CBS should take it from me, an 18 year old viewer, and be happy with the 5.9 million more viewers NCIS has over House, and maybe look at House’s erratic ratings, which is likely the result the difficulty of juggling so many characters.

I only just started watching the show in reruns during the summer of 2007 and at first I found it only mildly entertaining. I’ve tried to watch some of the other procedurals but they bore me to tears about halfway through and I find the acting to be lacking in some of them as well. But NCIS is very different, and it’s one of those shows that you have to see several times to really “get it.” The humor is the obvious difference, but I don’t think it’s the most important difference. The characters are people you come to care about more each week. I don’t tune in to see them solve a crime, although that part of the show can be interesting. But I really tune in to see what new things I’m going to learn about the characters each week. (Dinozzo for example comes across at first as just an immature frat boy, but if you actually watch the whole series it becomes apparent that he is much more competent than he acts like he is and is probably the most complicated of all, except possibly Gibbs). The characters are multi-layered and complex and they are like a family. I want to know more about them every week and I want to see them interact with each other. Each week the show gives you some tidbits and you keep wanting to come back for more. NCIS seems to have perfected this the past few seasons and that is why the ratings are defying convention and going up instead of down.

I think a lot of people don’t take the show seriously because of the humor, or they discount it as an “older person’s show,” but I don’t think this assumption does the show justice. The producer’s of the show understand their audience and know how to keep them coming back.

I still say the best thing CW could do is grab an NFL like deal. Get people to accept it as a legit network.

Futon Critic says CW *will* air two episodes of Privileged (12/1 & 12/8) following Gossip Girl.

http://www.futoncritic.com/news.aspx?id=7843

Also, while a 4.0 demo is probably not much out of 19 million viewers. it’s still more than most 8pm shows on CBS get. Plus, CBS wouldn’t risk leaving it’s best new show hanging like that. Anyone really think The Mentalist can do 16 million viewers on its own?

Ben, everything we hear about “remote free” for Fringe is that it’s working and advertisers are happy. It would seem almost everyone who watches the show watches the commercials.

I would also suggest watching the Yellow Fever Supernatural episode. Dean’s girly scream still has me laughing. And the Eye of the Tiger at the end is already a hit on Youtube.

Julia, but there are differences. Some shows do better and some do much worse. There are shows that I believe a lot watch same day, about 20 minutes after the shows start so they can skip commercials.

Good for “The Biggest Loser”. NBC needed some good news after Monday night’s disappointment.

I really loved last night’s Fringe episode.

Why do people watch procedurals so much? NCIS, The Mentalist, Without a Trace…they’re all just kind of generic. I guess people just like more and more of the same.

18-49 seems to be the industry standard, plus it’s the only slice we regularly see season-to-date info for.

I don’t think total viewers is meaningless. I think that it’s meaningless if it is used by itself as a data point. I agree fully that if two shows have indentical demos but one show has 5 million more total viewers, that show should make more money. But, I also think House makes more revenue than NCIS despite the fact that NCIS had almost six million more total viewers last night.

I don’t think the DVR numbers are meaningless either — just the live+7 DVR numbers. The same day DVR usage is meaningful, at least as a proxy, and the live+7 numbers are also meaningful, especially as an indicator of how much the business model is going to have to change, but not to revenue.

MediaLife 18-49 ratings only: http://www.medialifemagazine.com/artman2/publish/Overnights_50/McCain_wins_vote_of_Leno_s_viewers.asp

TV Week, 18-49 ratings only: http://www.tvweek.com/blogs/ratings-chart-attack/2008/11/ratings_rise_as_viewers_seem_k.php

There are other examples, but posting more would belabor the point.

Age demos are all that matter to advertisers, and therefore are all that matters to television executives and the future of shows. As far as DVR* numbers, as far as we can tell they are irrelevant to the economic success of shows, but they are not irrelevant in terms of examining how TV viewing is changing in the US.

*Edit:By this I meant Live+7 viewing, not Live+SD viewing.

I expect 90210 2.0 to pick up steam in the new year, with a new showrunner who is making it more real life teen issues. I will not stop watching the show even if it worsens, it sounds stupid but i hate starting something and not getting round to seeing the conclusion.

Who can give me 5 reasons to watch the most recent 4 episodes of supernatural?( I got bored after the *yawn* guy turning in to a hannibal:(

Speaking if The CW…

Now that 90210 is turning out to not be the saving grace the execs at The CW were hoping for, does that mean that the channel may really close-up shop by September of 2009?

BTW: I like Eli Stone and hope ABC keeps it on at least for a full season.

Last season’s finale could have been a fitting end for the series had ABC canceled the show…

But now that they decided to go through with a season 2 I just hope the writers have the chance to give these characters a good ending that they deserve.

Coming from somebody who probably has not seen a single episode.

That could be wrong, but if the CW is putting its eggs into 6 hours (Mon-Weds) and two out of six (arguably three out of six, I’m sure 90210 isn’t living up to expectations) aren’t performing, they don’t have many hours to work with to try and improve things. If they really want to give Privileged a go, they need to try it somewhere else. The options are after ANTM or on Mondays.

LIE TO ME on the other hand is likely going to be a huge hit. I bet it follows HOUSE next season on Tuesday. It would make sense.

P.S. Eli Stone doesn’t stink compared to the Detroit Lions, in fact it probably comes off smelling like a rose…