The Breakdown: NBC Wednesday in 2018-19 (Chicago Med, Chicago Fire, Chicago PD)

It's time for a journey through the NBC Wednesday schedule in 2018-19...


fall

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2017-18	The Blacklist		The Blacklist	Law and Order: SVU		Law and Order: SVU	Chicago PD		Chicago PD	103
	2017-18	86		86	117		117	105			105	103
2018-19	Chicago Med		Chicago Med	Chicago Fire		Chicago Fire	Chicago PD		Chicago PD	127 (+24%)
	2018-19	127 (+48%)		127.158907769165	135 (+16%)		135 (+16%)	119 (+13%)			119 (+13%)	127.126476700452
VsAvg	+63%		0.631035028163104	+32%		0.324507017709675	+17%		0.174788850771383	+36%
Rank	1/18		1/18	2/18		2/18	4/18		4/18	2/18

The union of three Chicago series paid immediate and huge dividends. The improvement at 8/7c with Chicago Med vs. The Blacklist was most obvious from the beginning, but in the fall the network had double digit growth in all three hours.

winter

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2017-18	The Blacklist		The Blacklist	Law and Order: SVU		Law and Order: SVU	Chicago PD		Chicago PD	109
	2017-18	94		94	116		116	116			116	109
2018-19	Chicago Med		Chicago Med	Chicago Fire		Chicago Fire	Chicago PD		Chicago PD	128 (+18%)
	2018-19	136 (+45%)		135.670967162281	127 (+9%)		127 (+9%)	121 (+4%)			121 (+4%)	127.786372420251
VsAvg	+87%		0.867537009047978	+41%		0.414927183026116	+14%		0.138140271790384	+43%
Rank	1/18		1/18	2/18		2/18	4/18		4/18	2/18

The year-to-year growth fell off a little bit after the new year, with the Fire and PD improvement slowing to single digits. Still double-digit improvement across the night, and still the second-biggest NBC Wednesday in the A18-49+ era.

spring

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	10:00	10:30	Avg
2017-18	The Blacklist		The Blacklist	Law and Order: SVU		Law and Order: SVU	Chicago PD		Chicago PD	98
	2017-18	75		75	110		110	109			109	98
2018-19	Chicago Med		Chicago Med	Chicago Fire		Chicago Fire	Chicago PD		Chicago PD	111 (+13%)
	2018-19	112 (+50%)		112.251245710742	115 (+4%)		115 (+4%)	105 (-4%)			105 (-4%)	110.582765942247
VsAvg	+75%		0.751551380207314	+44%		0.437723759436324	+3%		0.0308371105933268	+35%
Rank	1/18		1/18	2/18		2/18	6/18		6/18	2/18

And that story continued into the spring. The last two hours were barely even breaking even year-to-year by this point, as Fire and PD could not hold up quite as well in the spring as SVU/PD a year ago. But that ridiculous growth at 8/7c carried the day, keeping the nightly average up by double digits year-to-year, and at the second-highest level for an NBC Wednesday in the era.

Rating the Ratings

Name	Lo	Avg	Hi	y2y	Plus	Label	Plusy2y	Results
Chicago Med*	1.0	1.20	1.4	-1%	126	hit	+14%	detail
Chicago Fire*	1.0	1.21	1.4	+12%	127	hit	+29%	detail
Chicago PD*	0.9	1.10	1.4	-8%	115	solid	+5%	detail

Chicago Med: At least according to True Plus, it was actually Med that had the most impressive performance in this lineup. It was up 14% from a previous season that largely aired after This Is Us, while Fire was completely buried behind megabombs for all of last season and really had no choice but to improve a lot. I also think it's noteworthy that Med looks a lot more impressive relative to its entire previous history. (Fire, I would argue, wasn't really any stronger than what it did two years ago.) And finally, Med's timeslot growth held up a lot better over the course of the season, while Fire's growth dissipated a bit later in the year. Grade: A.

Chicago Fire: I said it all above. Fire did a good job, and the raw growth is obviously amazing to look at, but I think Med was actually the bigger winner of the two. So I'll make Fire settle for merely a Grade: A-.

Chicago PD: Thought about knocking this down to a B but Fire ultimately wasn't that huge of an improvement on SVU, so I think it did perform a little better than last year. Grade: B+.

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 NBC Wednesday.