A newsmagazine took the crown on a mostly down night. NBC:  There must have been some reason why DATELINE zoomed 0.6 from last week, increasing its rating by more than 50% and topping the night with a 1.7.  Whatever it was, the show should consider trying it again.  The evening started with a decent 1.5 […]

Last night was dominated by ESPN, whose airing of the BCS CHAMPIONSHIP GAME may beat all the broadcast networks combined, despite a number that trailed off as Alabama’s irreversible destruction of Notre Dame became clear.  18-49 numbers aren’t yet available, but early household ratings indicate the game could be up 10% from 2012, when it […]

  Returnees were steady or slightly down. DEMOGRAPHIC DETAIL: For each broadcast program (or hour segment), the chart below displays preliminary live+same day 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 analysis and […]

NBC looks to its past–and faces its present. NBC:  30 ROCK had a nice send-off, a 1.9 that was up half a point from last week as old fans gathered to watch the gang one last time.  But “catastrophic” doesn’t do justice to the debut of DO NO HARM, which at 0.9 is reportedly the […]

Another night with little for the networks to cheer about. ABC:  The first 90 minutes of the night provided some good news, as THE MIDDLE rebounded a bit from last week’s low to 2.2 (up 0.3), THE NEIGHBORS was up 0.2 to 1.9 and MODERN FAMILY rose a tick to 3.9.  But the tick went […]

You know it’s a weird night when the clearest-cut winner is Community. FOX:  As of this morning’s preliminary numbers, FOX won the night, but it’s loaded with asterisks.  AMERICAN IDOL‘s 3.5 may change because it ran until 9:32PM–for now, it’s down 0.3 from last week, and down a giant 1.4 from this time last year. […]

CBS and the other networks carrying March Madness had a very good round three Sunday (round two if you are a purist and don’t count the silly “play in” games as round one).  The CBS tripleheader games yesterday were up solid double-digits looking at the household ratings from the 56 metered markets (covering about 70% […]

  NBC’s curse continues. NBC:  The network really thought it had something with the dating show READY FOR LOVE, promoting it like crazy and clearing Tuesdays of Go On, The New Normal and Smash so it could pair 2-hour episodes with THE VOICE.  But last night’s blah result was a 1.6, and as Mitch Metcalf […]