The Sked: Tuesday Ratings September 18

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NBC’s solid early premiere week continued well last night, with a first-place 3.0 Adult 18-49 rating from 8-11 pm.  This matches last Tuesday’s nightly rating with The Voice up this week over last, while the scripted shows from 9-11 pm were down somewhat week to week.  The Voice averaged a 4.5 in the preliminary fast nationals from 8-9 pm (probably going up to a 4.6 in official nationals later today), up from a 4.0 last Tuesday.  (So far the The Voice has scored a 4.2 last Monday, 4.0 last Tuesday, 4.7 Monday, and 4.5 or 4.6 last night.)  Perhaps the early start on September 10 threw some people and the audience is just now catching up this week.  In any case, this is a solid start.  In the 8:30 half hour alone last night, The Voice topped out at a 5.0 rating.

The ratings become a little more effete and precious as the night wears on, however.  At 9:00 pm Go On (Matthew Perry) scores a still decent 3.3 rating (down just one-tenth from last week’s time period premiere), while The New Normal drifts down to a 2.2 (down a more significant three-tenths from last week’s premiere).  A 3.3 and 2.2 for the comedy block would be acceptable if it were October and November and all the other network shows had premiered, but these two comedies have yet to face original New Girl episodes or NCIS: Los Angeles or even Happy Endings.  Not exactly Murderer’s Row of competition, but its greater competition than the current slate of repeats and specials against them.

Back in May, we forecast that Go On would average a 2.3 in the fall and New Normal a 1.9 rating.  It appears we were low on Go On (it probably settles around a 2.7 eventually), but we were right on with New Normal (it will certainly drift below a 2 against original competition).   At 10 pm, Parenthood turned in a 1.8 (down one tenth from last week and already matching our 1.8 fourth-quarter forecast for the show).  We might need to revise the fall average for Parenthood down a tenth or two.

The other networks were all below a 2 rating for the night.  FOX averaged a 1.6 for the finale of So You Think You Can Dance (down from the 2.0 finale last summer).  CBS averaged a 1.5 rating from 8-11 with repeats of an NCIS and two NCIS: LA episodes.  ABC averaged a 1.4 rating with two repeat comedies (1.1 rating from 8-9) and an okay 1.6 from 9-11 pm for a 20/20 special with Barbara Walters featuring classic TV star interviews.