Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles moves to 8pm Friday this week. Its results on Mondays last Fall were the 3rd worst for any Fox scripted show. With those results on a Monday it would certainly have been cancelled at the end of the season. How well does it have to do on Fridays to be renewed?
On Friday, expectations by the network may be different, owing to the perceptions of the difficulty in maintaining successful scripted shows that night. While the number of people watching television is only about 15% lower than it is on Thursday night, the broadcast networks have put themselves in somewhat of a chicken and egg situation. Except for CBS, which has seen some success, the other broadcast networks have either programmed cheap unscripted shows on the night, or made Friday the dumping ground for their scripted shows that were either failures elsewhere (Lipstick Jungle), cost subsidized (Friday Night Lights), or strategic leftovers (The Game, Everybody Hates Chris).
So the question is, what 18-49 demo rating does Terminator need on Friday to return next season? (Total viewership is meaningless to the future of the show, and every show) Unfortunately, there is little experience to draw on except at CBS. No other network renewed a Friday scripted show from last season to this season. Forget Friday Night Lights. It survives, and will only continue to survive, because of subsidies from DirecTV, so we can't compare it to any other show. With a subsidy, FNL has no future.
If we assume that Fox may follow CBS's lead and give Terminator a lower hurdle on Friday, what might it be? Last season, the CBS Friday shows Ghost Whisperer and Numb3rs were renewed with 79% and 73% of the network's overall adults 18-49 demo audience. This season, prior to the American Idol premiere, the Fox season to date adults 18-49 viewership average was 3.53 million, or approximately a 2.7 adults 18-49 rating. So for Terminator to reach 73% of that level, it would need an 18-49 demo audience of 2.58 million and a 1.98 18-49 demo rating.
Those calculations match up fairly well with what my gut tells me. If Terminator can sustain more than a 2.0 demo rating, it has a reasonable chance of being renewed. Below that, and Terminator is going to be cancelled.
Sadly, and I'm a fan of the show, I don't think that's going to happen. I will predict a sustained 1.7 rating for the show on Friday.
If you want to take more of an above the benchmark "floor" approach to what Terminator needs (as commenter Nick C. suggested Fox might be), last Friday night the ultra-cheap Cops (half new, half repeat) averaged a 1.4 rating. A repeat of House two weeks ago also did a 1.4 rating. Obviously, Terminator would need to do better than that to be renewed, but how much better?
How well do you think it needs to do to be renewed and not cancelled? How well do you think Terminator will do on Friday's?
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I dont think TSCC will even get a 1.7!!! and the show cant be that to cheap to make, and its not even a FOX show!! not looking good
There is no competition on friday nights, not at all. Only the CBS tank. But maybe if TSCC and Dollhouse can do a good combo, with “good” numbers, they can make it. After all, they don’t need a lot to finish second. I heard TSCC wasn’t a really expansive show, meybe they’re making money out of it. If it’s enough, who knows, they will probably stick has a duo on friday nights. Maybe the real objectif for FOX is to finish “big” second. But hey, this is not really looking good..
Anything below 2.0 is certain goodbye TSCC… I think that 2.1+ may keep the show on, but I think that FOX expects TSCC to match CBS average rating for friday, which means it will need more than 2.2… Will it do 2.2? No way, BEST for which we can hope is 2.05, 2.1. So I’m voting 2.2+ for renewal, and 2.0-2.2 for sustainable ratings.
One of the advantages of being a TiVo owner is that I don’t have to worry about what night a show is on. In the rare instances there are 3 good programs on at once, there is always the internet. What surprises me is that studios will kill a show with higher ratings just because it’s on at time when competition is fierce. Right now about 25% of Americans are using DVRs to time shift their television. As more and more consumers discover how wonderful a DVR really is, it’s inevitable that the studios will need to think about this differently. While I can understand why they aren’t all that enthused about DVR viewership, I still think that the smart programmers will embrace this audience. If they’d take some of these struggling shows that are on a thursday night 9pm time slot and reair them at 3am, it would help to solve some of their problems. Ideally, a program should succeed or fail based on the total number of viewers instead of how many people the networks can convince to schedule an appointment to watch television.
it was kinda obvious the show wasnt going to do well this season. remeber when it aired in jan-march? sure it was getiing crap ratings with no competition. i hope the ratings pick up. the show is good far better than lost for example. even though that wouldnt be difficult lol
@Davis: DVR viewers don’t pay the bills, simple as that.
A DVR is basically a VCR with more storage space. VCRs have been around for decades now and not affected total numbers much and right now it doesn’t seem like DVRs are either. Besides, why should the nets care about DVR viewing considering they are more likely to skip the commercials?
Robert, the first season had a rating of 3.0 or above, save for one episode. Sure it was against very little competition, but I wouldn’t call a 3.0+ rating crap.
As for how it’ll do on Fridays… I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, I’m optimistic that it’ll get 2.0+ which I think will be enough for renewal. On the other hand, I can already feel the nausea I’ll get when next Friday’s numbers will come in and they won’t be good. I won’t let that put me down though. Keep the spirit up and let the power of positive thinking do it’s job, that’s my motto for the next week.
I’m saying it will hold above a 1.8…I really have no idea though, and I think that if it holds below a 2, it should be cancelled.
It’s interesting look back at February to see TSCC 6th for FOX with around 8 million viewers.
It’s also interesting to see House with 24 million viewers.
This is an oddball case where I think the most important factor is how much the studio is charging the network per episode. Typically for a new show that costs ~3M that gets discounted down to around $2M-$2.3M by the studio. If costs are $2.5M it’s probably typically more like $1.8M the network pays.
Figure that the discounts this year are already much steeper than that. If FOX can get this show next year for a million bucks per episode, it probably would be fine with even a 1.7 rating with 18-49s. But if it’s $2M an episode, repeats and unscripted programming in the 1.3-1.5 range will be more profitable for FOX than a 2.0 with TSCC.
[edit] And by oddball case, I mean in the sense that there might have been circumstances with this (T4 Movie) that allowed for really steep discounts that don’t typically exist for a show with as few episodes as TSCC has made.
Terminator is in a bad place. But it would be in a even worst place without Dollhouse. So… let’s hope.
Robert, how much will DVR numbers factor into Fox’s decision? T:SCC is a DVR heavy show already, and moving to Friday nights is only going to increase those numbers.
Thecolours, I suppose it would depend on how much that DVR viewing contributes to the C3 data.
Nice article. It actually made me more optimistic, though that probably wasn’t the intention.
But anyways, well said, Gusar. We just gotta sit tight for a few more days now…
Judgmet Day could be approaching sooner than expected. But will the show be able to survive it?
Well FOX was obviously testing the numbers with first HOUSE repeats, then COPS, plus they know what the game shows did. Why would they be doing all that unless they were trying to see what is best for Fridays? They’ve promised Whedon (and likely someone at Warners) that this Friday Night lineup would be given a good chance. So they have numbers now. They know what a repeat does, they know what COPS does and game shows.
With that information they obviously feel that these shows should do X. What X is I’m not sure, but anything over a 2.0 and I bet they’re happy at least happy with the decision to let the season play out. Renewal happy? It’s tough. It depends on costs. Warner did give them a good deal but there were multiple reasons for the deal. DODGE was putting in money for their products to be showcased. I’m not sure if DODGE can afford to next season.
Look at HOUSE, they practically pay for the show with just product placements “promotional consideration provided by,” and I believe more shows will go that route. TSCC is perhaps strong enough to keep providing FOX an inexpensive product.
FOX will buy anything if it’s cheap enough. Look at TIL DEATH
My guess is other than for promotion and PR purposes the Live+7 DVR numbers won’t really be a factor for the renewal decisions with TSCC. I don’t know that moving to Friday nights will increase absolute DVR viewing of TSCC, but it will very probably increase its % of viewing via DVR.
Isn’t it possible that the DVR numbers will go down and the live viewers will go up? I mean, most of Terminator’s fans are sci-fi geeks that don’t go out. That’s not suppose to be an insult, I’m one of them. There was so much competition Monday nights, now on a new night with a lot less competition, couldn’t the viewers and demo POSSIBLY go up?
Nick, I agree that FOX will happily let the season play out if the night does a 2.0 or better. but I don’t equate that to what will happen next year. I think FOX will let both shows play out their runs on Friday pretty much regardless of of the ratings. If they average a 1.7 on Friday, I’m not thinking FOX is going to cut immediately.
I also agree FOX will buy anything if it’s cheap enough, but I’m very doubtful that WB will be able to offer it as cheaply next year as it was this year.
I assume these calculations would hold true for Dollhouse as well.(2.0 or bust) But maybe that show has a longer leash, because it’s Whedon, and they don’t want Firefly2.
If I were Fox, I would hold on a decision until well after the season is over, and see if the shows can build an audience during summer repeats. Establishing a respectable Friday Night Lineup is a good move by Fox, I just don’t know if doing it with a struggling show, and a unknown property is the right move.