Our Renew / Cancel Index predicts potential renewal or cancellation for scripted broadcast primetime shows for the 2010-11 season (results through January 24, 2010):
- Likely To Be Canceled By May, 2010
- Some Danger Of Being Canceled By May, 2010
- Likely to Be Renewed For The 2010-11 Season
- Renewed For The 2010-11 Season
| Program | Renew/ Cancel Index |
| Law & Order (F), (P) | 0.56 |
| Mercy (P) | 0.67 |
| Trauma (P) | 0.70 |
| Parks & Recreation (P) | 0.77 |
| Community | 0.84 |
| Heroes (P) | 0.90 |
| Law & Order: SVU (P) | 0.96 |
| Chuck | 0.98 |
| 30 Rock (P) | 1.08 |
| The Office (P) | 1.51 |
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1/29 Update: Parks & Recreation renewed for a third season. Community's chances have improved.
Heroes has had its ratings ups and downs this season, but lately, they've been all down. Since the new year it's had adults 18-49 ratings of 2.2, 2.1, 1.8 and 1.9 (prelim). It's going to take some really super powers to get its ratings back enough to save it from being canceled, and its only got a few episodes left this season to do it.
Chuck scored another 2.5 rating last night. I think that's just on the good side of renewal for the show. If it can keep that ratings level up, I am confident it will be back.
Since NBC's freed up 5 more hours of primetime post-Leno, some marginal shows like Parks & Recreation and Community look a lot better for renewal.
As horrible as the situation is, I've got to believe NBC will try something new other than the ratings sinkholes Trauma and Mercy. Even starving post-Leno beggars have to be a little bit choosy.
For shows in the Some Danger category only, I am including short term Index indicators for shows either with either improving 
or deteriorating 
Indexes, based on short term averages instead of season to date Indexes.
This is a breakdown of NBC 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 a 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.
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.
Poor Heroes!!!
i used to like it so much even when most people bagged it… but last episode had so many plot holes i was scratching my head trying to figure out if the writers thought we were stupid, if they themselves were dumb… or a combination of the two.
@ Irvin…I agree : POOR HEROES
It’s so sad.
I’ll hold out hope just because NBC’s stupid.
But I know the end when I see it. This is the end.
NBC wont be around much longer. Is The Biggest Loser, The Office, and football the only things keeping this network alive?
Here’s hoping that despite that .77 Parks gets a ssn 3… and some decent promotion
Hasn’t Law & Order already been renewed for the record breaking season ? I believe i read it somewhere on this site. Could be wrong though.
Jimmy, RE writers and plot holes
In my experiences regarding television watching, when I see comments like yours about a television show’s storytelling, my first thought is to believe it is not only a combination of both of those factors, but it is also a delusional belief on the writers’ part, subconscious or conscious, that they are getting away with it because they are sooooooooooo good.
I gave up on Heroes early in season 2. The level of quality, to my subjective viewpoint, had already fallen off the earth. I do not speak to what it is now, only to what past experiences with other shows have been when comments such as yours are posted. I suspect that, given the ratings fall this show has suffered, though, you are not alone in your disappointment with what was once a promising show. My only surprise (and it is a mild one since this is NBC we’re talking about) is that Heroes has managed to make it this far.
I used to be one of the people who thought Heroes could still be saved. The show has gotten so out of hand that as a die hard fan I’d rather they cancelled it.
Empire, NBC’s Bromstad said in an interview that L&O would be coming back, and that she wouldn’t be the one to deny it the record, but there still has been no formal announcement as far as I know. Although the likelihood there has and I just forgot is not zero!
Heroes
I Absolutly love CHUCK, i would really be dissapointed if it got cancelled, i have been a fan of Heroes, but its gotten a little boring, so if it got cancelled i wouldnt really care….
things will look better for all of these shows as the season wears on. If you factor out SNF, I’m certain that Chuck, and L&O: SVU would be at or above the 1.0 mark on the index.
John the Mon, “things will look better for all of these shows as the season wears on. If you factor out SNF, I’m certain that Chuck, and L&O: SVU would be at or above the 1.0 mark on the index.”
Indeed. But factoring out The Jay Leno Show’s 1.5 rating would make all these shows look worse. Not that what’s replacing those 5 hours this spring will do any better, but if NBC makes an assumption that it can replace Leno with 2.0 rated dramas, at considerably more expense, then it’s not quite so simple as to say “everything looks better post SNF”.
Heroes is not going anywhere after this season… too much primetime hours opening up to simply give one more new show a try. With the amount of shows they would be bringing, I can almost guarantee that the show that would take Heroes place will be a failure. Even with the bad ratings, one thing that Heroes has going for it is a strong presence in the international market and decent dvd/bluray revenue. An easy to market show.
So while the future looks bleak for Heroes, it makes no sense to cancel it after this season given the amount of new hours that will already available. After next season, when some of the new shows hopefully being successful, they can start cutting out the old.
Nightstar……. Heroes has gotten MUCH worse since season 2, and when I was watching the crappy second season I didnt even think that was humanly possible. Who are the Heroes writers? seriously, what are their names? WHY DO THEY HAVE JOBS?!
Qhat, IMO the best thing NBC could do is bring in a lot of new shows for next year. Take a look at ABC’s Wednesday night, they started the season with 5 new shows (the entire night was new) and 3 of those shows have already been renewed, so 3 shows survive and 2 were cancelled, if you ask me that’s pretty successful.
Even if Heroes hasn’t tanked overseas like it has here (and I think it has) if it’s ratings don’t bounce back to at least a 2.4 for the remaining few episodes it’s going to be very hard to justify it getting another season. A Friday death slot would be the only place I’d put it if they were interested in more episodes for syndication and DVD sales, but even that’s a long shot at this point.
I know that the ratings for Heroes suck, but based on DVD sales of the show and its popularity internationally, in addition to the fact that NBC probably won’t want to cancel a show that’s been on the air for four seasons without giving it closure (not because they care about the show, but because of fan backlash against the network), I think it will get one more season, but with a shorter episode order– probably in the neighborhood of 10-13 episodes.
Save the chat show – save the heroes *g*
Bring back Eccleston!
What’s sad about this is that I recently looked up the ratings for The Black Donnellys and Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip in 2006/07… the former had ratings comparable to Chuck’s now, the latter’s hovered around 3.0 (before the show was effectively cancelled, anyway). So, good job in cancelling those, NBC. (Granted, we don’t know if those shows would have experienced significant ratings erosion, à la Heroes. But clearly, most of their replacements haven’t had a lot of luck attracting viewers.)