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AWAKE is getting sleepy.
NBC: A 20% drop from a series premiere isn’t ordinarily anything shocking or particularly worrisome. But when you start with a 2.0 the way AWAKE did, that leaves you with a 1.6 in Week 2, and that makes Week 3, when the show will be facing fresh competition on both CBS and ABC for the first time, look like an oncoming train. (The show continues to be problematic creatively, too: see our Pilot + 1 Review.) Earlier in the evening, 30 ROCK had its last 8PM airing of the season (COMMUNITY arrives next week) and remained 0.1 above its season low with 1.4, while PARKS & RECREATION was comparatively robust at 1.9. THE OFFICE and UP ALL NIGHT (with what may have been its most insufferable episode yet–if the show would just own up to the contempt it feels for almost all human beings, it might be a lot better) were up 0.1 from last week.CBS: BIG BANG THEORY continued to dominate Idol at 8PM, and a repeat Big Bang provided strong competition for FOX at 8:30PM, holding on impressively to almost 80% of the new episode’s audience. That (along with the weak competition on ABC and FOX) pushed PERSON OF INTEREST to a new series high of 3.4, which in turn gave THE MENTALIST its best number in a month.
FOX: AMERICAN IDOL came awfully close to losing the full 8-9PM hour (4.8 vs 4.6), continuing its diminished ways. THE FINDER aired its last Thursday episode before being burned off on moving to Fridays, with a 2.3 that was last place among the original shows in its hour.
ABC: Repeats for the evening, putting it in last place (other than CW) in every hour.
CW: Also in repeat mode, with a rerun SUPERNATURAL substituted for THE SECRET CIRCLE to little effect.
Tonight’s interesting move is CBS experimenting with a new Mentalist episode at 9PM. Apart from the CBS shows and GRIMM, everything is unscripted or a repeat.
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