Our Renew / Cancel Index predicts potential renewal or cancellation for scripted broadcast primetime shows for the 2010-11 season (results through November 8, 2009):
- Likely To Be Canceled By May, 2010
- Some Danger Of Being Canceled By May, 2010
- Likely to Be Renewed For The 2010-11 Season
| Program | Renew/ Cancel Index |
| Til Death (S), (F) | 0.20 |
| Brothers (F) | 0.24 |
| Dollhouse (F), (P) | 0.25 |
| Fringe | 0.57 |
| Bones (P) | 0.75 |
| Lie To Me (P) | 0.76 |
| Glee (P) | 0.89 |
| American Dad (P) | 0.93 |
| The Simpsons (P) | 1.11 |
| The Cleveland Show (P) | 1.15 |
| Family Guy (P) | 1.25 |
| House | 1.49 |
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Note that the Index values for all Fox shows will continue to be very depressed for some time because the World Series ratings have unusually boosted Fox’s overall average. That will slowly subside as Fox’s average evens out post-baseball. For the time being, the order of the shows is far more important than the Index values.
I'm on record in the recent past as being positive on Fringe's chances for renewal even with its relatively poor ratings performance on Thursdays. However, last week it managed only a 1.7 adults 18-49 rating. Was that entirely a post World Series scheduling/confusion situation? Why then did Bones dip just slightly to a 2.6? The eyes of Fringe fans should be on this week's results. Another sub-2.0 rating and you might want to start a crazy fan "Save Our Show" campaign. Commenter Harold suggests skywriting.
Dollhouse, 'Til Death and Brothers , all certain to be canceled, are off Fox's schedule for the November sweeps period. Dollhouse will gets its 13 episodes aired, as it seems Brothers will too. Who knows (or cares) what happens with all the episodes of 'Til Death.
10/11 Update: Dollhouse is officially canceled.
This is a breakdown of Fox scripted shows and their renewal and cancellation prospects. Here are links to the other networks:
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Notes:
The Renew/Cancel Index is a show's Season To Date adults 18-49 rating divided by its network's Season to Date average 18-49 rating. If a show's season to date 18-49 ratings average equalled its network's 18-49 average, the show would have an Index of 1.00. Without special factors, scripted shows that were more than 10% below their network's average are typically canceled by the end of the broadcast primetime season.
Factors that could cause a show to be renewed with well below average index:
- (F) -Fridays: Shows airing on Fridays have been renewed with significantly lower than average Indexes.
- (S) - Syndication: Shows nearing syndication (66-88 episodes), often have economic factors that trump ratings leading to renewal.
- (T) - Third Party: Shows that have a portion of their cost underwritten by a 3rd party can be renewed with substantially lower ratings.
- (P) - Produced by the network's production company - For shows on the bubble, being produced by the network's corporate production company can be a survival advantage. For real losers, it's unlikely to help.
While I initially tried to designate shows with "plum" timeslots, I think it's hard to make that call at this point in the season. It's likely still a factor, but will have to be an "after the fact" call.
What's the History of the Index and How Did It Do In the Past? Check out the results from the 2007-8 season and the 2008-9 season.
Nielsen TV Ratings Data: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved. All ratings used are Live+Same Day viewing.
I still think Fringe could get renewed, but it doesn’t DESERVE to be. FOX is probably just not ready to give up on it yet.
They hopelessly bungled this season, and that was a more critical error than putting it on Thursday. I have a hard time seeing it improve without a massive reorganization of the show’s writing and production staff. Don’t think that’s happening either.
I guess next Thursday’s airing will tell a lot about Fringe – if that terrible rating was just baseball or the show itself.
Past Life’s order was cut.
Only one of Lie to Me / Fringe gets another chance on Tuesdays after AI this spring. Only Fox knows which.
i dont think fox will can fringe, it doesnt have much else to choose from
American Dad had a 2.0 this Sunday and yet the index is the same as last week. Now how does that work?
I’m so worried about FRINGE it’s even hard to put into words. I don’t think I could take its cancelation….I guess I would take a break from TV for a while if that happened.
“Only one of Lie to Me / Fringe gets another chance on Tuesdays after AI this spring. Only Fox knows which.”
Is this really an Either-Or situation? Is there no hope they’ll renew both?
I’ve seen a lot of fans saying that this has been a bad and so far boreing season of FRINGE. When fans say that in the first months of S2 it just doesn’t look good. It will be hard to bring back millions of viewers once they move on. The truth is, I believe, that the show is of low quality and was so in S1 but it was masked because of the big numbers it scored when it was paired with American Idol and HOUSE in the early days.
Probably not. FOX only programs 2 hrs a night so they have fewer spots available for pilots as well as returning shows. Fringe may be burned off on FRIDAYS this spring is my guess.
I don’t think I could take its cancelation
Maybe watching X Files reruns would help get you through.
I think I will rely on statements by creator J J Abrams concerning the future of Fringe – he is of the opinion that Fox is “solidly” behind the show. With that said, this year will probably be a ‘full’ season – next year is another story. Perhaps the fans were indeed correct in warning Fox that a move to Thursday would mean big trouble: so far, it looks like they were right on the money !
Fringe is a high quality show–in every department OTHER than the scripting. The scripts aren’t terrible, there’s usually some good moments, but they just aren’t getting the job done.
It was a problem last season, but it’s a much bigger one this season. We’ve met the main characters, and what was needed was a driving narrative to keep us interested. Also, they promised us Leonard Nimoy, and he’s barely been there.
They’ve got a great cast, a workable premise, great visuals–and inadequate writing.
The X-Files had writers like Glen Morgan and James Wong–without them, it would never have gotten past its first season.
They hired Darin Morgan as a consultant on Fringe, but we’ve yet to see a single script from him.
The writing is just too bland, and they don’t take chances.
Dennis, since that American Dad episode wasn’t in its regular timeslot, Nielsen wouldn’t count its ratings for its season average, so neither did I. It is somewhat of an arbitrary distinction, but it’s the convention, and I’m following it.
AH ok, that makes sense. I totally see why nielsen doesn’t iclude those numbers, but I still think that 7:30 outing of AD gave sort of an impression on how it will be doing in the spring.
I agree with the X-Files re-runs, and perhaps episodes such as “Ghost in the Machine”, “Space”, and “Teso Dos Bichos” would have interest. They’re about the same quality as the regular Fringe episodes.
Honestly though, the only thing Fringe does well is mytharc. They really need to get back to it, and wrap it up this season or with a generous extra 13 episodes next year. I like the show, but it really did not deserve the hype or numbers it got last year, and it’s now just settling on the numbers it should always have gotten.
There’s no real sex appeal on the show or any romance, so while it’s no cure all they could try a small something in that area. Really, for a show that makes no effort at all to appeal to the public in the way 99% of shows do, their ratings are surprisingly high.
Dollhouse btw seems to have gotten pulled out of it’s December airings and pushed back to January. At this rate, I don’t expect for Dollhouse to air till summer, or just be released on DVD/Hulu/Both.
‘Til Death replaced it, and then once Brothers ends, ‘Til Death will take over.
I care about ‘Til Death
Chalk this one up to a scheduling snafu. My DVR was not set to record Fringe this week because it thought the World Series was going to be on instead. We were just lucky we saw a commercial for it, said “Wait, that looks new” and then had to record it manually half-way through a non-existent baseball game. Is FOX to blame?
I’ll withhold judgment on until after this Thursday when there is no sports complications. I think it will go back to its pre sports ratings. Those weren’t great but they were good enough.
“Dollhouse btw seems to have gotten pulled out of it’s December airings and pushed back to January.”
This isn’t true. You misread the article. Dollhouse is airing its next six episodes December 4th-18th, then it resumes airing for the final three episodes on January 8th.