thought Supernatural and Smallville would have looked even better. I doubt Whose Line and Hart of Dixie can beat that but I think they will look better than anything else they've had there, I think it will be a successful lineup.
I know you aren't doing Schedules Plus for Saturdays, but do you have a rough sense of how Fox's Saturdays compared to Fridays when the network aired the Cops/America's Most Wanted combo? I'm curious if the weekend nights approached parity with each other; I'd think that the '05-'06, '09-'10, & '10-'11 Fall seasons would be the closest.
I'm sure finances played a big part in dumping WWE Smackdown, but we should also consider that wrestling did not play into the female, teen-centric identity The CW initially tried to position itself as. However, not renewing the show freed up the night to allow Smallville to hit 10 seasons and successfully "sheltered" Supernatural so it, too, can air at least 10 seasons (and perhaps a spinoff).
They were actually much stronger than the Friday lineups in general. Cops usually pulled roughly a 55ish and AMW was usually in the low 60s. Friday didn't become > Saturday until after Fox dumped that lineup.
Yes, that goes hand-in-hand with what I was saying. I remember reading that part of what made Smackdown unappealing was that its viewers never really responded to promos for other CW programming, and I'm sure that became even more of a problem after they took the "rich kid soap" direction.
This kind of makes the Goldbergs and Trophy Wife more legit than I thought. But maybe that's just because these are fall numbers only? I think the 10pm hour will be the worst ever though.
This feature that you have really highlight what their problem is right now: the lack of a decent 9pm anchor comedy. How I Met Your Mother is doing better than any 8pm option did almost ever. 2 Broke Girls is doing better than mostly anything they've had there (except for its own freshman season and for a season of Mother) and Mom is in the middle of pack as far as 9h30 options go but it also has by far the weakest lead-in ever presented there. They are clearly missing a 9pm player that can uplift the entire thing. Also, I never realize how big Miami was.
That is, if Hart of Dixie airs on Friday at all. In case Star-Crossed (premieres February 17th) bombs, I have little doubt The CW would dump it to Friday and simply leave HoD (returns in mid-March) in its Monday timeslot.
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