ABC cleans up on the “specials” programmed elsewhere. ABC:  A great night all around.  THE MIDDLE kicked things off by rising 0.3 from its last airing to 2.4, followed by THE NEIGHBORS, up 0.4 to 2.0. MODERN FAMILY dominated the night with a 4.7, up half a rating point, and SUBURGATORY was also up 0.5 […]

With the announcement of the Oscar nominations today, Lincoln only became more of a favorite by London oddsmakers (moving from a payout of about $1.80 on a $1 bet last week to about $1.40 today).   The odds got a bit longer for Les Miserables and Argo, but Zero Dark Thirty had the biggest swing (from a payout of about $5.50 last […]

Nothing like a train wreck.  FOX tried to channel some of the energy from past silly specials (When Animals Attack, Celebrity Boxing) last night with Stars in Danger: The High Dive, low-end celebrities trying to do the incredibly difficult sport of high diving.  The average rating for the two-hour special was a bad 1.3 with adults 18-49, […]

  In any given year, there are perhaps 15 movies that can even be seriously entertained in a Best Picture conversation, so with the combination of a potential 10 Oscar nominees under the new rules and the weeks of preliminary awards, Top 10 Lists, predictions and speculations that occupy the weeks preceding the announcement, the […]

The second weekend of 2013 should total about $122 million for the top 12 films, a little better than the same weekend the last few years but below the comparable weekend in 2009 and 2010.  Zero Dark Thirty moves from the art houses to a fairly wide release and should play more commercially than The […]

  It’s been a busy couple of days for premieres and returns on basic cable (pay cable’s big night is this upcoming Sunday, when both HBO and Showtime begin their winter schedules).  The winner:  PRETTY LITTLE LIARS on ABCFamily, with a strong 1.4 rating in 18-49s that was beaten for the night only by an […]

  Jimmy Kimmel’s set got a bit of an upgrade, but other than that there was little visible evidence that the 11:35PM version of JIMMY KIMMEL LIVE will be very different from its midnight incarnation.  Kimmel has never been Mr. High-Concept–he leaves that for Letterman and Conan–and as Jay Leno, still the winner in both […]

Life without The Voice isn’t so much fun. NBC:  Even in our DVR society, where people can watch what they want pretty much when they want, lead-ins still matter.  Thus the replacement of The Voice with oldster reality show OFF THEIR ROCKERS (2 episodes at 1.5/1.8), caused both GO ON and THE NEW NORMAL to […]