The War of 18-49, Charmed (2018)

A Familiar Franchise Re-Opens CW Sunday

The CW had given up on programming Sundays following the 2008-09 season, but fall 2018 marked what they hoped would be a triumphant return to the night. The inaugural Sunday night lineup featured one of the strongest shows from the superhero empire (Supergirl) plus a remake of Charmed, the show that had done nice business on Sunday in the last years of the WB but didn't survive to the CW. On premiere night, the new Charmed actually woke up some of the original series echoes. The 0.54 premiere (57 Plus) would've been right at home among the middle seasons of the original series run, and even week two (0.43 / 45 Plus) was in line with the last couple seasons.

But it quickly fell out of original series territory with another big drop to 0.34 in week three. While it stayed in the 0.3's for most of the rest of the fall, it had dropped to 0.2 for good by the spring, and was consistently way behind Supergirl which had held up pretty well in the spring.

Lower-Priority Scheduling

With an underwhelming post-premiere trajectory, the CW didn't waste much time shipping Charmed off to Friday night for fall 2019. At least in season two, though, Charmed remained a reasonable enough occupant by CW Friday standards. It pretty much hung around the same 20 Plus it had been pulling late in season one on Sunday.

Delayed till the winter in the 2020-21 season like most of the CW regulars, season three returned to the Sunday 9/8c hour and got ugly in a hurry. The 0.11 premiere was already lower than any of its Sunday episodes in season one (albeit just barely), and then it plummeted south of 0.10 for most of the rest of the way. It returned to Friday for a late spring-early summer run, but once again it looked much weaker than in its last stint on the night. So while much of the network was back on the regular schedule in 2021-22, Charmed was held for late in the season alongside Dynasty.

It didn't get that much worse in season four compared with its spring run the previous season, but the damage had already been done. On a network that had higher renewal standards at the 2022 upfront, Charmed hit the end of the line after four seasons.

Adults 18-49 info by season:

Seas	Year	Slot	Avg	y2y	Lo	Hi	Results	Grade
1	2018-19	Sunday 9:00	0.26		0.2	0.5	detail	C+
2	2019-20	Friday 8:00	0.17	-36%	0.1	0.2	detail	C+
3	2021	Sun 9:00, Fri 8:00	0.09	-49%	0.1	0.1	detail	D+
4	Spring 2022	Friday 8:00	0.06	-25%	0.0	0.1	detail	C-

Historical-adjusted ratings by season:

Seas	Year	A18-49+	Label	Now22	y2y	Lo	Hi	Premiere	Finale
1	2018-19	28	marginal(CW)	0.14		17.88	57	57	19
2	2019-20	20	solid(CWFri)	0.10	-26%	15.86	27	21	20
3	2021	13	flop	0.07	-35%	9.31	17	17	12
4	Spring 2022	13	flop	0.06	-6%	7.84	18	14	14
AVERAGE:		AVERAGE:	18	flop

The War of 18-49 chronicles the ratings history of veteran primetime series. For more, see the Index.