The Breakdown: CW Tuesday in 2018-19 (The Flash, Black Lightning, Roswell, New Mexico)

It's time for a journey through the CW Tuesday schedule in 2018-19...


fall

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2017-18	The Flash		The Flash	Legends of Tomorrow		Legends of Tomorrow	66
	2017-18	82		82	50			50	66
2018-19	The Flash		The Flash	Black Lightning		Black Lightning	52 (-21%)
	2018-19	70 (-15%)		69.8251129017976	35 (-31%)			35 (-31%)	52.3520322323563
VsAvg	+17%		0.17063832201186	-19%		-0.192538769088674	+2%
Rank	5/18		5/18	11/18		11/18	10/18

After showing incredible promise pretty much throughout season one, that version of Black Lightning simply never showed up again for season two. Even in the fall with a Flash lead-in, it was mostly pulling 0.3's (after consistently getting 0.5's even in spring 2018!). The Flash had another down year, but in 2018-19 the declines at 9/8c were far more severe all season long.

winter

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2017-18	The Flash		The Flash	Black Lightning		Black Lightning	65
	2017-18	72		72	57			57	65
2018-19	The Flash		The Flash	Roswell, New Mexico		Roswell, New Mexico	49 (-24%)
	2018-19	67 (-7%)		66.800672983264	32 (-44%)			32 (-44%)	49.4054471164185
VsAvg	+27%		0.274013484108592	-22%		-0.224410838750129	+5%
Rank	5/18		5/18	12/18		12/18	10/18

Black Lightning-related comparisons in the 9/8c hour would continue to haunt the CW all season long; starting in the winter, that was because newbie Roswell, New Mexico was getting compared against the high standard of BL season one. This period had The Flash's best comparisons of the year, led by a string of three straight 0.7's in late January and early February.

spring

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2017-18	The Flash		The Flash	Black Lightning		Black Lightning	53
	2017-18	62		62	45			45	53
2018-19	The Flash		The Flash	Roswell, New Mexico		Roswell, New Mexico	40 (-26%)
	2018-19	54 (-12%)		54.4023478513871	25 (-45%)			25 (-45%)	39.6495933005275
VsAvg	+13%		0.134128114703671	-30%		-0.29734717283613	-5%
Rank	6/18		6/18	13/18		13/18	11/18

The spring was more of the same, as Roswell, New Mexico mostly hovered along the border between 0.2 and 0.3 and was thus massively behind Black Lightning's late-season 0.5's.

Rating the Ratings

Name	Lo	Avg	Hi	y2y	Plus	Label	Plusy2y	Results
The Flash*	0.5	0.61	0.8	-23%	64	hit(CW)	-11%	detail
Black Lightning	0.2	0.30	0.4	-46%	32	marginal(CW)	-38%	detail
Roswell, New Mexico	0.2	0.27	0.4		29	marginal(CW)		detail

The Flash: After three years of declines (more than 10% on average), The Flash has finally arrived at the highest-rated season for any of the other superhero shows of this era (season four of Arrow). It's not completely collapsing, but just steadily eroding, and it still really stands out on a network where seemingly every other weeknight is a 0.3/0.2 combo. Grade: C+.

Black Lightning: Already updated.

Roswell, New Mexico: A reasonable renewal for the CDub but not much more than that; I would say Legacies and Charmed (especially considering DVR growth) were at least a little stronger, and they were not breakouts. Grade: C.

The names in this last table link to the shows' War of 18-49 pages. Links with an asterisk(*) have been updated with the new info. Updates to younger shows will come later in the summer.

Here's the now updated Schedules Plus for CW Tuesday.