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; Officially Canceled
- 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 |
| Til Death (S), (F) | 0.20 |
| Dollhouse (F), (P) | 0.23 |
| Brothers (F) | 0.24 |
| Fringe | 0.57 |
| Lie To Me (P) | 0.70 |
| Bones (P) | 0.76 |
| Glee (P) | 0.76 |
| American Dad (P) | 0.82 |
| Human Target | 0.88 |
| The Cleveland Show (P) | 0.98 |
| 24 | 1.03 |
| Family Guy (P) | 1.12 |
| The Simpsons (P) | 1.13 |
| House | 1.21 |
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I give up trying to figure out how to adjust the Fox overall season average ratings for sports and American Idol. Folks will just have to refrain from comparing Fox's list to the other networks' lists. The order of the shows is far more important than the Index values in Fox's case, and the "magic" 0.90 Index for renewal will not be appropriate.
Fox's newest drama, Human Target, has aired in so many dfferent timeslots (and will have yet another tonight), and its ratings have been so variable, its impossible to pin down its prospects at this point. It's certainly done fine so far, but the real ratings test will come after February 3 when it moves to 8pm Wednesday. Until then, we're not going to learn much that matters.
All the schedule experiments with the two shows continue to show little practical ratings difference between Fringe and Lie To Me. Your guess is as good as mine what Fox does. At this point I don’t think I’d be terribly surprised by any combination of their renewal or cancellation (either one, both, neither).
Dollhouse is officially canceled. Brothers seems to be canceled in practice, but Fox is silent. 'Til Death continues to hang around the Fox schedule, popping up now and again. I'd be stunned if it was back again, but I was stunned last spring too.
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 4 week averages instead of season to date Indexes.
I’ve added a new category, Renewed For The 2010-11 Season, for shows who’s renewal has already been announced for the next season. It may take a while to get all the past announcements noted, let me know what I have missed, yet be patient.
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.
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 will be first with a prediction – I don’t think Human Target will make it. I watched the first two shows and while I think the leads are very good in that sort of action show – the entire thing was just too ridiculous to take seriously and not funny enough for it to be memorable.
There was no style. Again, the writers are not up to the task.
It’s going down. It will take awhile, but put a fork in it – it’s done.
Wait. Was “24″ definitely renewed or retired? Why is the font black?
The problem with Human Target, is unless you use a DVR you never know when its on. Sunday, Wednesday, Tuesday. FOX make up your mind.
A question: Does the average for The Simpsons include the 20th Anniversary Special or not?
Dan-O, thanks for the catch. The 24 color designation was an error, it should not have been indicated as already renewed.
Dennis, the 20th anniversary special is not included in the Simpsons average, but the regular episode that preceded it is.
24 has not been renewed and could get canned
http://www.sliceofscifi.com/2010/01/12/fox-says-fringe-has-a-good-shot-at-third-season/
Read this. For me, Fringe isn’t in ALL that danger.
Yeah, we saw those quotes last week or so Hey but thanks again for reminding. It’s definitely good news and if all Fox wanted was Fringe to beat out last season’s Thursday’s then it’s in fine shape.
Human Target — live action cartoons brought to you by Fox and DC Comics. Check your local schedule for this week’s episode… again… and again… and again… and again…
I enjoy a fairly mindless action-adventure-buddy-mystery show as much as the next person, and the three amigos who headline this show do work work well together, but the stories are light-weight even for this sort of genre show. For the show’s sake, I hope the ratings hold out long enough for the stories to get better. It’s one of those shows I hope succeeds but fear may not.
that is, “work well together”.
I feel like this year is the will-they-won’t-they for FOX, as last year was for NBC.
Last year, so many shows were on the bubble due to 5 hours being stripped for the “very promising” Jay Leno Show. So certain show that would normally get another season were put on the bubble.
Now this year it all depends on IF the execs at FOX run So You Think You Can Dance in the fall or summer. If they run it in the summer, there’s room in the fall for some of the marginally rated dramas. If Dance ends up in the fall again, they will take 3 hours of primetime (with FOX only getting 8-10p for primetime anyways), so those decent rated shows are in danger.
It’s hard to make predictions when we don’t know when they will air the new season of Dance.
nkinsey, my money is on FOX running SYTYCD in the fall one more time just to hold the timeslot for X Factor the following year. It’s a situation where they know it’s not going to do dreadful in the ratings, and it’s cheaper than airing another season of a more expensive scripted show with slightly better ratings.
Tommy- I’m RIGHT there with you. I think it would actually be silly for them NOT to do that. This is the first time in FOREVER where FOX won in 4Q, which is ALWAYS their weakest quarter. So I think they will keep it there this fall, and bring it back summer 2011.
Tell you one thing, I think airing your pilot multiple times before the second episode even airs needs to become the wave of the future for the broadcast nets. Not sure if Human Target will survive because of that move (it is, after all, such an awful–and awfully derivative show), but it seems to makes sense to use all that Friday and Sat real estate that is going to waste now to generate a few extra viewers for these new shows (and to also slot them into other days instead of repeats of established shows which don’t actually need to extra airings to survive).
I think this move by Fox with Human Target was a smart one, even if the show itself is not. When fewer than a handful of ticks can mean life or death, it makes sense to make certain that new shows get every extra chance to be seen as is possible.
After all, basic cable has been playing this card for years now, with multiple-multiple airings of all episodes of all of their shows each week. I have to think that is something every network is going to be doing soon. Change or die.
based on the one episode I viewed, ‘Human Target’ looks to be expensive in terms of sets, action sequences, location shooting, extras, all that stuff that drives up budgets.
For FOX to renew this series, based on the ratings to date, would I think largely depend on the producers ability to contain the costs and the charged through licensing fee…not as many studios are in to deficit financing in these troubled, uncertain times.
Nothing new about Fringe, but nice to hear it.
FOX has insisted on summer programming, so i guess we’ll see how LTM does.
Any chance Human Target is cheap enough for Friday?
Schmoker – I’m right there with ya! The multiple airings was pretty smart, especially around AmerIdol.
vsaint- Have you even seen PREVIEWS of the show, my friend? Even judging by those, there’s no way it’s cheap enough for Friday.
I agree that this show will fail. It’s suffers from really bad writing. I started watching the 2nd episode and couldn’t bring my self to finish it.
Why is it that House has a 1.2 when Grey’s has a 1.7 when they have similar ratings?
I think that if 24 retires this year (not for ratings there just finished) then Fringe is safe and will get the post House slot.