The long wait is almost over. LOST returns this Wednesday at 9pm with a two-hour season premiere.
The key numbers to focus on are probably last year's season premiere and season finale. I've noted them below with both the final live plus same day DVR numbers and live plus seven days worth of DVR viewing.
| LOST | Live+SD (000) | Live+7 (000) |
| Season four premiere | 16,137 | 17,766 |
| Season four finale | 12,303 | 13,991 |
As you can see, LOST continued to bleed away viewers last season, and really by about 5 episodes in it had bled off to the level of the finale (a bit less, actually). But during its run LOST was typically the most-watched show via DVR outside of American Idol.
There's really nothing to make of the numbers one way or the other because there is already a course plotted to the end of LOST - it will run another season after this year. It would take a series of events even more unlikely than what actually occurs on the show LOST for that not to work out, so fans of the show don't need to fret about the ratings, whatever they are. It would probably have to fall below a 3.0 rating among 18-49 year olds, and I see no chance of that. Last year's finale had a 4.9 rating among 18-49 year olds, though that was off significantly from the 6.7 rating among 18-49 year olds for the premiere.
But, regardless of whether the ratings are particularly important in the case of LOST, it's fun for some of us to speculate about them anyway. My guess is that the season premiere will draw in a few more viewers than last season's finale with close to a 5.0 rating with the 18-49 year old crowd. But, things are a bit different this year. There is no writer's strike and last year LOST aired on Thursdays, against reruns for a good portion of its run.
This year it's on Wednesdays and will face off against Criminal Minds on CBS, Lie To Me on Fox, and Law & Order: SVU on NBC. Lie To Me will have the huge lead-in from American Idol, so it should be interesting to see how that shakes out.
Update: Lie To Me will run at 9pm for the premiere and at least an episode after that, once Idol is back in its in-studio competition phase, Lie To Me will move to 8pm and American Idol will be air against LOST at 9pm. It still should be interesting...
I watched the screener for the two hour season five premiere of LOST on Christmas Eve, and I'll watch it again in HD on the big screen this week. I enjoyed the premiere, though if you're looking for some more OMFG moments, you might be disappointed. The premiere seemed to serve as more of a set-up than a vehicle to reveal much that you didn't already know. But to the degree you wish to avoid any spoilers whatsoever, now is your last chance to look away!
If you already concluded that when the island was moved in last year's finale, it wasn't an issue of where it moved, but when it moved, then there are no spoilers here. If all the focus on time-travel, last year, particularly the wonderful well-done episode, "The Constant" didn't tip you off to the fact that time travel plays a central role in LOST, than the premiere will certainly reveal that much.
Mostly, I think LOST is just a show about the human struggle, and it captures it marvelously. All the preposterous stuff is just a backdrop to develop how different people handle difficult circumstances differently. Overall, I think they've done a brilliant job of that. I'm not one who believes in the tooth fairy, or time travel, or faster than light travel. The tooth fairy doesn't interest me much, but I love fictional treatment of time travel and faster-than-light travel.
While time travel seems to be at least theoretically scientifically possible, even if it is, it seems like it would require more energy than we'll ever figure out how to harness. Still, I love the fictional treatment of time travel whether it's Back to the Future or Star Trek.
With time travel as a backdrop, who knows what twists and turns the show will take? I hope they won't abuse the ability to play around with timelines. If last season's "The Constant" was any indication, I'd rate the handling of it as artistic.
lost will face American Idol
Fox changed Wednesday schedule (AI to 9, Lie to me to
so I guess Lost’s demo will be around 4.5-5.0
katy, i don’t typically track schedules closely, but two separate DVR programming guides, plus the FOX.com schedule have this Wednesday’s Lie to Me airing from 9:03-10:06. new episodes of Lost will air at 9pm, and I’m not sure the special Lost clips show at 8pm facing AI counts!
This week it will be Lie to Me, but AI will be moving to the 9:00 slot when they go to the in-studio competition.
See Variety’s report by Michael Schneider from Tuesday, January 13 at http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117998439.html, where it says “‘Idol”s Wednesday edition will move to 9 p.m. once the show reverts to its in-studio competition phase. That means new drama ‘Lie to Me’, which is initially airing behind ‘Idol’ on Wednesdays at 9 p.m., will slide down to 8. In doing so, Fox notes that ‘Lie to Me’ will face less powerful drama competish.”
I’ve updated the post, but it’s not clear to me whether that switch happens in three weeks, a month, or six weeks. It’s not happening the first two weeks, and by then, everyone will have forgotten about this post anyway!
I wonder if people who originally learned to write in English are sent to “Variety Writing School” so they can begin using words like “competish”, and instead of president, or CEO, “prexy” and “topper”. Or perhaps its just the editors.
According to the futon critic, lie to me will slide down to 8 after airing 6 episodes
I’m so excited!!!! Lost will be back in their original timeslot where it get their higher ratings, it will have no problem beating Criminal Minds but I dont know about Lie To Me. The 18-34 numbers for Lost are decent, right?
Cool, Lost was originally on at 8pm on Wednesdays.
You’re right! ABC has moved so many times
Wed at 8
Wed at 9
Wed at 10
Thursdays at 9
Thursday at 10
Wed at 9
Lost is a case of ABC clearly messing with success. Has any other self-sustaining hit series been moved as much? A lot of people attribute the fact that Lost has lost a chunk of its audience to the complexity of the series, but I would divide it between that and the constant time slot moves.
No, I blame the Season 3 schedule.. with the first 6 episodes and the rest of episodes in February. In paper was a good schedule but the execution was pretty bad because the last episode before the hiatus (I Do) had a lame cliffhanger.
Also, the crappy comedies that ABC had before Lost like lead in has also hurt the series, this year is not exception giving Lost NO lead in at all.
I thought Lost will be at 8 pm. It’s not like season 1 or 2 when they could face Idol and still get 15 million, and Criminal Minds is a threat too.
ABC should move Lost to 8 togather with Lie to Me.
I love ‘Lost’, but if I was ABC, I would not give ‘Lost’ a lead-in. Even at its worst key demographic showing ever (in early May of 2008), it still managed a 4.7 and placed ninth for the week and third among ABC shows, behind only ‘Desperate Housewives’ and ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ (in 18-49 year-olds). Starting with its pilot episode that brought in 19 million live viewers to the fourth place network, ‘Lost’ has almost always been a self-starter. In the fall of 2006, it played after ‘Dancing with the Stars’ and averaged ~92% viewership retention (while it has always had a better demo rating). In the spring of 2008, it aired after ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ and managed ~72 viewership retention and ~78 demo retention, but had completely different age and gender group demographics when broken down. ‘Lost’ does fine without a lead-in and ABC does not really have any shows that would be suitable, anyway.
Re: Tom – The first two seasons averaged 19 million live viewers for original episodes. The 15 million that you are counting refers to the season average, which includes repeats.
“Lost is a case of ABC clearly messing with success. Has any other self-sustaining hit series been moved as much? A lot of people attribute the fact that Lost has lost a chunk of its audience to the complexity of the series, but I would divide it between that and the constant time slot moves.”
Bones immediately comes to mind.
LOST: BONES:
Wed at 8 Tuesday 8PM
Wed at 9 Wednesday 8PM
Wed at 10 Tuesday 8PM
Thursdays at 9 Monday 8PM
Thursday at 10 Wednesday 8PM
Wed at 9 Thursday 8PM
Unlike LOST though, Bones is a lot better at keeping it’s viewers episode-by-episode.
About the time-travel. You can do it tastefully like Lost and Terminator or you can do it horribly like Heroes. That has gotta be the dumbest use of timetravel incorporated in a story. Let’s see if the Heroes fans still think their show is better than Lost.
Tony, I think that boat sailed after Heroes first season finale. I don’t think that anybody honestly thinks that Heroes > Lost anymore, and thank god! those people were annoying.
I blame season 3 with the huge drop in viewers. If you look at the total viewers and 18-49ers when it moved from 9 to 10pm, you can clearly see that the show around 85% of its 18-49 aud, but lost about half of it’s audience outside of those demos. It was the late timeslot that caused most of the loss of viewers, although it was beat-up-on-Lost season so most attributed it to quality.
As for this season premiere, I predict 12-13 million viewers and near a 5 in adults. We’ll likely see that sink throughout the season to 10-11 million as Lost is heavily DVRed and DVR penetration has increased.
Here’s something I wrote a few years back when Lost was shedding viewers:
Season 1: 8.8/18.4 (viewers 18-49/total viewers)
Season 2: 10.3/18.9
Season 3.1: 9.0/17.0
Season 3.2: 7.6/13.1
Viewers outside of the 18-49 demo:
S1: 9.6 million
S2: 8.6 million
S3.1: 8 million
S3.2: 5.5 million
Between S3.1 and S3.2, the show lost 15% in 18-49s, but 32% in the outside demos. From season 1 to 3.2, it lost 13% in 18-49s, but 43% in the outside demos.
I wish people wouldn’t compare lost and heroes. They’re different shows. Anyway, I never got into lost because I didn’t watch it in it’s first seasons, and now I would be completely lost.
@Doug, you say Season 3 was a beat-up-on Lost season? That sounds a lot like what Heroes is going through this season…it’s become popular to hate it…hopefully Heroes will recover like Lost did.