Friday, June 20, 2014

War of 18-49 Update, Bones (2013-14)


Let's take a look at the 2013-14 season (the ninth overall) of Bones on Fox.

Timeslot Lo Avg Hi y2y A18-49+ Label y2y Results
M 8:00, F 8:00, M 8:001.2 1.722.3 -19%91marginal -10% detail

Rating the Ratings: For much of the season, Bones appeared headed for one of its most impressive seasons. As of its last fall Monday episode on November 11, it was down just 2% year-to-year, perhaps benefiting from a pairing with the strong newbie Sleepy Hollow. Then it shook off a slow start on Friday to become one of its network's strongest Friday performers ever, delivering mid-to-high 1's. But it all fell apart with Bones' second in-season move, back to Monday to lead into fast-bleeding The Following. The show essentially saw no growth from what it had been getting on Friday, making it a less valuable player (and nearly 25% below its spring 2013 level). So a B+ player in the fall/winter performed at closer to a D level in the spring.

I give Bones some grading benefit of the doubt because I do think the scheduling jerk-around was bad for the show, as was the network's general meltdown. But even if it had a good reason, the damage may have been done. Will it be able to improve upon its recent mid-1's in yet another move to Thursday this fall? Grade: B-.

Here's the now updated War of 18-49 post for Bones.

12 comments:

Spot said...

Bones series low was a 1.9 before this season, and now this season its average is below that low. That's bad. I'm really worried about how it will do on Thursday next year

Spot said...

This might hurt my NBC needs to be repeating Chicago PD theory, because it is repeating so poorly. But seeing as it is going to have to face potentionally potent Stalker in the fall, they need to do something for it to hold up

Spot said...

While I don't think it was talked about nearly as much as it should, FOX moving Bones to Mondays in the spring was in my opinion the worst move of the entire season from any network, considering the options they had and the potential long-term damage they did. I really feel sorry for the show that after enduring so much, including an incredibly well survived move to Friday in the middle of the fall, FOX finally damaged it for real with yet another move. I would probably feel sorry for it enough to give it a B but I can't really argue with a B-.

Spot said...

Even if Stalker has numbers slightly higher than CSI, I think the crossover audience between CSI and Chicago PD would probably still be higher. I could be wrong, but my guess is that PD is not significantly hurt by Stalker. A bigger issue could be the fact that SVU seems to have more than overachieved this year and those shows tend to severely course correct the year after (the most recent example would be TVD last year/this year).

Spot said...

If moving Bones back to Monday was the worst in season move, what do you think was the best in season move? (I'm thinking ABC swapping Resurrection and Revenge's time slots)

Spot said...

I don't know. I remember Chicago Fire getting really mowed down on finale might by a 2 hour Criminal Minds. Assuming Stalker has the same audience as Minds and PD as Fire, I think it *might* be problematic

Spot said...

I agree too. Flipping 2.5 Men and Crazy Ones can also be listed


FOX leads the top three worst moves, Bones back on mondays, Cosmos dismantling Animation Domination while Almost Human without a back order left a hole on mondays filled by Bones, Brooklyn Nine Nine after New Girl and Glee on tuesdays.


Not a move or anything like that, but not cancelling Dads was another mistake too.

Spot said...

Chicago PD replacing Ironside was a solid one too. Giving Mixology the post Modern Family slot and ABC trying to launch Lucky 7, What Would You Do?, Killer Women, Mind Games, and Celebrity Wife Swap out of Trophy Wife is a particularly laughable one

Spot said...

It's actually a good question. I would go with ABC's split season treatment for OUAT, GA and Scandal (Revenge to a lesser extent). Honorable mention: The CW breaks up Arrow/Supernatural and resists from launching TO on Thursdays, launching TO/Supernatural on Tuesdays instead

Spot said...

I don't have as much of a strong opinion about the Cosmos thing as others, because it seems that it was always FOX's plan to send Bob's Burguers to 7pm this year and American Dad was going away anyway. I would have simply kept Almost Human on Mondays until the end of the season and let Bones thrive on Fridays. As for B99 after New Girl, hindsight is a powerful thing and yes, it certainly feels that way now, but back then we all thought FOX was doing right by B99 by giving it the post New Girl slot - a lot of people argued for that in the fall. I think FOX didn't anticipate the extreme incompatibility of the pairing back then nor did it anticipate the collapse of New Girl. I would give them a pass on that one.

Other horrible moves:
- ABC trying to launch What Would You Do?, Killer Women, Mind Games and Wife Swap out of Trophy Wife (I give them a pass for the worst move simply because it didn't have long term consequences in terms of hurting a known property like Bones)
- Connected to the first one, but still: ABC's refusal, all season long, on swapping Shield and the comedies on Tuesday
- ABC giving Mixology the post MF slot
- ABC deciding to air a repeat of Mixology before Castle (I know it was a one off but still, they could at least have done so in the multiple weeks Castle was on repeats)
- CW's decision to launch Star-Crossed against the Olympics
- CBS's refusal in moving LA to Mondays at midseason to give Intelligence the Tuesday 9pm slot
- NBC replacing Dateline with low rated specials that only hurt Grimm
- NBC not pulling Michael J. Fox and Sean earlier than they did
- FOX moving Glee to Tuesdays (I didn't realize this was a bad move back then to be honest, but it was clear people were right about it being one)
- FOX never giving Enlisted a chance, starting by not allowing to lead out from Bones right away and only giving it the post Bones lead-out twice in its run

Spot said...

I agree on all of those.

Spot said...

Shield's final 6 episodes (with 5 after Captain America 2 was released) was great, but the January-March scheduling was very hard to keep track of

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