The Breakdown: CW Wednesday in 2019-20 (Riverdale, Nancy Drew)

It's time for a journey through the CW Wednesday schedule in 2019-20...

NOTE: In addition to classic A18-49+, Breakdown posts in 2019-20 also use CVPlus, comparing spring ratings against a higher league average due to viewership inflation from COVID-19 stay-at-home orders. See here for more.


fall

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2018-19	Riverdale		Riverdale	All American		All American	36
	2018-19	46		46	26			26	36
2019-20	Riverdale		Riverdale	Nancy Drew		Nancy Drew	28 (-24%)
	2019-20	33 (-29%)		32.9875528321235	22 (-14%)			22 (-14%)	27.5133967221593
VsAvg	-39%		-0.393623591851784	-36%		-0.361064913254056	-38%
Rank	18/19		18/19	17/19		17/19	19/19

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2018-19	Riverdale		Riverdale	All American		All American	36
	2018-19	46		46	26			26	36
2019-20	Riverdale		Riverdale	Nancy Drew		Nancy Drew	26 (-28%)
	2019-20	31 (-33%)		31.049430153817	21 (-19%)			21 (-19%)	25.8968979653151
VsAvg	-43%		-0.42817790430735	-40%		-0.397413796968679	-42%
Rank	18/19		18/19	17/19		17/19	19/19

Riverdale's declines only sped up in season four; beyond a somewhat promising 0.4 premiere, it rarely even eked out a rounded 0.3 beyond that. At least initially, though, the declines at 9/8c were not as severe, as newbie Nancy Drew proved a more compatible match than the year-ago All American.

winter

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2018-19	Riverdale		Riverdale	All American		All American	30
	2018-19	39		39	21			21	30
2019-20	Riverdale		Riverdale	Nancy Drew		Nancy Drew	21 (-31%)
	2019-20	26 (-32%)		26.3623833716695	15 (-29%)			15 (-29%)	20.7441705219694
VsAvg	-37%		-0.372173663885176	-44%		-0.442552290869494	-40%
Rank	16/19		16/19	16/19		16/19	17/19

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2018-19	Riverdale		Riverdale	All American		All American	30
	2018-19	39		39	21			21	30
2019-20	Riverdale		Riverdale	Nancy Drew		Nancy Drew	20 (-35%)
	2019-20	25 (-36%)		24.8135102762064	14 (-33%)			14 (-33%)	19.5253851353755
VsAvg	-41%		-0.407910952369749	-47%		-0.474398078603679	-43%
Rank	16/19		16/19	16/19		16/19	17/19

But another chunk of the Nancy Drew audience disappeared after the new year, around the time that All American was showing some resiliency in winter 2019, so the Nancy Drew comparisons at 9/8c were no better than what Riverdale was doing.

spring

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2018-19	Riverdale		Riverdale	Jane the Virgin		Jane the Virgin	27
	2018-19	28		28	25			25	27
2019-20	Riverdale		Riverdale	Nancy Drew		Nancy Drew	16 (-40%)
	2019-20	20 (-30%)		19.8971308789924	12 (-53%)			12 (-53%)	15.8639286737912
VsAvg	-57%		-0.568040555879209	-60%		-0.603775738639508	-58%
Rank	19/19		19/19	19/19		19/19	19/19

Year	8:00	8:30	9:00	9:30	Avg
2018-19	Riverdale		Riverdale	Jane the Virgin		Jane the Virgin	27
	2018-19	28		28	25			25	27
2019-20	Riverdale		Riverdale	Nancy Drew		Nancy Drew	18 (-32%)
	2019-20	23 (-20%)		22.576226562778	13 (-46%)			13 (-46%)	17.9999644216743
VsAvg	-51%		-0.51137413288722	-55%		-0.551684033873278	-53%
Rank	19/19		19/19	19/19		19/19	19/19

And the final few episodes of Nancy had even bigger timeslot declines, put up against the solid Jane the Virgin swan song from a year ago. Unlike some CW shows, the Riverdale trends actually line up more reasonably using CVPlus; its last three episodes after returning in mid-April hovered more around the 0.20ish level from the winter, rather than taking the usual major collapse.

Rating the Ratings

Name	Lo	Avg	Hi	y2y	Plus	Label	Plusy2y	Results
Riverdale	0.2	0.22	0.4	-38%	27	marginal(CW)	-28%	detail
Nancy Drew	0.1	0.14	0.3		17	flop		detail

Riverdale: Yes, the CW was down big in general, but this was one of the worst offenders, falling all the way back behind its season one Plus (from before the streaming bump kicked in). It looks a bit less ugly in DVR trends and remains a major gainer, but not quite enough to pull me off of a Grade: D.

Nancy Drew: Comparing it with flop Riverdale lead-outs of the past, it was certainly a better performer than season one of Dynasty which I gave a D. The comparison with All American is a little more ambiguous; Nancy had a lot more DVR interest overall and clearly sparked a bit more out of the gate, but it also had a much worse trajectory across the season and was down in the timeslot just as much as Riverdale by the winter portion. I'm gonna give it the same 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.

Previous Breakdowns for CW Wednesday: 2015-16 | 2016-17 | 2017-18 | 2018-19

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