Sorry Pushing Daisies fans, but things still don't look great ratings-wise. Though things were ticking up for Old Christine and Gary Unmarried which had their highest preliminary metered market overnights of the season.
These results are more horked than normal because of the baseball game and the debate. The preliminary numbers are always subject to change, but especially so any time live events like the baseball playoff and the debate are on.
Baseball is no longer America’s pastime. The final presidential debate between Barack Obama and John McCain was far more viewed and even just CBS (the last of the big three networks airing the debate) had more households tuned in to the debate than the playoff game had. The hated Los Angeles Dodgers (if you’re a San Francisco Giants fan, you must hate them!) lost the NLCS in five games. Congratulations to the Philadelphia Phillies who head to the World Series.
Although Philly is the fourth largest television market, it’s not great news for Fox with the World Series ratings…unless the Red Sox make another miraculous playoff comeback. I’m not seeing it in the cards.
Data table:
| Time | Net | Show | Prelim Metered Market HH Rating/Share |
| 8:00 | FOX | NLCS Game 5 (8p-11p) | 5.7/9 |
| CBS | The New Adventures of Old Christine | 5.4/9 | |
| ABC | Pushing Daisies | 4.7/7 | |
| NBC | Knight Rider | 4.5/7 | |
| CW | America's Next Top Model | 2.7/4 | |
| 8:30 | CBS | Gary Unmarried | 5.3/8 |
| Debate Coverage 9p-10:30p | |||
| 9:00 | NBC | Debate | 7.8/12 |
| ABC | Debate | 7.5/11 | |
| CBS | Debate | 6.1/9 | |
| Denate Analysis: 10:30-11p | |||
| 10:00 | NBC | 6.9/10 | |
| ABC | 6.8/10 | ||
| CBS | 5.0/8 |
Metered Market Overnight Ratings: This is normally the first available ratings information, and is based on the electronic measurement service that Nielsen provides in 56 of the nation’s largest markets. In each market a sample of homes is selected to represent that individual market. Often, networks or syndicators provide metered market information as an early indicator of a program’s performance. In aggregate, the 56 metered markets represent 79,890,610 homes, or 70% of all U.S. TV households. Preliminary metered market data are available as early as 8:00AM (ET). Final metered market information, reflecting line-up changes, pre-emptions and runovers, are normally available by 3:30PM (ET).
Still not good, but this is a little, tiny bit better, at least in the prelims.
I’m a big fan of Paula Marshall, Cupid, Seinfeld, Sports Night, Snoops,
Hidden Hills, Veronica Mars, Out of Practice; but Gary Unmarried is
one of the least funny shows I’ve ever seen.The canned laughter is
no help. Get some new writers! Still, America seems to prefer it
and old Christine over the superior Pushing Daisies. Ugh!
I don’t like this one bit. I don’t understand how crap shows do so well and Pushing Daisies isn’t getting the love it should. It’s better than anything else out there. ABC needs to promote it more and give it a better time slot.
Oy, Crystal, please don’t turn this space into one filled with whining PD fans. Can’t we be the reasonable fans who don’t blame poor ratings on timeslots and conspiracy theories? Please?
I watched Pushing Daises for those who would like to see it picked up for another season. I liked it! Tough luck since I don’t own a Nielson >< But Soccer is still Trinidad’s favorite past time, next to Cricket – Almost everyone saw Trinidad beat the USA 2 to 1 last night.
Julia, if the ratings don’t change upward, Bill is already predicting that PD will be this year’s Moonlight in terms of “comments on the site”. All you can do really is grit your teeth and brace yourself.
Moonlightfan, I recently moved and I live fairly near a large park that has soccer and baseball fields. When I went there on Sunday they were playing soccer on the soccer fields — and I’m not making this up — Cricket on the baseball fields. So Americans do play these games (though not as well as Trinidad apparently!), they just don’t watch them much on TV much.
I also don’t understand why an ad for Life on Mars was aired in place of the ad for next week’s episode!
How do you estimate total viewers from these numbers?
Should these numbers be correct, Pushing Daisies would have logged it’s best numbers of the season still.
Alec, there’s no way to, really. A rating point means 1.14 mil households (approximately) but any number of people could have been watching in each household. The viewer numbers will be up shortly, I assume.
Alec, Julia is right, but in the fast affiliate data the users are tracked. PD got 6.29 million and a 1.9/6 in the 18-49 demo last night. I will hold out for the 18-34 data for a few minutes, but if if doesn’t come by then I will post just w/the 18-49 numbers
Julia, the only way to stay away from fandoms is to not read any comments on any website.
Even though I’m really enjoying PD, people just aren’t watching it and it really doesn’t have that much competition so we can’t blame it on the time slot. We just need to be ready for cancellation, because really I can’t think of a good reason for ABC to keep it around with these horrible ratings.
I’ll stick to my delusions that Bryan Fuller has managed to employ Jedi Mind Tricks on the execs over at ABC and will keep the show around at least for 22 episodes. It’s far more enjoyable than watching and dreading that each episode might be the last.
Stacy, I can think of a million good reasons for ABC to keep it around!
Jason, unfortunately, none of those reasons have anything to do with good business sense.
While I agree that we shouldn’t blame PD’s ratings on the time slot, I really DO believe that it would help if ABC promoted the show more… They’ve barely advertised it at all this season!
I think promoting the show is very important, particularly because we only got 9 episodes in Season 1, then it was GONE for 10 months because of the strike! Viewers need a nice reminder in order to get back into the show.
Amanda, I can’t promise this is true, since I never saw the article, but a friend of mine told me that ABC apparently spent more money marketing PD than any other show.
Improvement is improvement. ABC alarmingly didn’t air a “next week on” after the episode, though, and there were NO PD promos on Sunday, Monday, or Tuesday in ABC’s lineup (millions of Life on Mars promos). ABC is holding out on Barack Obama, though, hoping that if it doesn’t participate in his buyup of airtime (Disney-owned ABC is far less Democrat-friendly than are NBC and CBS) PD will be the only scripted show on (assuming the World Series reaches six game), and may have a spike in numbers. Matt Roush doesn’t think ABC will let it go quietly, and we may be seeing a Friday Night Lights-type arrangement. Also, since it’s produced by Warner, I could see a possible pickup from the CW, where it would fit well, and where ratings expectations are lower…
I’d say that since there WAS improvement after LESS promotion, there’s still reason for optimism. Also, the three Emmys don’t hurt. They don’t hurt a bit. I can’t believe how much those are minimized. Do you honestly think ABC isn’t considering that at all?
Also, since it’s produced by Warner, I could see a possible pickup from the CW, where it would fit well, and where ratings expectations are lower…
Oh, no no no no no no. Let’s not start down this path. Please? You’re only making the rest of us look ridiculous.