| Scoreboard |  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total Viewers (million) | 16.50 | 10.53 | 9.21 | 6.58 | 4.42 | 1.03 |
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-49 | 3.3/9 | 4.3/11 | 3.4/9 | 2.2/6 | 1.6/4 | 0.4/1 |
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-34 | 2.0/6 | 3.9/11 | 2.9/9 | 1.4/4 | 1.7/5 | 0.5/1 |
Updated December 3, 11:30PST with 18-34 show data below.
Dancing with the Stars absence was a friend to CBS, sending even more of the 50+ crowd CBS' way, but some 18-49 year olds as well. CBS was the night's leader in total viewers though Fox won both the 18-49 and 18-34 demos (and by fairly wide margins at that, see above). NCIS was slightly up vs. last week, but The Mentalist, which last week had to battle with the DWTS finale was up almost three million viewers to a series high 18.77 million viewers.
That's the good news, the bad news -- if any part of having a hit show can really be "bad" news was that with less than half as many viewers both the second hour of The Biggest Loser and Fringe trailed The Mentalist by only .1 among 18-49 year olds.
Fringe had less than 9 million viewers (8.69 million) and it lost ~600,000 viewers from the first half hour to the second (8.994 million to 8.380 million) but those who departed House for The Mentalist must have mostly been older because Fringe only dropped .1 in among 18-49 year olds from a 3.7 to a 3.6. The bigger competition in the demos during the 9:30pm half hour was The Biggest Loser which scored a 4.0/10 among 18-49 year olds and a 3.4/9 among 18-34 year olds (winning both demos for that half hour).
According to Jim was back and promptly lost almost three million viewers out of the Christmas classic Santa Claus is Comin' to Town. And if one half hour of According to Jim wasn't enough, another 600,000 or so bolted during the second half hour. Sadly for our friends at Eli Stone, it lost still another half million plus and averaged under five million viewers and only a 1.6/4 in the demo. At least ATJ did a 2.0 or a better in both its half hours.
Last Tuesday's overnight report is available to compare, though since there was no Dancing with the Stars finale this week, obviously things look a bit different. I'll add in the 18-34 data later if I can.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | Viewers (Millons) | 18-49 Rating/Share | 18-34 Rating/Share |
| 8:00 | CBS | NCIS | 18.54 | 3.7/10 | 2.0/6 |
| FOX | House | 12.37 | 5.0/14 | 4.5/14 | |
| ABC | Santa Claus is Comin' to Town (R) | 8.98 | 3.1/8 | 1.9/6 | |
| NBC | Biggest Loser: Families | 8.05 | 3.1/8 | 2.6/8 | |
| CW | 90210 (R) | 1.20 | 0.5/1 | 0.6/2 | |
| 9:00 | CBS | The Mentalist | 18.77 | 3.8/9 | 2.5/7 |
| NBC | Biggest Loser: Families | 9.27 | 3.7/9 | 3.2/9 | |
| FOX | Fringe | 8.69 | 3.7/9 | 3.2/9 | |
| ABC | According to Jim | 6.15 | 2.2/6 | 1.4/4 | |
| CW | Privileged (R) | 0.86 | 0.3/1 | ||
| 9:30 | ABC | According to Jim | 5.51 | 2.0/5 | 1.2/3 |
| 10:00 | CBS | Without a Trace | 12.20 | 2.5/7 | 1.7/5 |
| NBC | Law & Order: SVU | 10.31 | 3.6/10 | 2.9/9 | |
| ABC | Eli Stone | 4.93 | 1.6/4 | 1.0/3 |
Shows are sorted by viewers in each time slot.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2008 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101.
IDK, obviously CBS would have hoped splurging on Simon Baker would get some younger viewers to tune in instead of simply keeping NCIS’s old viewers around, but in the end The Mentalist had more young people watching than the super-hyped, horribly lead-in dependant, probably dropping in the finals Fringe. It’s not as if the additional 50+ people are actively hurting CBS’s business. As supposed hit shows go, The Mentalist is still in the best shape out of those Tuesday 9pm shows.
SVU beat Heroes in the demo (and viewers). So with a new Office, the best Heroes can hope for is third this week.
Old people keeping NCIS, Mentalist, Trace on top.
Fringe seems to have found stability in the upper 8 million area. As long as it hold there and keep its key demo in the 3′s its safe. Though its sad that so many people find fat people losing weight entertaining.
WOW, Eli Stone really does get beat up by the numbers. Don’t get me wrong, I like the show. It’s really bad when According to Jim pulls better numbers than your show. Poor Eli, I enjoyed it while it lasted.
No Joe, young people keeping them on top. More young people watched Mentalist than Fringe
You know why people watch The Mentalist? Because Simon Baker is sexy.
Wowiezowie, Biggest Loser took a nice jump in the demos and in viewers, in both hours. That 18-49 figure of 3.7/9 rating/share in the 9 pm hour is pretty huge, no pun intended, for such a program. Was last night the finale? Or did all the 18-49 viewers switch from DWTS to Biggest Loser, while the 50+ DWTS fans moved to the Mentalist? In any case, Fringe is down a tic and I’m bummed about that. It’s finally starting to move from “okay” to “really good,” and it’s ever-so-slightly decreasing in viewers and demos
.
I do hope Fringe is safe, because I cannot wait to see how it does when FOX asks it to stand on its own next season. So far it shows no signs of being able to hold down a night like House and Bones do for FOX.
Fringe is going to do awesome this winter with it being behind American Idol. I’m confident it’ll hit series highs. It’s a very popular show with 18-49′s and 18-49′s watch American Idol. I mean look how house became a huge hit and 24…they both got post-idol slots. I’m so glad that it has remained consistent in the ratings around 3.9 each week (this weeks was a little weaker but who cares, it was still a great episode)
im blown away by mentalist’s numbers… 4.0 in the 18-49 demo and what the heck, 19million viewers? god.. im really really blown away… because, its just another episodic crime show… in my opinion anyway. Im sad to see it beating Fringe in the demos, it was simply amazing last night.
Can someone tell me if chuck or the office will be be the post superbowl show?
Either way, non of them will pass 20 million.
Bob, given the possibility of errors in rounding to one digit past the decimal place, I’d say in the final analysis, Mentalist and Fringe are very close to equal in the 18-49 demo. 18-34 demos will show the real “youth” trends.
As for Eli Stone, when it’s a confirmed cancellation, why bother investing any more time watching it?
Julia,
SVU is by far the strongest NBC show outside Sunday Night Football. Taking into consideration the incompatible lead-in and the tough competition from CBS I certainly call this show a powerhouse. Oh, and let’s not forget the dismal marketing promotion it gets from the NBC honchos. Glad to see it do so well because it deserves it.
Joe Cool,
I should expect Fringe to shoot over 10 million viewers come January with Americal Idol as its lead in.
Programmers should never under-estimate how compatible shows can keep the viewers glued to their TV sets. CBS is by far the master programmer.
More young people watched Mentalist, just barely. But its the old people that made the big difference in the overall numbers.
Simon Baker? He is rather creepy looking. I keep expecting him to show up doing something weird on TMZ.com
The Office gets the post superbowl spot and The Office will probably get 25-30 million viewers. Its a very popular show and its hilarious
Fringe is a Very hyped show
JJ Abrams Said in one of his interview that he ” wanted to create The X-Files vibe of the 90′s ” but it doesn’t even come close to The X-Files
the leading lady Anna Torv… needs acting lessons
Fringe is now placed 3rd in it’s time slot behind Mentalist and Biggest loser and dropped points in 18-49 demo
still FOX Hype it as HIT ???
“As for Eli Stone, when it’s a confirmed cancellation, why bother investing any more time watching it?”
Um, because you like it?
Sure, not many people like Eli Stone, but why not watch the ones that are left if you liked the previous episodes?
I’ve never understood the idea of TV watching as an “investment”.
Yeah Simon Baker has been getting A LOT of press recently. I wonder how much his cover on the TV Guide that’s on stands right now (even I was tempted to buy that issue, and I’ve never bought a tv guide before)had to do with last night’s great ratings
. And the spread that he got in People’s Most Beautiful People sure didn’t hurt him any… Good for him. The show’s good and he’s very good in it.
Eli Stone? Siggggh.
Fringe is still doing well still. I don’t get why the Mentalist is a hit. It’s just like every other Procedural out there.
In the words of one of my favorite artists:
“Originality is a ghosttown. And it’s oh so hard to get to, and when your to, then people start to hate you…”
Nick, Fringe is a hit. One episode drops one tick. Whatever, and last night was the biggest loser finale. Fringe will do amazing in the post-idol spot in january