Many more disclaimers can be seen on the individual pages, but the most basic one to keep in mind is that the listed schedules are fall lineups, even when midseason replacements may have done much better. (But I try to mention those midseason replacements that did better.)
More 2013-14 Schedules Plus updates: ABC | CBS | NBC | Fox | CW
Monday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | 10:00 | 10:30 | Avg | |
| 2012-13 | How I Met Your Mother | Partners | 2 Broke Girls | Mike and Molly | Hawaii Five-0 | 125 | |
| 152 | 98 | 160 | 135 | 102 | |||
| 125 | 148 | ||||||
| 2013-14 | How I Met Your Mother | 2 Broke Girls | Mike and Molly | Mom | Hostages | 111 (-11%) | |
| 180 (+18%) | 134 (+37%) | 115 (-28%) | 111 (-18%) | 63 (-38%) | |||
| 157 (+26%) | 113 (-23%) | ||||||
| Avg | 116 | 143 | 133 | 130 | |||
| VsAvg | +36% | -21% | -52% | -15% | |||
| Rank | 2/11 | 9/11 | 11/11 | 11/11 | |||
The departing How I Met Your Mother started off at 8/7c with the network's best lead-off ratings in the era, and 2 Broke Girls (which replaced We Are Men (101) very early) actually had the second-best numbers at 8:30, trailing only season one of 2BG two years previous. But Mike and Molly was the lowest-rated 9/8c anchor, and the second hour trailed all previous occupants except for the first couple years after Everybody Loves Raymond ended. And the 10/9c hour was the kind of dumpster fire rarely seen on CBS, with midseason replacement Intelligence (71) only barely outrating Hostages if you take out its post-NCIS premiere. All this was a recipe for a major shake-up in fall 2014, with only one hour of comedies, the new drama Scorpion at 9/8c, and hopefully reliable NCIS: Los Angeles at 10/9c.
Tuesday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | 10:00 | 10:30 | Avg | |
| 2012-13 | NCIS | NCIS: Los Angeles | Vegas | 125 | |||
| 159 | 133 | 82 | |||||
| 2013-14 | NCIS | NCIS: Los Angeles | Person of Interest | 128 (+2%) | |||
| 149 (-6%) | 129 (-3%) | 105 (+28%) | |||||
| Avg | 121 | 113 | 85 | 106 | |||
| VsAvg | +23% | +14% | +24% | +20% | |||
| Rank | 4/11 | 4/11 | 1/11 | 2/11 | |||
In a rare down year for the NCIS twins, CBS Tuesday still slightly improved year-to-year overall due to Person of Interest pulling CBS' best-yet ratings in one of its worst hours historically. This lineup only trailed 2011-12 historically (in which Unforgettable was 10 points weaker than PoI but the NCIS duo were each over five points stronger).
Wednesday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | 10:00 | 10:30 | Avg | |
| 2012-13 | Survivor | Criminal Minds | CSI | 127 | |||
| 136 | 136 | 109 | |||||
| 2013-14 | Survivor | Criminal Minds | CSI | 121 (-4%) | |||
| 131 (-3%) | 132 (-3%) | 101 (-7%) | |||||
| Avg | 91 | 118 | 107 | 105 | |||
| VsAvg | +44% | +12% | -5% | +15% | |||
| Rank | 4/11 | 4/11 | 9/11 | 4/11 | |||
A third straight year for this three-hour lineup some more minor depreciation in each hour (though Survivor was basically even if the spring comparison (127 vs. last year's 122) is added in). CBS finally opted to make a change in the hour that was down the most, as newbie Stalker will debut at 10/9c. Still, it was way ahead of the Wednesday historical average because 8/7c was such a trouble spot in the pre-Survivor years.
Thursday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | 10:00 | 10:30 | Avg | |
| 2012-13 | The Big Bang Theory | Two and a Half Men | Person of Interest | Elementary | 153 | ||
| 249 | 180 | 137 | 107 | ||||
| 215 | |||||||
| 2013-14 | The Big Bang Theory | The Millers | The Crazy Ones | Two and a Half Men | Elementary | 137 (-10%) | |
| 269 (+8%) | 140 (-22%) | 111 | 121 | 92 (-14%) | |||
| 204 (-5%) | 116 (-16%) | ||||||
| Avg | 167 | 167 | 119 | 151 | |||
| VsAvg | +23% | -31% | -23% | -9% | |||
| Rank | 2/11 | 11/11 | 11/11 | 7/11 | |||
Much like Monday, Thursday saw the best ratings yet in the 8/7c half-hour (and in fact, the best Plus ratings for a broadcast scripted program in a decade). However, the hour as a whole dropped year-to-year due to The Millers, and things really soured on a historical basis in the last two hours. The comedy combo just barely fell behind the weakest year of CSI (117), while Elementary fell behind the weakest post-CSI occupants Shark (102) and Eleventh Hour (99).
Friday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | 10:00 | 10:30 | Avg | |
| 2012-13 | Undercover Boss | CSI: NY | Blue Bloods | 70 | |||
| 76 | 67 | 66 | |||||
| 2013-14 | Undercover Boss | Hawaii Five-0 | Blue Bloods | 77 (+10%) | |||
| 80 (+5%) | 76 (+13%) | 74 (+12%) | |||||
| Avg | 70 | 64 | 69 | 68 | |||
| VsAvg | +15% | +17% | +7% | +13% | |||
| Rank | 3/11 | 1/11 | 5/11 | 1/11 | |||
Friday was by far the biggest pleasant surprise on the CBS schedule in 2013-14. In no way did I see Hawaii Five-0 and Blue Bloods both making double-digit improvements, and Blue Bloods ended up with a career-high Plus. Undercover Boss and Blue Bloods each lagged a bit behind the strongest years of Ghost Whisperer and Numb3rs in their respective hours, but Five-0 was enough of an improvement at 9/8c that it was still the network's strongest overall Friday yet. Even this night gets a shake-up next fall as The Amazing Race bumps Undercover Boss back to midseason duty.
Sunday
| 8:00 | 8:30 | 9:00 | 9:30 | 10:00 | 10:30 | Avg | |
| 2012-13 | The Amazing Race | The Good Wife | The Mentalist | 94 | |||
| 121 | 79 | 82 | |||||
| 2013-14 | The Amazing Race | The Good Wife | The Mentalist | 87 (-8%) | |||
| 107 (-12%) | 76 (-4%) | 77 (-6%) | |||||
| Avg | 107 | 83 | 82 | 91 | |||
| VsAvg | -0% | -9% | -5% | -5% | |||
| Rank | 5/11 | 8/11 | 7/11 | 8/11 | |||
CBS Sunday fell to its weakest ratings since the days of the regular movie night in the mid-aughts. The real surprise here was just how far The Amazing Race fell (and it was down even more in the spring (93)), returning to its late-aughts level even with the occasional help from an increasingly potent NFL. That got it demoted to Friday... but while it had the worst trend in 2013-14, it still isn't CBS' real problem on this night. Madam Secretary replacing the Race could make things even uglier.
9 comments:
I'm still surprised that CBS didn't keep Intelligence in the post-NCIS slot and just shifted NCIS: Los Angeles to Mondays in midseason during 2013-2014. At least they are doing it this year instead of throwing the New Orleans spinoff there.
Switching gears to being surprised in a positive manner, not only did Person of Interest outrank other CBS Tuesday @ 10:00 shows, it roughly was at parity with Chicago Fire. And that show had a Fall boost with The Voice as a lead-in; take that away and Fire probably wouldn't have accomplished that.
It's impressive that both CBS and ABC had their strongest Fridays in the Plus era in the same year. I wouldn't be surprised if Fridays improved for CBS even further. The Amazing Race will drop in the Friday move, but the attention that the schedule shake-up causes may bring different viewers that didn't previously watch Hawaii Five-O to the net. It still doesn't answer the other questions around Race: will there be a second cycle this season? If so, where does it go? My gut says yes if Madam Secretary bombs out. Otherwise, maybe CBS should hold season 26 for summer and pair it with Big Brother. There are enough drama reserves (The Mentalist, Battle Creek, CSI: Cyber [if CBS audibles out of the spin-off replacing the original series at 10:00]) to make that possible., and Race would be the most compatible lead-out Brother has had.
If CBS really wanted to address Sundays to the positive, they'd jettison 60 Minutes entirely on football overrun nights; for games that end early due to a blowout and have a relative lack of post-game blather just shove in a sitcom rerun already in progress so the whole night can start on time. And I have to think that The Millers is really going to be exposed next season with more Big Bang reruns as a lead-in instead of that happening only once this go-around.
I think NCIS: LA will be hurt in the move, but it'll have to drop something like 58% to not match Hostages in that slot
2013-14 predictions.
Hours that will improve:
Mondays at 10: that's a no brainer, NCIS:LA won't take a huge drop to match Hostages awful number.
Wednesdays at 10: Stalker seems compatible with CM and CSI was close to the marginal level last season.
Fridays as a whole: Amazing Race will probably do better or similar in raw number compared to UB and the dramas are likely to take a below league average drop, since its old-skewing audience remained steady the entire season
Sundays at 10: CSI scored a 101 last season, despite the typical drop that happened to shows moved thare (Mentalist and Miami) it will still be able to do better than TM.
Toss-ups:
Tuesdays as a whole: it depends on the league average drop, I expect it to be slightly down from last season, POI improved the 10 PM slot but it is a show more prone to drops (since its raw numbers dropped 30% last season), now it is being compared with itself, but NO might improve over LA and help the mothership too.
Wednesdays 8-10: another small drop seems likely, but league-average here is important too.
Down hours:
Mondays at 8: this hour will obvsiouly be up for fall but 22 weeks of 2 Broke Girls vs six weeks of TBBT will make it go down again, Mom will probably be up in plus but I doubt it'll match 2BG disappointing performance after Mother since The Millers was followed by TBBT in all but one week and scored a 140, 2BG a 134, Mom will probably be around 120-130.
Mondays at 9: Scorpion will probably start solid but collapse when TBBT leaves and in the end, it won't match the falling comedies.
Thursdays as a whole: starting in november will do it, on a best-case scenario, TBBT won't be hurt by shifiting on season, but Millers will take a drop since its audience is TBBT's, the 9 PM hour will probably be stronger with Men, but McCarthys will probably be another TCO/Bad Teacher. Elementary is CBS lowest rated mon-thu drama and likely to take another above-average drop and be shifted to sundays/fridays for syndication purpose.
Sundays 8-10: I want to see Madam Secretary but I know it could probably be one of the fastest cancelations of the season, The Good Wife has little room to drop, will probably go down just a bit above the average.
Not keeping Intelligence behind NCIS was one of the biggest moves (or non-moves) of the season. CBS had so much time to move LA out of the way, that I was of the belief that they were never going to move for fear of risking a possible syndie cash cow for something that might not be.
I am worried about LA. It had no big four drama competiton for the last two years. Now it will be facing NBC's top drama and a solid ABC procedural. I don't feel like the Blacklist, NCIS: LA, and Castle can peacefully coexist. I don't feel like The Blacklist will be the one hit hard because it will have such a big lead in advantage. I think either Castle or LA will be hurt bad.
The Blacklist has a head start against NCIS:LA and Castle too.
I've said before that I'd have cancelled 60 Minutes after the Benghazi feature controversy - it was the perfect opportunity not only to rebuild the news department's suddenly damaged reputation (and be consistent with the Bush draft-dodging story a decade earlier, that claimed Dan Rather as well as 60 Minutes II), but to rebuild Sundays. Throw in TBBT (R) in the gap between the end of the game and 8/7c and you're turbo-charging the 8/7c hour. Throwing in one of the oldest skewing shows on television out of the NFL is a dreadful piece of scheduling, and now CBS has torn up the Monday comedy tradition with far less to gain than they would from cancelling 60 Minutes, not even the tradition argument holds water anymore.
I think LA will bleed in the fall and it will look bad it and its fans will probably hate on CBS but I think come January it has a real shot of coming first in the slot once The Blacklist leaves and State of Affairs has to survive sans the voice very early on during its run. I think Castle is the most likely to be hurt in the drama logjam there this year.
We've made practically the same classification for the entire week, it's impressive! I think the only difference is that I am a bit more optimistic about the Thursdays at 9 pm hour but even then isn't a strong opinion.
I think that the fact that CBS has such a big portion of its schedule depending on the league average is a horrible sign in terms of how much its stock is aging FAST.
Post a Comment