Spotted Ratings, Weekend Roundup 9/20-9/22/13

WHAT MATTERS:

• All of this stuff is very old news by now, so I'll be quick on the details on the last three days of the 2012-13 season. ABC's Friday premiere lineup was a bit of a disappointment, especially The Neighbors as a clear weak link at 8:30.

• On Sunday, the Emmy Awards were up a stout 26% year-to-year, probably picking up at least a few ticks due to its NFL lead-in. (It dropped in each half-hour: 6.5 -> 5.5 -> 4.9 -> 4.6 -> 4.5 -> 4.1). Despite the big competition, there were series highs aplenty on cable: the penultimate Breaking Bad (3.4), the series finale of Dexter (1.3) and the season finale of Devious Maids (1.1).

Spotted Ratings, Sunday 6/23/13 & 6/30/13

WHAT MATTERS:

• Broadcast TV's Sunday struggles have now definitely continued into the summer months, as NBC got no interest whatsoever from drama co-production Crossing Lines. ABC had a less unreasonable start out of its duo of Celebrity Wife Swap and Whodunnit?, but both were down sharply in week two. And CBS' Sunday edition of Big Brother started out 17% behind last year, which was about the same year-to-year decline as the premiere on Wednesday (-15%).

• Cable has not been without its own disappointments on the night:

The Question, Sunday 6/30/13: Can Dexter Keep Killing It in the Summer?

The flagship Showtime drama Dexter quietly had a sensational season in fall 2012, growing double-digits year-to-year pretty much from wire to wire. But with its lead-out Homeland skyrocketing even faster, Showtime has elected to separate the two. Homeland now has the fall responsibility, while Dexter moves to the summer for the first time and has to contend with smaller viewing levels and a much more potent competing drama on HBO in True Blood. Can Dexter keep killing it in the summer? That's The Question for Sunday, June 30, 2013.

Spotted Ratings, Sunday 9/30/12

WHAT MATTERS:

• ABC premiere Sunday: great for the returnees, not s'much for the new show. Once Upon a Time and the Sunday premiere of Revenge were both just barely below their year-ago series premieres and wayyy ahead of their respective high-2 and low-2 levels from late last spring. Both shows did about 0.3 better than I expected, though most commenters were closer to the mark. Given those results, it's undoubtedly a slow start for 666 Park Ave at 10/9c. It was down about 30% from the year-ago Pan Am premiere despite having the same-sized lead-in.

• NFL overrun-infused Fox saw a nearly-even return from The Simpsons, but it quickly soured from there, as the rest of the animation was down in the general 15-20% vicinity vs. the year-ago occupants.

• CBS was also soft with the returns of The Amazing Race, The Good Wife and the Sunday debut of The Mentalist. The first two were down in the same 15-20%ish range year-to-year, while The Mentalist took a bit bigger hit in its first run at the Sunday 10:00 death slot.

• NBC's great Giants/Eagles matchup sent Sunday Night Football up a bit despite the competition.

• There was some ratings interest on Showtime, where Dexter (1.3) remains another of those cable serials that keeps growing and growing and growing. It was up two tenths year-to-year to yet another best-ever level. Emmy-sweeping Homeland (0.7) came back about equivalent to last season's finale numbers, but that meant massive growth (more than 50%) from last year's series premiere.

Ratings Five-Spot, WE 12/25/11 - Homeland, Terra Nova, American Horror Story, The X Factor, Who's Still Standing?

2011's final Ratings Five-Spot at SpoilerTV wraps up some of the last few fall finales of 2011. I cover Homeland, Terra Nova, American Horror Story and The X Factor and also look at NBC's holiday-time run of Who's Still Standing? Check it out!

Schedule Five-Spot, WE 11/20/11 - Rules of Engagement, A Gifted Man, Survivor, Dexter, South Park

Phew! The news just seems to come in bunches. This one is mostly about CBS' midseason announcements but touches on a couple other things too. Here's my third and final Schedule Five-Spot for the week ending November 20, 2011:

Rules of Engagement - OK, so I know CBS likes to be particularly retentionista with their comedies, but does Rules of Engagement really deserve to have its episode count trimmed? I don't have any delusions that the show is Truly as strong as its raw numbers indicate, but my metric still has the show a little stronger than most of CBS' second tier of mostly "safe" dramas. If an expansion of comedy is nigh (and it should be), I'd want to have this around.

Ratings Five-Spot, WE 10/9/11 - Dexter, Hung, House, American Horror Story, The League

For the first time in the SpoilerTV era, the Ratings Five-Spot dips into cable ratings, examining the Dexter, Homeland and Hung premieres from a couple Sundays ago and a pair of solid FX premieres in the last week. I also take one stop on broadcast in looking at the return of House and week two of Terra Nova. Check it out!

Ratings Five-Spot, WE 12/12/10 - The Sing-Off, American Country Awards, Eureka/Warehouse 13/Leverage, Sunday Night Football, Dexter

Here's your Ratings Five-Spot for the week ending December 12, 2010:

The Sing-Off - In December 2009, the NBC holiday reality series was in "did nicely for December filler; let's bring it back next December" territory. This year, the show has taken the next step into "stronger than almost everything on our schedule" territory, including a 3.3 demo on Monday of the current week. That's gonna make it tough for NBC to resist upgrading it from the "filler" role, but most of the rest of the TV year is littered with singing and dancing competitions. We'll see just how lightly NBC treads.

Scheduling Five-Spot, WE 12/5/10 - The Biggest Loser, Archer/Lights Out, Body of Proof, Dexter, Chase

Here's your Five-Spot of TV scheduling news for the week ending December 5, 2010:

The Biggest Loser Moves to 9/8c - This might not be "news" for this week, more likely back when the listings came out, but the reality show aired at 9/8c on Tuesday this week and will the next two weeks (led into by game show Minute to Win It). The show has taken a beating against DWTS and Glee all season, but things finally turned around on Tuesday as it got away from both and posted a 2.9 demo, tying the season high set for its premiere. That's way up from recent numbers which have oft been south of 2.5.