ABC True Power Rankings, May 2014

The upfront extravaganza is finally here! Every weekday for the next three weeks, this blog will have a meaty piece of coverage surrounding the annual schedule releases. It starts this week with the season's final edition of the True Power Rankings, the SHOW-centric half of the upfront preview, digging deep into the merits of individual shows by network. Next week come the Upfront Questions, the SCHEDULE-centric look ahead to upfront week. (Save your mock schedules for next week!) The following week, the schedules come out, and with them come the Upfront Answers.

The True/A18-49 averages cover the last one-third of aired episodes this season, rounded up, through April 20.

Other May True Power Rankings: ABC | CBS | NBC | Fox | CW

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ABC Comedies		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
The Elite
1	Modern Family	3.78	3.38	45%	-18%	6
2	The Middle	2.13	1.95	34%	-10%	6

There's always so little to say about these guys! They're still strong and they're going to retain their timeslots next season. Period. Neither of these shows got quite the help from syndication that I was hoping for, but both of them have been slowly chipping away at their year-to-year deficits since February. Are they doing better because of syndication, or because American Idol is so much less relevant? 

Modern Family is going to miss out on a third straight season as a megahit, but if it can average a 3.5ish the rest of the way, it could narrow that year-to-year deficit to -15%ish. And it seems quite possible The Middle will end up declining less than the league average.

ABC Comedies		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
The Actual Middle
3	Last Man Standing	1.78	1.31	27%	-11%	7
4	Suburgatory	1.65	1.60	37%	-36%	3
5	The Goldbergs	1.58	1.53	42%		7

One of the ongoing struggles with the True formula is how much weight to put on collective spring declines. Many a show has declined somewhat in the second half of the season and yet gone up in True, suggesting it may need to be dialed back a bit. But Last Man Standing is a show for which the True uptick feels legitimate. I mean, it's gotten the same mix of 1.2's, 1.3's and 1.4's post-DST that it was getting in the fall, and those are simply better numbers now than they were six months ago. It's emerged more decisively as the #3 ABC comedy, and it should not be sweating a renewal.

The Goldbergs will get renewed, but it's still performing at a relatively modest level, with no real signs of momentum in the second half of the season. The best thing you can say about the show is that it has surprisingly little dependency on its Agents of SHIELD lead-in, and maybe it should not get as much compatibility credit as that portion of the formula suggests. If it had shown a little more heat, I'd suggest it become part of the Wednesday mix, but it could go either way now.

Meanwhile, Suburgatory is the one of these three that seems a legitimate question mark. I don't necessarily think that's an injustice in a vacuum, but it sure looks like one when you compare it to...

ABC Comedies		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
The... Not Dunzo?
6	Back in the Game	1.34	1.58	35%		4
7	Mixology	1.29	1.33	43%		3
8	Super Fun Night	1.28	1.37	44%		6
9	The Neighbors	1.27	0.95	30%	-49%	8
10	Trophy Wife	0.98	0.90	39%		7

...these alternatives.

This is going to be one heck of a test of the power of studio favoritism. I haven't done hard research on this, but it feels like studio considerations have usually only been a tiebreaker, not a justification for major ratings reaches. This would be well beyond tiebreaker, because it would be pretty crazy for Suburgatory to get the axe in favor of any of the three ABC Studios productions (Mixology, The Neighbors and Trophy Wife). In fact, I'd argue you should renew repeats of Suburgatory ahead of those three! Would any of them in originals even pull the 1.1 that Suburgatory repeats have been getting after Middle repeats? Maybe The Neighbors? I dunno.

But let's humor these rumors and say that ABC is going to make a studio-based reach. If they do, there's one show that ought to be well ahead of the other two: The Neighbors. It has the highest episode count in the can, it's the best fit for syndication, and it's the one already airing in the bad timeslot (the "bird in the hand," as I always say). Shepherding it to syndication wouldn't hurt the network that badly since it doesn't really seem to damage Shark Tank at 9/8c. Maybe it does damage ST and we just don't know it, but it feels hard to make the case that Shark Tank would be doing so much better since it's already easily the biggest Friday show in the A18-49+ era.

Is there a viable path to a Mixology renewal, as Deadline suggests? The show hasn't bombed as hard as it could have, especially given how horribly it premiered. If 1) ABC is absolutely hell-bent on renewing an ABC Studios show and 2) the crew behind The Neighbors have absolutely moved on to their new show in development, Mixology would probably be the next logical choice. But it's miles from syndication, it probably wouldn't do well in syndication anyway, it's not compatible with anything, and it doesn't have the fanbase groundswell of other hangout comedies that might suggest some ratings upside. So it's really hard to come up with a universe in which this is a smart renewal. If you're going to show blatant favoritism to the studio, you should at least do so with the expectation that it can pay off on the back end.

That leaves Trophy Wife, the show seemingly everyone on the Internet would want to be that studio-based reach. But as I said in February: if the back nine was a modest surprise, a season two would be even another order of magnitude beyond that. Trophy Wife has gotten even weaker since that back nine was awarded, and it's simply a much weaker show than anything else with which it's competing. It's my favorite show of these three, and as a fan I would like to have seen it get a chance after Modern Family, but it's not like The Goldbergs is some horrible pairing. And the rejection after that show has been pretty massive. It gets Neighbors raw numbers on a much higher-viewed night and with a bigger lead-in. Hell, even when Mixology has had a Goldbergs-sized lead-in (repeats of Modern Family), it's done a few ticks better than the Trophy Wife norm. If ABC were really going to make this happen, they should've tried to generate at least some glimmer of Nielsen hope in some other slot. With what they have now, I just don't see how they can do it.

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ABC Dramas		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
The Power Hours
1	Scandal	3.22	2.92	43%	+27%	6
2	Grey's Anatomy	3.00	2.54	40%	-14%	7

Another smashing season of Scandal is in the books with no real signs of burn-out in sight. Still, as much as the affiliates and Jimmy Kimmel must love broadcast TV's #1 drama in the 10/9c hour, not utilizing it to lead into something else in primetime feels like a wasted opportunity. In a perfect world, Scandal would be on Thursday at 9/8c leading into new Shonda Rhimes/Viola Davis drama How to Get Away with Murder.

The problem is that Grey's Anatomy is still very much in the mix. Grey's is a declining franchise, but it's doing so at a much slower rate than I think most casual industry followers realize. It's still a legitimate hit series, and thus of tremendous value to ABC. That makes messing with Grey's a particularly high-stakes situation; you have to be worried about accelerating that decline and thus losing a large chunk of that tremendous value. Could it survive a move to another night? Would it hold up in a move to Thursday 8/7c? Is a tri-Shonda Thursday too much of one thing on the same night? There's no solution that I'm in love with. On a certain level, this is a good problem to have, but it's still a real problem. More on the Thursday possibilities next week!

ABC Dramas		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
The Second Tier
3	Agents of SHIELD	2.31	2.02	44%		6
4	Once Upon a Time	2.24	2.12	39%	-24%	6
5	Resurrection	2.09	2.15	35%		2
6	Castle	1.89	1.81	25%	-4%	7

The raw numbers have continued to inch down for Agents of SHIELD, so the "huge disappointment to ABC" narrative has persisted, but the True formula suggests this is still about the same show it was in roughly early November, maybe even a bit stronger than its early 2014 episodes. All indications are it's coming back, and I would think it's coming back to Tuesday. The question is what surrounds it.

Resurrection has taken on its own disappointment narrative, since it's declined in each of its five post-premiere episodes. But as with SHIELD, there's a pretty big gulf between "game-changer" and "cancellation-worthy," and Resurrection should end season one somewhere in that gulf. I mean, I put the over/under at 2.25 for the premiere and about half of the commenters went under, so I think ABC would still be pretty happy with low 2's for the back half of the run. It should come back in the fall after Once Upon a Time. I have some worry about all these "limited series" collapsing in season two (The Following isn't assuaging these fears), but give it the best chance by keeping the hiatus to a minimum. Even if it does collapse, at least for next fall it's got to be a better option than hurling another DOA new concept like Betrayal or Red Widow at the wall.

Does all this mean that the second-tier show with the best chance of switching nights is actually the one that's had the same timeslot for six seasons? A Castle move long seemed very possible. But once Dancing with the Stars began declining sharply, it felt like the window to move it had probably closed, and ABC would ride out the combo until it got weak enough to necessitate a major overhaul. And yet, things have improbably swung back in the other direction. Both seasons of DWTS picked up some Plus ground this season, and The Bachelor is pretty close to as strong as it's ever been on Monday. We may find ourselves back in a situation where Monday at 10/9c is a fertile ground for a newbie. Castle, as always, could fill any number of potential holes: Tuesday 10/9c, Wednesday 10/9c, Thursday 8/7c, Sunday 10/9c.

ABC Dramas		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
The So-So Serials
7	Nashville	1.65	1.40	35%	-20%	7
8	Revenge	1.48	1.49	33%	-28%	7

Does the True formula overrate the importance of lead-in (or just timeslot in general) for serialized dramas? Nashville's True score has risen late in the season as its lead-in has gotten even worse/less compatible. Many of Revenge's highest True scores came in January when it had comically terrible lead-ins and had to deal with event season. Now that Revenge has a good lead-in again, it's dropped back behind Nashville in the True scores. I can see why this is the case; they're doing nearly the same raw numbers, one after Mixology and one after Resurrection. But I don't know that I buy it. Nashville is perhaps inflated by having a worse timeslot in this comparison.

Because of this, I wouldn't be all that hesitant about using one of these shows as "spackle." While I think that term is often associated with more standalone shows, that definition seems a bit backwards because they're actually the shows that benefit more from good situations. I always thought it was weird to consider Body of Proof as some kind of versatile player, considering its story was really that it could do OK after Dancing with the Stars and was a nightmare elsewhere.

I think Nashville's relatively good spring hold and the long-term uncertainty around Resurrection means both these shows will get renewed. But it's not a lock, and either way, they're not strong shows. I'd rather only have one on the fall sked and put one in the reserve role. I don't know how much value there really is in getting Revenge to four full seasons, but since it's almost there I guess it's the more likely fall candidate.

ABC Dramas		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
Paul Lee's Picks
9	Once Upon a Time in Wonderland	1.09	0.88	33%		5
10	Killer Women	0.97	0.65	27%		2
11	Mind Games	0.92	0.70	38%		2
12	Betrayal	0.85	0.74	33%		5
13	The Assets	0.80	0.60	25%		1
14	Lucky 7	0.72	0.70	36%		1

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ABC Unscripted		True	A18-49	Skew	y2y	Counted Eps
1	The Bachelor	2.69	2.78	38%	-7%	4
2	Shark Tank	2.57	1.91	34%	+5%	9
3	Dancing with the Stars Spring	2.43	2.25	20%	-2%	2
4	Dancing with the Stars Fall	2.00	1.95	20%	-5%	4
5	20/20	1.98	1.56	30%	-2%	11
6	America's Funniest Home Videos	1.37	1.40	27%	-8%	6
7	The Great Christmas Light Fight	1.35	1.30	32%		1
8	The Taste	1.05	0.93	37%	-31%	3

Last season, it was considered a very real possibility that ABC could flip Dancing with the Stars and The Bachelor, putting the stronger series in the regular season twice. It didn't happen; the only move was that ABC cut DWTS down to just one night. It's anyone's guess whether that actually made a difference for DWTS, but something sure did. The franchise has steadied the ship, and that's a big deal for ABC.

I still think ABC would be better off from a pure ratings points standpoint with DWTS in the winter and Bachelor in the fall/spring. But the situation has not really changed from last year; if anything, DWTS looks more favorable because it's not declining rapidly anymore. So if it didn't happen last year, I wouldn't expect it this year. Part of me wonders if ABC favors more regular season DWTS because it takes more viewers away from older-skewing CBS.

Similarly, the ship may have sailed on a Shark Tank move to another night. Like the DWTS/Bachelor flip, it's not impossible, but the circumstances were better last year. I liked the idea last year because it could help funnel some viewers into a totally unproven SHIELD, but at this point it wouldn't help SHIELD or whatever Shonda drama is on Thursday at 9/8c nearly as much as it helps 20/20. I also liked the idea last year because it seemed like ABC had enough potential comedy returnees to try a two-hour TGIF. This year, with less depth, it would be a bigger stretch to put together. (Last year, their sixth and seventh comedies were the cancelled How to Live and Malibu Country; their sixth and seventh options this year will not be so strong.) A Friday without Shark Tank would take a huge step backward from their top Friday lineup this season, and Shark Tank's presence on a weeknight would be very hard-pressed to make up for those losses.