> This morning we anticipated that the season finale of THE WALKING DEAD on AMC would outrate anything on network television last night, but that didn’t do justice to Dead‘s accomplishment.  In the finale’s initial airing (it was repeated later in the evening), it broke Dead‘s own record as the highest-rated cable television drama ever, […]

  Most Americans relaxed after their turkey by watching a pigskin. DEMOGRAPHIC DETAIL: For each broadcast program (or hour segment), the chart below displays preliminary key advertiser demographics (adult 18-34, 18-49 and 25-54 ratings), audience skews (women 18-49, men 18-49 and adults 50+ shares) and total viewership (thousands of people over the age of 2). Ratings […]

> One network dominated all of primetime last night… FOX:  …and it wasn’t FOX.  You can’t call TERRA NOVA a disaster–a 3.1 rating (slightly adjusted from Mitch Metcalf’s report) is a decent number these days, and the show did hold its audience solidly through all of the 2-hour premiere–but given the massive hype, not to […]

  Last night provided a hint of how much EMPIRE hurts BLACK-ISH. DEMOGRAPHIC DETAIL: For each broadcast program (or hour segment), the chart below displays preliminary key advertiser demographics (adult 18-34, 18-49 and 25-54 ratings), audience skews (women 18-49, men 18-49 and adults 50+ shares) and total viewership (thousands of people over the age of 2). […]

  MANHATTAN LOVE STORY:  Tuesday 8:30PM on ABC THE FACTS:  Boy (Jake McDorman) meets girl (Analeigh Tipton), but here’s the gimmick:  we hear all of the couple’s hidden thoughts throughout.  The series creator is Jeff Lowell, whose sitcom writing/producing career goes back to Cybill and Spin City. WHAT IT’S SAYING:  He’s cute, she’s cute, and […]

The ratings below are household ratings from the 56 television markets with local Nielsen meters for Saturday January 11 and Sunday January 12, 2014. The 56 markets (out of 210 total) cover about 70% of the US television population.   NFL Playoffs: Divisional Weekend Saturday 19.5 rating FOX 4:30 NFC New Orleans-Seattle (+4% from 18.7 for […]

  Anyone who’s been following the tumult in television, typified by the recently-concluded WGA strike and the ongoing-as-of-this-post SAG-AFTRA strike, knows that a key issue for the industry is that the streamers, who now dominate the programming landscape, keep their metrics deeply opaque.  This is their firm policy not just with their talent, but even […]

  Because of Nielsen’s holiday schedule, we may not have Thursday cable 18-49 numbers for several days.  However, based on household ratings, ESPN got exactly the punch from the new COLLEGE FOOTBALL PLAYOFFS that it had hoped for with its multi-billion dollar license deal.  Preliminary numbers give yesterday’s ROSE BOWL a 15.5 household rating, up […]