Spotted Ratings, Premiere Wednesday 9/24/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• FINALS UPDATE: ABC saw upward adjustments in the first 90 minutes, making Modern Family (3.9) now look like a pretty solid win at just 7% behind last year's premiere. Red Band Society (1.1) also mercifully got a tenth back.

• Despite uninspiring starts from ABC's longtime Wednesday tentpoles, the new kids on Wednesday looked quite promising. Black-ish (3.3) was down only about 10% from its Modern Family lead-in (3.7) and had virtually full retention in total viewership, making it probably the most impressive post-ModFam premiere yet. And The Goldbergs (2.3) ticked up from a surprisingly modest The Middle (2.1) in first new episode on Wednesday. Add in a 25% year-to-year dip for Nashville (1.5) and ABC was still down 16% from last year's premiere Wednesday. But don't blame it on The Goldbergs and Black-ish.

• NBC's tri-crime drama night got off to a decent start with The Mysteries of Laura (1.5) dropping a predictable 25% from its post-America's Got Talent preview, and Law and Order: SVU (2.1) and Chicago PD (1.9) scoring well. But since SVU had a stunningly high 2.6 two-hour premiere last year, NBC was still down 23% from last year's opening Wednesday. And these shows have tended to spike when CBS is out of the crime drama business, so let's see what happens when Criminal Minds and Stalker join the mix.

• CBS had a very good night with the 90-minute return of Survivor (2.7) and the 90-minute finale of Big Brother (2.6), each up a tenth from when CBS did this arrangement last year (it was on pre-premiere Wednesday, but vs. much more unscripted competition). This combo was 9% above CBS' premiere of its regular Wednesday lineup last season.

• And Fox had another very brutal night as Hell's Kitchen (1.3) inched down again and Red Band Society (1.0) dropped 23% in week two. This was 55% behind two hours of cancelled The X Factor last year...

• The big four preliminarily combined to go 21% behind premiere Wednesday last year.

FULL TABLE:

Info		Show						Timeslot		True
	A18-49	Skew	Last		LeLa	Rank	y2y	TLa	Ty2y
The Middle	2.2	37%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	-12%	+100%	-12%	2.3
The Goldbergs	2.4	42%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	-23%	+118%	+9%	2.3
Modern Family	3.9	44%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	-7%	+200%	-5%	3.4
Black-ish	3.3	38%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	n/a	+120%	-23%	2.7
Nashville	1.5	33%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	-25%	+114%	-25%	1.4
							ABC:	+131%	-13%
Survivor	2.7	35%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	+4%	+50%	+5%	2.7
Big Brother Wed	2.6	48%	+13%	+0.3	n/a	1/3	n/a	+152%	+13%	2.5
							CBS:	+87%	+9%
The Mysteries of Laura	1.5	19%	-25%	-0.5	n/a	2/2	n/a	-25%	-17%	1.7
Law and Order: SVU	2.2	28%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	-19%	-17%	-10%	2.3
Chicago PD	1.9	28%	n/a	n/a	n/a	1/1	-5%	-5%	-34%	1.9
							NBC:	-16%	-22%
Hell's Kitchen	1.3	45%	-7%	-0.1	n/a	4/4	n/a	-10%	-48%	1.4
Red Band Society	1.1	41%	-15%	-0.2	-0.1	2/2	n/a	-19%	-58%	1.3
							Fox:	-14%	-53%
Penn and Teller: Fool Us	0.5	42%	+0%	+0.0	n/a	1/3	n/a	-9%	+67%	0.6
Penn and Teller: Fool Us (R)	0.4	36%						+60%	+100%	0.5
							CW:	+13%	+80%
							Big5:	+34%	-18%

KEY (click to expand)

A18-49 - Adults 18-49 rating. Percentage of US TV-owning adults 18-49 watching the program.
Skew - Percentage of adults 18-49 within the show's total viewership.
Last - A18-49 difference (percent and numerical) from the show's previous episode.
LeLa - A18-49 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 so far this season.
y2y - Percent difference between A18-49 and the show's rating a year ago.
TLa - Percent difference between A18-49 and the network's rating in the timeslot one week ago.
Ty2y - Percent difference between A18-49 and the network's rating in the timeslot one year ago.
True - 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.