Spotted Ratings, Thursday 3/22/12: Cool Cool Cooling Off

WHAT MATTERS:

• Fox looked solid with the timeslot premiere of Touch, which dropped by just 21% out of another soft American Idol. After the upward finals adjustment, it may end up Truly stronger than the second episodes of eventual failures Terra Nova (3.1) and Alcatraz (3.0), even though both of those had much smaller lead-ins. But Touch had very little competition in this particular hour. Obviously Touch looks good by comparison right now because it hasn't collapsed (yet) as those other shows eventually did. Need to see more data.

• An Office-free NBC had a really bad night, with everything down by multiple ticks. Community and 30 Rock each lost a half point in the 8:00 hour, Up All Night lost 0.2 without its usual lead-in, and Awake plummeted by 25%. It seemed inevitable that the 8:00 hour in particular would drop, but for it to happen to this extent before the CBS scripted competition returned is rather unfortunate. Next week: Big Bang's back.

• ABC saw a nearly Charlie's Angels-esque 24% drop from week two of Missing.

• Vs. the year-ago games, CBS' first game (Wisconsin/Syracuse) was about even, while the second game (Cincy/Ohio State) was significantly down from last year's 3.3.

FULL TABLE:

Info				Show				Timeslot		TRUE
	Viewers	A18-49	Skew	Last	LeLa	Avg	Rank	Tavg	Lead
Missing	8.81	1.6	23%	-24%	n/a	-24%	2/2	-3%	n/a	1.99
Grey's Anatomy (R)	4.53	1.2	34%	-14%	+23%	+16%	3/7	-65%	-25%	1.11
Private Practice (R)	3.29	0.8	31%	+0%	-8%	+0%	1/2	-68%	-33%	0.62
NCAA Basketball	6.81	2.1	39%	-16%	n/a	+10%	2/6	-42%	n/a	2.45
NCAA Basketball	6.29	2.4	49%	+14%	+0%	+23%	2/7	-11%	+14%	2.09
Community	3.87	1.7	56%	-23%	n/a	+2%	3/12	+8%	n/a	2.16
30 Rock	3.31	1.5	58%	-25%	-23%	-6%	7/12	-19%	-12%	1.78
30 Rock	3.42	1.6	60%	+7%	-12%	+0%	4/13	-44%	+7%	1.57
Up All Night	3.25	1.5	59%	-12%	-33%	-23%	19/21	-24%	-6%	1.56
Awake	4.73	1.2	32%	-25%	-12%	-31%	4/4	-7%	-20%	0.98
American Idol Thu	15.58	4.2	34%	-9%	n/a	-20%	10/10	+2%	n/a	5.73
Touch	11.81	3.3	36%	-15%	-35%	-15%	2/2	+3%	-21%	3.10
The Vampire Diaries	2.69	1.3	62%	+8%	n/a	-3%	9/17	-2%	n/a	1.75
The Secret Circle	1.72	0.7	52%	+0%	+8%	-17%	13/17	-15%	-46%	0.57

KEY (click to expand)

Viewers - The total number of viewers (age 2+, in millions) that watched the program.
A18-49 - Adults 18-49 rating. Percentage of US TV-owning adults 18-49 watching the program.
Skew - Percentage of the total audience that falls in the 18-49 demo.
Last - A18-49 percent difference from previous episode.
Lead - A18-49 percent difference from lead-in program.
LeLa - A18-49 percent difference between the show's lead-in and its lead-in for the previous episode.
Avg - A18-49 percent difference from the show's average demo for previous original episodes this season.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes that have aired so far this season.
Tavg - A18-49 percent difference from its timeslot's previous original entertainment average this season.
TRUE - True Strength, a metric that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in. (Note: these are PRELIMINARY TRUE calculations. Finals come next week.)

(R) - Repeat.

Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.

More Spotted Ratings in the Index.