| Scoreboard |  |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Adults 18-49: Rating/Share | 1.5/5 | 1.5/5 | 1.1/3 | 1.0/3 | 0.6/2 | 0.4/1 |
| Adults 18-34: Rating/Share | 1.5/6 | 0.9/3 | 0.7/2 | 0.8/3 | 0.5/2 | 0.5/2 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 3.29 | 7.26 | 4.26 | 4.44 | 1.64 | 1.15 |
Last week I wrote that the premiere of Defying Gravity didn't appear to be optimized for ratings success, and while I tried to remain upbeat about the gloomy predictions, since we're results-oriented, there's no way to be upbeat about the results. It pulled a 1.1/3 with adults 18-49 between 8pm-10pm and was the lowest rated scripted series premiere of the summer. Having Ty Pennington: Ty’s Great British Adventure with a 1.0 in the demo probably didn't help much. Fans will try to take heart that it tied last night's Merlin (1.1 adults 18-49 rating) and beat part two of The Storm (1.0 adults 18-49 rating), but that doesn't strike me as very comforting.
FOX and CBS tied for the lead for the night with adults 18-49 and CBS led in overall viewers. A repeat of Family Guy was the biggest 18-49 draw with a 2.2 rating, and CBS' Big Brother was second for the night with a 2.1 rating.
You can see TV ratings from other recent Overnight ratings reports here.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating/Share | 18-34 Rating/Share | Viewers (Millons) |
| 7:00 | CBS | 60 Minutes | 1.3/5 | 0.8/3 | 9.20 |
| ABC | America's Funniest Home Videos (R) | 1.2/5 | 0.9/4 | 4.77 | |
| NBC | Dateline NBC | 1.0/4 | 0.8/4 | 4.72 | |
| FOX | Til Death (R) | 0.7/3 | 0.4/2 | 1.67 | |
| CW | Easy Money (R) | 0.3/1 | 0.3/1 | 0.65 | |
| 7:30 | ABC | America's Funniest Home Videos (R) | 1.4/5 | 1.0/4 | 5.50 |
| NBC | Dateline NBC | 1.3/5 | 1.0/4 | 5.36 | |
| CBS | 60 Minutes | 1.3/5 | 0.6/2 | 9.23 | |
| FOX | American Dad (R) | 0.8/3 | 0.7/3 | 1.76 | |
| CW | Easy Money (R) | 0.3/1 | 0.3/1 | 0.72 | |
| 8:00 | CBS | Big Brother | 2.2/8 | 1.6/6 | 7.18 |
| FOX | The Simpsons (R) | 1.5/5 | 1.5/6 | 3.21 | |
| NBC | Merlin | 1.1/4 | 0.9/3 | 4.39 | |
| ABC | Ty Pennington: Ty’s Great British Adventure | 1.0/3 | 0.7/3 | 4.52 | |
| CW | Movie: Overboard (R) | 0.6/2 | 0.5/2 | 1.75 | |
| 8:30 | CBS | Big Brother | 2.1/7 | 1.5/5 | 6.64 |
| FOX | The Simpsons (R) | 1.9/6 | 1.9/7 | 4.14 | |
| NBC | Merlin | 1.1/3 | 0.9/3 | 4.52 | |
| ABC | Ty Pennington: Ty’s Great British Adventure | 1.0/3 | 0.7/3 | 4.14 | |
| CW | Movie: Overboard (R) | 0.7/2 | 0.5/2 | 1.94 | |
| 9:00 | FOX | Family Guy (R) | 2.2/6 | 2.4/8 | 4.63 |
| CBS | Cold Case (R) | 1.1/3 | 0.7/2 | 6.47 | |
| ABC | Defying Gravity (premiere) | 1.1/3 | 0.5/2 | 3.97 | |
| NBC | The Storm: Part 2 | 0.9/3 | 0.7/2 | 4.32 | |
| CW | Movie: Overboard (R) | 0.8/2 | 0.6/2 | 2.31 | |
| 9:30 | FOX | The Simpsons (R) | 2.0/6 | 2.3/7 | 4.31 |
| CBS | Cold Case (R) | 1.1/3 | 0.7/2 | 6.80 | |
| ABC | Defying Gravity (premiere) | 1.1/3 | 0.6/2 | 3.68 | |
| CW | Movie: Overboard (R) | 0.9/3 | 0.7/2 | 2.45 | |
| NBC | The Storm: Part 2 | 0.9/3 | 0.6/2 | 4.10 | |
| 10:00 | CBS | Without a Trace (R) | 1.2/4 | 0.8/3 | 6.23 |
| NBC | The Storm: Part 2 | 1.0/3 | 0.6/2 | 3.99 | |
| ABC | Defying Gravity (premiere) | 1.0/3 | 0.5/2 | 3.54 | |
| 10:30 | CBS | Without a Trace (R) | 1.4/4 | 0.8/3 | 6.36 |
| ABC | Defying Gravity (premiere) | 1.1/3 | 0.5/2 | 3.58 | |
| NBC | The Storm: Part 2 | 1.0/3 | 0.6/2 | 4.09 |
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Shows are sorted by 18-49 rating in each time slot.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 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.
Memo to ABC. You can try to repeat the magic that got from Grey’s Anatomy. Nice try…
These numbers are terrible. Perhaps the big networks should go back to running repeats all summer long. The numbers couldn’t be much worse than what we’re seeing now.
The idea of trying out new shows during the summer, throwing out a million new shows and seeing what if anything sticks, just isn’t working very well for them. They need a new strategy.
Why did ABC premier this series 6 weeks before the season starts? When viewers return to TV watching in mid-September, this series will be half over and many people won’t bother checking it out.
Maybe if they replace the blond woman with Jennifer Aniston to make out with Peter Gibbons (Livingston), replace the fat guy with Stephen Root as MILTON wielding his trusty red Swingline stapler and they watched episodes of KUNG FU to pass the time, it would get better ratings? Bill Lumberg would be the new mission control guy who would keep telling them to fill out the cover sheets for their TPS reports.
Granted this was 10 times better than the awful STORM movie, didnt even bother with part 2 after they killed off Dan Fielding (Night Court), but DG is just too dull and cerebral for the masses. Its basically a series version of MISSION TO MARS (the French are the only ones who thought that movie was great – at least according to Wikipedia) meets 2001 A Space Odyssey starring “the guy from Office Space”.
Time to blow the cast out the air lock and call it a wrap. I hope at least they explain what the mysterious alien thing is that is telling them what to do and apparently has the power to clog arteries of annoying Indian guys from long distances.
“Defying Gravity” fails because it exhibits three of the worst Sci-Fi movie cliches: 1) long, tepid voice-overs; 2) overuse of FLASHBACKS; and 3) at least one astronaut suffers from what you’ll recognize as “space madness”.
You’re much better off buying the DVDs of Ron Moore’s “Battlestar Galactica.”
Defying Gravity was better than Meteor, Impact, and The Storm. That being said, it wasn’t anything special. I did like how there was some kind of outside entity behind their actions. The voiceovers were pretty stupid and I don’t think Donner ever had anything insightful to say.
BSG? Definitely more worthwhile as it has 3 key elements – weapons fire, robots and explosions. CW could have aired 3 BSG episodes every Sunday night over the summer and gotten better ratings than anything else they aired this summer. Would have been an interesting experiment.
Nice ratings for The CW movie! Sad for Defying Gravity:( I thought it was decent but not great, probably wont continue watching!
2.31 for cw movie!!!its the best number since may for the cw!!!!!!!!!!
in 9:30 SLOT IT WAS SECOND !!!HOW IMPRESSIVE!!!2.45!!!
I ? Merlin
uh, that ‘?’ was a heart a second ago.
So True Blood probably beat Defying Gravity. (The past two episodes have been a step beyond awesome.)
I watched and thought the show has possibilities. I will watch again next week.
Nice to see Merlin beat something this week.
I think 1.1 people saw it.
Good thing Defying Gravity is an international co-production. If it’s successful in at least one of those other countries, it can salvage something, anyway. I believe it’s supposed to air in the UK and Germany, at a minimum. Canada, too?
I thought it was decent, with definite potential. I didn’t have the highest opinion of the Grey’s Anatomy pilot, either, and that show vastly improved.
I liked the flashbacks, the mystery surrounding the mission, and some of the characters. Didn’t see enough of others to say yet.
DG tied/lost to the CW – I think that’s enough said right there.
I tried watching bits and pieces of it (since Canada’s CTV premiered the show simultaneously on TWO of its main networks yesterday) – it was worse than I expected…
I like something other than repeats for summer viewing. Merlin isn’t the greatest show, but NBC has to be happy as it cost them next to nothing compared to an original show would have.
“Good thing Defying Gravity is an international co-production. If it’s successful in at least one of those other countries, it can salvage something, anyway.”
I doubt the international aspect will make ABC renew it. After all, Crusoe was an international co-production, and NBC canned it. I think the same will go for Defying Gravity and Merlin. (BTW, I watched the last 10 minutes of Merlin, and I couldnt stop laughing at that stupid dragon. What an awful show.)