Tuesday, April 28, 2015

10 Ratings Blurbs: 4/28/15 Edition


I am not ashamed to admit this list really came together within the last hour because I had no idea what to put on the list this week outside of 4-5 shows.

1. Game of Thrones (6.711 million 3.5)- I don’t have anything notable to say here. These numbers are still really good and the show does appear to be doing better than it was at this point last season. It is very early and the show is already renewed for a 6th season so HBO is in prime position to have a strong spring with this show.

2. Dancing with the Stars (13.22 million 2.0)- I don’t talk about the broadcast competition shows much. Most of them air multiple seasons per year and more than one episode per week. This show had to downsize and that turned out to be a very good move for the show. It was bleeding viewers and the format appeared to be stale no matter what twist got included. Now the show has stabilized (and ABC’s scripted lineup has plummeted) so this looks like a pretty healthy show again. The expectation is that ABC will stay the course and renew the show for 2 more seasons in a couple of weeks.

3. Ru Paul’s Drag Race (320,000 0.1)- I don’t get the ratings for this show. There seem to be some wild fluctuations going on here. Some weeks the show does reasonably well and other weeks the numbers don’t look that good. Maybe Logo is used to that pattern because I’m not sure how it would have stayed on the air for 7 seasons if there wasn’t some sort of security or stability with this show.

4. The Voice (Tuesday: 11.25 million 2.6; Monday: 10.49 million 2.6)- This show is not where it was even from just last year. The burnout is catching up with it and that is to be expected. It is still a very good performer for NBC and they need it because a lot of people realize they have pieces that look solid but underneath the pieces, they have a world of trouble going on. Everyone believes the show will be back for 2 more seasons next year. No one knows if that renewal will come with more changes. That may be revealed in a couple of weeks.

5. Swab Stories (1.273 million 0.7)- VH1 knew what they were doing with this. They knew this show had absolutely no chance to attract viewers premiering on Wednesday. Love & Hip Hop Atlanta had a pretty steep (but normal) drop from the premiere and this technically aired behind the aftershow so I understand why the ratings aren’t very high for a Monday airing. Still this was a move to basically ensure its renewal even if the show loses a million viewers when it moves to Wednesday (Think of this along the lines of Hollywood Exes and Dating Naked).

6. Preachers of Detroit (200,000 0.1)- I still have absolutely no clue what Oxygen might do with this show. They could renew it because they really want to keep this franchise but they could cancel it because of their own miscues causing the ratings to really suffer. I don’t know. Right now they seem to want to hang their hats on the Prancing Elites (if you see that press release, read it carefully. That show got less than 700k for the premiere. Good for Oxygen but not as good as that press release would have you to believe). The network is a mess and all of their shows are now caught in the crossfire of a “rebrand” that really isn’t a rebrand (I say that because Oxygen has always targeted younger women. Using different words and producing the same type of shows they have always produced to attract the same audience is not a rebrand).

7. The Americans (1.220 million 0.3)- This show skated by basically because of critical acclaim and the changing landscape of scripted shows on FX (Their drama slate is flimsy and struggling comedies just get shipped to FXX). The numbers were absolutely terrible and were definitely in cancellation territory all season. FX renewed it a few weeks ago so it will be back next year. It is way too early to tell if next season will or should be the last and unless there is a specific plan in place from the producers, FX probably won’t go the route of announcing next season as the last one. I’m sure that they want to see if they can find any new hit shows and assess where they are going as a network before making any big decisions on this show beyond season 4.

8. Barely Famous (138,000 0.1)- This show originally wasn’t going to be in the post today but I just found out this episode was the finale and I saw the news that VH1 renewed it for a second season and it had to get a mention for that. Personally, it’s a terrible decision but I guess expectations are super low for everything this year because there’s no way the lowest rated show on the network averaging 113,000 viewers and a 0.1 demo (and the show has hit a 0.0 demo twice this season) deserves to get renewed. I think it’s a headscratcher that shows like this and Hindsight can get renewed with dismal ratings and lovely press release announcements but 95% of their Monday shows don’t get that same courtesy. It makes no sense to me.

9. R&B Divas: LA (376,000 0.2)- I was completely unaware that last week was the finale otherwise I would have had this show on the list then. I now see that reunion episodes are basically the highest rated episodes of the entire season for this franchise. I recall seeing numbers like these in the past and now I think it’s odd how a show can grow its audience by some 50-80% just from normal episodes to the reunion episodes. I’m a person who thinks reunion shows are largely a waste of time and perhaps with numbers like these, TVOne needs to figure out why their in-season episodes fall flat with viewers whereas the reunion episodes do not.

10. Single Ladies (296,000 0.1)- I didn’t put this show here to pick at its ratings this week. There’s no reason to do that. It is not going to do much better than this on the network it airs on and these numbers are basically 1/10th of what it was getting last season. Those are facts. What is also a fact is that VH1 canceled this show and since that cancellation they have premiered at least 6 shows that have done worse than this one is currently doing (and that total includes the scripted show Hindsight). Food for thought.

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