Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 5/6/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• Fox's embattled live-action comedy department is officially closed for the season with the upticking finales of New Girl (1.2) and The Mindy Project (1.3). The latter ended up with its first-ever growth from an original of the former, and it was easily Mindy's biggest rating since its return from hiatus in April. New Girl reportedly has the larger order of the two for next season (22 vs. 15), but the momentum seems to be moving in the other direction in these last few weeks. (Just look at the finales' year-to-year trends; New Girl was -43%, Mindy even.)

• Perhaps owing in part to Fox's uptick, there was major comedy carnage on the other two networks; The Goldbergs (1.3), Trophy Wife (0.7), About a Boy (1.5) and Growing Up Fisher (1.2) all hit new lows. It was not a good final impression for the NBC shows heading into the upfront, to say the least, though they got no help from an also particularly weak The Voice (2.5) at 8/7c.

• In drama land, NCIS (2.3) gave back some of last week's rebound, and Agents of SHIELD (1.9) adjusted off the tie-series low but was still down week-to-week. Glee (0.8) was not so lucky, notching yet another new low. And at 10/9c, an unusually impressive Chicago Fire (1.9) thumped Person of Interest (1.7).

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 4/22/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• The Voice (2.8) took a week-to-week drop on Tuesday, just as for its live premiere on Monday, but comedies About a Boy (1.9) and Growing Up Fisher (1.5) held up. The comedy results looked especially decent after the shows avoided their usual downward finals adjustments, leaving AaB up week-to-week.

• Agents of SHIELD (1.9) fell back into a tie with the last 8/7c episode two weeks ago, though that's still not great given CBS' NCIS went into repeats.

• Supernatural's huge plummet to 0.7 last week was pretty odd, but fortunately for the CW it was just a fluke; it got back to a more normal 0.9 this week. The Originals (0.6) had another new low in the prelims, and this time it didn't adjust up as it did last week.

• The Mindy Project (1.0) was steady even as New Girl (0.6) went back into repeats, and Glee (0.9) inched down to tie its low.

• Cable: FX's Fargo (0.65) was down 20% from its already modest premiere, but compared to the second weeks of fellow FX offerings The Americans (-32%) and The Bridge (-43%) that doesn't look so bad. The second week of Awkward (0.61) also had a significant dip, as did BET's comedies.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 4/15/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• A special 9/8c tryout for Agents of SHIELD (2.1) was of some benefit, amounting to a two-tenth uptick week-to-week. That doesn't seem like much, but given what happened on the other networks... anyway, more on that in a minute. ABC also launched a new season of Celebrity Wife Swap (1.0) at a mere shadow of what the show got in the regular season last year (including a 2.4 premiere on 2/26/13). But this was pretty close to what it averaged over the summer, and sadly an improvement on almost every regularly-scheduled original in the 10/9c slot this season. (Only the premieres of Lucky 7 and Mind Games did better!)

• The other good news was NBC's The Voice (3.0) and About a Boy (1.8) bouncing back a bit. But those really only look encouraging because they dropped so much last week.

• Then there was everybody else, where season lows were all over the place, though many of the outright lows were adjusted away after finals. Here are the details:
• CBS: NCIS (2.2, a low by two tenths even after a finals uptick), NCIS: Los Angeles (2.1, tie) and Person of Interest (1.8, adjusted up from a tie to not a low).
• NBC: Chicago Fire (1.7, new low).
• Fox: Glee (1.0, NOT A LOW!), New Girl (1.2, adjusted up to a tie), The Mindy Project (1.0, tie).
• CW: The Originals (0.7, adjusted up to a tie), Supernatural (0.7, adjusted down to a low by two tenths).

• FX launched new drama Fargo (0.8), which basically tied the 18-49 average of previous occupant Justified. But it was a bit below their last drama launch The Bridge (0.9 on 7/10/13), and most other recent launches of note on the network were in the 1's. This network has become somewhat famous for massive post-premiere drops, so they'll have to hope this modest premiere bucks the trend.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 4/8/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• Marvel Studios had a great weekend at the box office with Captain America: The Winter Soldier, but that did not translate to the small screen. Even though Agents of SHIELD picked up a second straight two-tenths uptick in the final ratings, it was disappointingly still down week-to-week. The ABC comedies also suffered, as The Goldbergs (1.4) and Trophy Wife (0.8) each tied series lows.

• NBC also caught the Tuesday blues; the Tuesday edition of The Voice (2.9) continues to deteriorate at an alarming rate, and now it's taking comedies About a Boy (1.7) and Growing Up Fisher (1.5) down with it. Chicago Fire (1.8) ended up looking good despite being down a tick at 10/9c, albeit against repeats on both competing networks.

• Only CBS had a remotely good evening as NCIS (2.6) bounced back a bit, but NCIS: Los Angeles (2.3) inched down the week after it fully retained the mothership.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 4/1/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• April got off to a foolish start for Fox, where Glee (0.9) reverted to a tie with its series low from three weeks ago and the one-hour return of The Mindy Project (1.0) was at a new series low. Something to note about these shows is that while both are big W18-34 draws, they have very different 18-49 skews; Glee had about 700,000 more total viewers. This probably means Glee leans much more toward the teen end of that 18-34 demo and Mindy much more toward the 35-49 end. Given this incompatibility, I don't think Fox could've expected a lot more out of Mindy. We already know that it gets bad 18-49 ratings, and they'll always be worse without New Girl leading in. But they'll have to put up with another full hour of Mindy next week before New Girl comes back.

• On ABC, Agents of SHIELD (2.0) was back with a two-tenths upward adjustment in finals that makes this feel like a much better result than the 1.8 in prelims. It was still a tenth behind its last original episode, but now two tenths ahead of the 1.8 when it last returned from hiatus (and when it last faced NCIS). And The Goldbergs (1.5) was back down even with the lead-in increase, continuing to appear more tied to the presence of comedy competition than to the lead-in.

• CBS' NCIS (2.4) adjusted up off of its new low, so it's now only tied for a season low (and NCIS: Los Angeles (2.4) only tied it rather than beat it).

• Like many of the other ugly results in the 8/7c, The Voice (3.1) adjusted up in finals, but it was still down another three tenths. but they can take some solace in lead-out comedies About a Boy (2.0) and Growing Up Fisher (1.6) continuing to hold.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 3/25/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• The fourth timeslot originals for About a Boy (2.0) and Growing Up Fisher (1.7) each gave back the tenth gained last week; the good news is there were no finals downticks.

• The CBS drama lineup of NCIS (2.5), NCIS: Los Angeles (2.4) and Person of Interest (2.0) had an upswing night. PoI in particular seemed to benefit from Chicago Fire (1.0) going into repeats at 10/9c. NCIS also faced a repeat Agents of SHIELD (0.8).

• On a roller-coaster night for Fox, Glee held onto the 1.1 "spike" from last week's 100th episode, then New Girl (1.2) hit a new series low, then Brooklyn Nine-Nine (1.3) bounced up in its season finale.

• I don't really make anything of pilot encore ratings as a rule, but people may yell at me if I don't mention that The 100 got a 0.5 and 1.6 million viewers for its pilot encore at 8/7c.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 3/18/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• After finals adjustments, The Voice (3.6) and the third regularly-scheduled originals of lead-out newbies About a Boy (2.1) and Growing Up Fisher (1.8) were all up a tick week-to-week.

• Fox also had a bounce-back thanks to the 100th episode of Glee (1.1), but a repeat New Girl (0.7) at 9/8c halted that momentum, helping usher Brooklyn Nine-Nine (1.1) to a new low.

• ABC's special Marvel Studios: Assembling a Universe (1.5) did much worse than the usual Agents of SHIELD original, but much better than the usual repeat. The Goldbergs (1.7) continued to operate apart from the 8/7c hour, growing two tenths week-to-week.

• And the CW had a new season low from The Originals (0.7), though Supernatural (0.9) adjusted up to merely tie its low. 

• Cable: Pretty Little Liars (1.28) had a truly massive 55% finale spike to a season high. After being down double-digits for most of the back half of this winter season, it ended with a finale up 9% year-to-year. 

First Two Weeks, About a Boy/Growing Up Fisher

WEEK ONE We'll do these two in tandem since they are somewhat connected. Anyway, the new comedies About a Boy and Growing Up Fisher did not exactly have the traditional week one and week two since they had Olympics previews (2.2/2.0) and then pilot repeats (2.3/2.0) before the actual regular timeslot originals began. But we'll use the first regularly scheduled originals, which had a respectable 2.5 (About a Boy) and 1.9 (Growing Up Fisher). The Voice led in with a 4.1 demo (including a 4.4 at 8:30), which was actually up from the 3.7 (4.0 at 8:30) that had led into the pilot repeats the week before.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 3/11/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• On Monday, a collision between The Bachelor's huge finale and Daylight Saving viewing depression produced some ugly numbers on other networks. But Tuesday saw DST plus a reduction in competition, as CBS went into repeats. So these results were much more mixed. ABC's drama department had the best night, as Agents of SHIELD (2.1) produced another double-digit surge with NCIS off the air. And at 10/9c, week three of Mind Games (0.8) had a spike from last week's 0.6 debacle (though it got a bit less ridiculous after giving back a tick in finals). As with Mixology's week two hold, this will likely be enough to buy Mind Games a bit more time.

• Downward finals adjustments hurt NBC's scripted shows; About a Boy (2.0) ended up down a steep 20% from last week's timeslot premiere. (In prelims, its lead-in The Voice went from a 4.4 at 8:30 down 14% to a prelim 3.8 this week). And Growing Up Fisher (1.7), while more resilient, also ended up down multiple ticks after finals.

• The Tuesday loser, as usual, was Fox, where the disastrous mix of Glee (0.9), New Girl (1.3) and Brooklyn Nine-Nine (1.2) keeps getting even worse. All three of these shows tied season lows set in what should've been tougher situations (Glee on Thanksgiving, NG and BK-99 against the Olympics).

• Cable: BET's duo of The Game (1.13) and Let's Stay Together (0.58) each dropped by over 30% from last week's premieres. TNT's Rizzoli and Isles (0.88) and Perception (0.53) also had a noteworthy night, each surging by over 30% to spring highs.

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 3/4/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• With everyone finally back in regularly-scheduled business, there was really only one winner: NBC, where The Voice (4.0) was actually up from last week's Tuesday premiere and lead-out comedies About a Boy (2.5) and Growing Up Fisher (1.9) continue to look respectable. I'm not really sure whether we should judge these numbers by series premiere standards, by second episode standards, or somewhere in the middle, but let's see what happens next week. Chicago Fire (1.9) rounded out a night of growth for the peacock.

• There was carnage on pretty much every other network:
• CBS followed last week's trio of new season lows with another trio of new lows, as NCIS (2.5), NCIS: Los Angeles (2.1) and Person of Interest (1.7) each inched down again.
• ABC's Agents of SHIELD (1.8) got walloped across its month-long hiatus (but adjusted up in finals), Trophy Wife (0.8) was more invisible than ever, and Mind Games (0.6) was down by nearly half in its second and maybe final episode as it lost its Bachelor lead-in. And the most promising point in the prelims, The Goldbergs (1.5), dropped in finals, so it was also down.
• And Fox's Glee (1.0) took a dive in its second week on Tuesday.

• Cable numbers now in the table: BET brought back The Game (1.6) with a whooping 32% growth on last March's premiere. It's not a total stunner since the show had a huge spike (1.9) to end last season, but it's still very good news. Its long-time BET lead-out Let's Stay Together (0.9) was bumped to 11:00 and matched last year's premiere.

SpotVault - Growing Up Fisher (NBC) - 2013-14 Ratings

Growing Up Fisher

Tuesdays, 9:30/8:30c, NBC

Spotted Ratings, Tuesday 2/25/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• The most interesting data points of Tuesday night got a little less interesting when NBC pre-empted original episodes of About a Boy and Growing Up Fisher for repeats of the About a Boy (2.3) and Growing Up Fisher (2.0) pilots.
• As noted last night on The Question thread, I'm declaring the game void due to the last-minute scheduling change. The fact that these episodes actually came pretty close to going over the line anyway makes me feel better about that decision. We can debate how much the move impacted the ratings on this night. Personally I don't think it was a huge deal, since a large percentage of the audience was gonna be first-time viewers who left the TV on after The Voice. But I also don't think it's a stretch at all to say they'd have each gone a tick higher with originals (which is all it would've taken). I watched the first minute of AaB, realized it was the pilot and tuned out, and I can't imagine I was nearly alone in that.

• Sandwiching that hour on NBC was a mediocre Tuesday premiere for The Voice (3.7, down nearly 10% from last spring) and another solid showing for Chicago Fire (1.8).

• ABC also shook things up on Tuesday in a big way, bringing in a special two-hour The Bachelor (2.5) at relatively normal levels. It seems like that should've been a good lead-in for the series premiere of Mind Games (1.1) (and the shows surprisingly had identical 18-49 skews), but the show was dead on arrival anyway. It nestled right between the premieres of ABC's previous two occupants of the slot, Lucky 7 (1.3) and Killer Women (0.9) (the latter had a measly Trophy Wife lead-in).

• CBS, Fox and the CW all had pretty bad nights against the added competition, including new season lows for all three CBS shows: NCIS (2.6), NCIS: Los Angeles (2.3) and Person of Interest (1.7). And Fox's move of Glee (1.2) to Tuesday did not resonate and did not help the 9/8c comedies; New Girl (1.4) and Brooklyn Nine-Nine (1.3) each got back only part of the drops seen in Olympic episodes a couple weeks ago. The CW's The Originals (0.8) also hit a new low.

• Cable notes: TNT brought back its summer Tuesday duo for a four-episode regular season run. Rizzoli and Isles (0.7) was roughly steady with its last premiere within the regular season, while Perception (0.5) hit a series low in its first ever regular season episode. The night's big winner was BET's Being Mary Jane (1.6), which spiked to its best numbers since the two-hour pilot in July.

Spotted Ratings, Olympics Roundup 2/21-2/23/14

WHAT MATTERS:

• NBC's Winter Olympics declines had been fairly disappointing for most of the Games, but it really escalated on the last few nights. Friday (3.6), Saturday (2.8) and Sunday's Closing Ceremony (3.2) were all over 40% behind the 6.5, 4.8 and 5.5 that rounded out Vancouver in 2010, and still well behind the 4.4, 5.1 and 3.8 to round out the 2006 Games. This put the final 2014 average at 18% behind the 2010 average.

• Because of these struggles, the post-Olympics previews of upcoming comedies About a Boy (2.2) on Saturday and Growing Up Fisher (2.0) on Sunday did not get the kind of sampling platforms NBC might have hoped for. But as in 2012, when it was clear Go On had more initial interest than Animal Practice, we can probably also declare an early favorite this year. About a Boy had the edge despite airing 30 minutes later on a much lower-viewed night.

• Sunday was further complicated by a rain delay to NASCAR's Daytona 500 on Fox, pushing it into primetime. The coverage ended up averaging a 2.8 demo rating. That added yet another layer of difficulty for CBS' probably ill-advised premiere of The Amazing Race (1.5), buried to a whooping 40% behind last spring's opener. (It may also adjust noticeably, as CBS had a 13-minute sports overrun of its own.)

• Episode three of The Walking Dead (6.6) was down just two tenths week-to-week and remains ever-so-slightly behind the scorching fall pace (when ep. 3 had a 6.8). And it was a potentially breakout night for HBO's True Detective (1.15), surging by 26% to a series high. (Progamming note: I'm going to try adding cable ratings with most of the usual full table numbers. Please check back at night or the next morning on the daily posts for these.)

The Question, Tuesday 2/25/14: Will About a Boy and Growing Up Fisher Grow Up From Their Preview Ratings?

Its comedy development in complete shambles, NBC will try to make something new worth keeping in this spring's About a Boy and Growing Up Fisher. The network decided to give each show a preview after the Olympics, something they also did in summer 2012 with Go On and Animal Practice. But while each of those previews in 2012 had lead-in coverage that broke a 9.0 rating, Saturday and Sunday's final half-hours couldn't even crack a three! With that in mind, each of these shows breaking a 2.0 wasn't the worst thing in the world. But what happens in their regular slots starting tonight is obviously much more important. Will About a Boy and Growing Up Fisher grow up from their preview ratings? That's The Question for Tuesday, February 25, 2014.

EDIT: NBC called an extremely late audible to re-air the preview episodes tonight, so this game will not count for win/loss records. However, everyone who entered gets the usual 0.1 point for participation, so please check in with the thread before the deadline if you were going to enter.

Best Case/Worst Case, Post-Olympic Week 2014: About a Boy, Mixology, Hannibal and more!

The Winter Olympics interruption has created an irregularly crowded "premiere week" to kick off the last three months of the broadcast TV season. Today, Best Case/Worst Case returns to preview the eight broadcast shows premiering this week. There's then over a week before the next broadcast premieres on March 9, so we'll be back toward the end of next week to hit the March premieres closer to when they happen.