Except for Big Brother, the dog days of summer have arrived in a big way. CBS:  BIG BROTHER held last week’s 2.5 rating.  As usual, THE BIG BANG THEORY towered over the night’s other reruns, this week with a 2.1–a number many sitcoms would be happy to get with a first-run episode. ABC:  WIPEOUT got […]

  BROADCAST FINALS ABC:  AMERICA’S FUNNIEST HOME VIDEOS dropped 0.07 to 0.44, CELEBRITY WHEEL OF FORTUNE lost 0.06 to 0.37, SUPERMARKET SWEEP slipped 0.02 to 0.34, and THE ROOKIE ticked up to 0.33. CBS:  The network of course peaked with its afternoon coverage of the AFC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME at 12.41.  Primetime was a set of […]

> The night was dominated by the World Series, but there was some fairy tale news from an unexpected place. NBC:  All things considered, it could have gone worse for the premiere of GRIMM.  A lot worse.  Although of course it didn’t win its hour against the Series, its 2.1 rating was by far the […]

Based on Friday’s and Saturday’s grosses, Weekend #32 of 2013 now looks like $142 million for the top 12 films, down from yesterday’s $148 million estimate but still up 6% from the average for this weekend the past few years.  Opening at 3,284 theaters Friday, Elysium from Sony grossed $11.0 million Friday and $10.8 million Saturday, now on […]

  BROADCAST FINALS ABC:  The finale of the JEOPARDY COLLEGE CHAMPIONSHIP jumped 0.29 from Friday’s installment to 0.79.  ABBOTT ELEMENTARY benefited from that kick, up 0.23 from last week to 0.64, and BLACK-ISH was up 0.13 to 0.43.  TO TELL THE TRUTH returned at 0.31. CBS:  Due to the Olympics, several networks aired their regular […]

The weekly network ratings in prime time (now based on seven days of official nationals) are final, with substantial downward revisions from our estimate yesterday. The Saturday fast national ratings were vastly overstated because of continued local coverage of NFL preseason games in a handful of markets, and that was enough to inflate the weekly […]

  BROADCAST FINALS:  With the exception of CW, all the broadcasters carried the STATE OF THE UNION address and its response (ABC had the bragging rights for those), so there was limited original programming.  ABC:  A rerun of JUDGE STEVE HARVEY at 0.41. CBS:  An FBI rerun at 0.40. NBC:  AMERICAN AUTO dropped 0.06 to […]

>Year to date box office is now back down to -4.0% versus the comparable period last year, similar to where the comparison was back around Labor Day.  As late as mid-April the box office total was -20% behind 2010, but by early June the comparison had dropped to -9% behind the 2010 pace.  In mid-August […]