Comments on: TV Ratings: March Madness Upsets Thursday; FlashForward Return Fizzles

By: isean413

isean413 — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 23:36:03 +0000

After this awful return performance by FlashForward, I'm no longer going to consider it a “bubble” show in my opinion. I don't see ABC bringing this back to be honest…specially with how much it probably costs and it's incredibly lack luster performance.

I'm even considering giving up on it as a viewer! I haven't seen the two hour return yet and to be honest…I'm dreading sitting down and watching it…I'm just not that excited about it.. .

By: isean413

isean413 — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:36:03 +0000

I'm even considering giving up on it as a viewer! I haven't seen the two hour return yet and to be honest…I'm dreading sitting down and watching it…I'm just not that excited about it.. .

By: Ronc303

Ronc303 — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 00:47:13 +0000

To be fair, Flash Forward was against the NCAA that dominated the 18-49 adult viewers. ABC should have prolonged the hiatus until March madness was over.
Flash Forward returned with excellent two-one hour episodes.

By: Ronc303

Ronc303 — Sun, 21 Mar 2010 17:47:13 +0000

By: StarStrider

StarStrider — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 15:14:48 +0000

I think it is over. I watched every episode up to the break. Wanted to like this.

But I couldn't get into at all. I thought with the right editing you could have found a decent single episode by hacking out the slow stuff out of those two.

I really don't like the lead characters. The Soppy emoting Olivia really brings nothing, I have started FFWD every time she is on screen.

The ONLY character I like right now is Simon.

Part of it must be the direction, but everyone else just seems so limp and dreary

Bottom line, they really had to "bring it" after the break. They didn't.

By: Alex Borbely

Alex Borbely — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 08:23:06 +0000

Shame that was probably the best episode so far.

By: Lucky_in_Vegas

Lucky_in_Vegas — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 03:02:50 +0000

Actually, it looks like about 6.5 million people watched it.

By: Lucky_in_Vegas

Lucky_in_Vegas — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 03:00:32 +0000

No first half hour bump, but the last half hour was the highest demo #. That means people tuned in and didn't tune out. That's even more impressive in today's climate.

By: Lucky_in_Vegas

Lucky_in_Vegas — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 02:56:42 +0000

I think that Marriage Ref will see bigger declines against The Mentalist and a new Private Practice. NBC might keep it for lack of anything else, and to try and stay in biz with Seinfeld. The show is horrible and is a sad reminder of how pathetic NBC is now compared to the time when Jerry was last on the network.

By: chels725

chels725 — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 01:23:46 +0000

Community & Parks and Recreation were great last night. The Office & 30 Rock were pretty awful. They need to put Community after The Office again.

By: annasarah1988

annasarah1988 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 20:23:49 +0000

I still really think ABC should have kept Ugly Betty on Thursdays. With a good amount of promotion, Betty would have been doing okay on Thursdays.

By: groove365

groove365 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 19:29:28 +0000

With all of the hype I expected a few more people to check out it's return.
This doesn't bode well for the V comeback.

By: Mumbo

Mumbo — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:47:44 +0000

And with that FlashForward goes from orange to red in the Index. I thought it would average a 2.3, lookings that promotional push didn't help at all though.

The ball's in V's court now.

By: Carol_R

Carol_R — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:13:04 +0000

Those are bad ratings for FF, especially since the NCAA was it's only main competition. Most of the other stuff were repeats or already low rated shows.

FlashForward in my opinion should never have aired at 8pm. It is a 10pm show (9pm at least) due to violent and suggestive content.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 18:10:00 +0000

Yea but at the end of the night flash forward got a 2.0 rating and the viewers are still pretty good. So u cant argue with Never yet u can say maybe or anyother synomyn to that. Plus u cant really judge this show when its been on hiatus for so long.

By: An0malous

An0malous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:56:57 +0000

V will definitely do better than a 1.9 in its first week back. No question about it.

By: atcat

atcat — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:41:51 +0000

I wonder how if V will wind up garnering the same amount of viewers as Flash Forward in both total viewers and 18-49.

By: PennNova

PennNova — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:38:18 +0000

People are saying that Flashforward was killed by the break but I disagree that was the sole or major factor in Flashforward's problems. I've watched most of the episodes on hulu and tried to enjoy it but couldn't get into it. The biggest problem I have with the show is the main character and his wife.

Anyway, the ratings Flashforward had before the break weren't incredibly far off from what they are now. I believe it was in the low 7 millions and low 2s for the demo. The bigger drop off is the ratings from the premiere to the break in the season, where the show lost over 5 million viewers and a big chunk of its demo. When a show loses that many viewers over a few months it's probably not going to survive.

By: atcat

atcat — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:34:14 +0000

From what I've been told the middle class suburban audience + 18-49 age demo are the two demographics a show must succeed with on NBC. The young male audience was once a factor, but all TV networks except CBS has young females as the priority gender.

By: Ike1

Ike1 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:29:09 +0000

"Why is this NBC comedy block renewed?"

Alex, I'm guessing great 18-34s and/or great male demos. Those are lucrative demos.

And/or: The producers/NBC-Universal are hoping to rake in huge wads of cash when all these sitcoms reach syndication, because there is a current drought of sitcoms in syndication. I'm thinking sitcoms just don't need more than mediocre ratings to get renewed these days for that exact reason. Why else would Til Death have lasted so long?

I'm glad: IMO, P&R has become really frakking hilarious, and Community is not bad either.

By: atcat

atcat — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:20:34 +0000

I think there is another death star in the ratings that comes annually that isn't American Idol, it's called the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament (a.k.a. March Madness).

By: uddave99

uddave99 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 17:16:55 +0000

I think you've got to take FF's ratings in consideration of the tourney. If not for the tourney lastnight I would have watched FF's return.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:57:00 +0000

I’m glad 30 Rock went up, I haven’t watched the episode yet, but it’s supposedly funny.

By: jpmd

jpmd — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:48:48 +0000

I wouldn't worry too much about Fringe's number Brandon, since it has already been renewed !

By: jpmd

jpmd — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:48:48 +0000

I wouldn't worry too much about Fringe's number Brandon, since it has already been renewed !

By: Alex

Alex — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:45:01 +0000

ABC's woes just keep get bigger. FlashForward has been a big (and expensive) bust for them. So ABC is now down to two hopes from this years drama development – Happy Town and V. Maybe Happy Town will do a Good Wife/Undercover Boss and perform much better than anyone expects! And I'm with Bill in regards to March Madness having next to nothing to do with FlashForward's numbers last night.

Elsewhere I'll repeat what I said last week – why is this NBC comedy block renewed? On the plus side for NBC The Marriage Ref is holding up much better than anyone expected. Lets see how long that lasts.

By: Brandon

Brandon — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:42:11 +0000

I wouldn't consider it being an excuse for me for poor ratings. CBS shows generally do damn well on Thursdays(possibly better than what March Madness did last night) but I NEVER watch anything on CBS on Thursdays. So in my case watching basketball instead was a direct result of not watching Flash Forward.

What is most troubling for FF is to look at what a repeat of another serialized show, Fringe did as compared to it in the same timeslot.

ABC FlashForward 1.9 5 6.476
FOX Fringe (repeat) 1.3 4 4.515

Not a good sign considering Fringe itself was in the danger zone with new episodes at ratings similar to what FF pulled last night.

By: Ryan47

Ryan47 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:32:01 +0000

Add a new one to the Bingo card. “March Madness killed my show!”

By: Ryan47

Ryan47 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:32:00 +0000

On another note, the basketball last night was a blast. Lots of good games.

By: Brandon

Brandon — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:31:00 +0000

Whoever decided last night was a good night to bring back FF should be fired. With basketball on there wasn't even time to watch it on DVR last night since it was 2 hours.

The show is probably toast and honestly I see it as a sign of things to come for ABC dramas. They can't pitch a successful new one to save their lives. Ratings for Grey's and Housewives are down and Lost is gone after this year. Is Private Practice the last new drama they have had that lasted longer than a season(Castle wasn't a full season last year but got a second is all I can think of off the top of my head).

I don't think it will get to the lengths of NBC's current state of crap ratings but I wouldn't be surprised if they took the steepest ratings decline over all the networks over the next 2 seasons. It would be hard for NBC to take a steep drop considering how they use a step ladder to reach what they pull at their very best.

By: Bill Gorman

Bill Gorman — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:29:45 +0000

You can make lots of excuses for FlashForward, but CBS last night wasn't much higher than it was last Thursday, and Fox and the CW ran all repeats. Nobody watched it because nobody wanted to watch it.

By: xzchief

xzchief — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:25:41 +0000

There's more NCAA basketball Mar. 25. New episodes of Survivor and Bones resume Apr. 1. FF is doomed.

By: Ryan47

Ryan47 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:24:00 +0000

Whoa, just blacked out there for a moment. I saw…yes, I believe it was the future. It was ABC’s fall schedule…and there was no FlashForward on it! What could it all MEAN?!

Sorry, couldn’t resist. So long, FF. Now to see if V fares any better….

By: Gocubs2010

Gocubs2010 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:10:37 +0000

Flashforward came back at a wrong time cause last night and next thursday is NCAA tournament had it waited or came back sooner I bet ratings would have been alot better.

By: MichyGeary

MichyGeary — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:02:00 +0000

Oh, FlashForward…how I will miss you. =(

By: MichyGeary

MichyGeary — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:02:00 +0000

Oh, FlashForward…how I will miss you. =(

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:57:00 +0000

Pretty stupid to bring Flash Forward against the NCAA tournament, especially the first night of games. You know how many people are either watching the game, at a bar watching the games or too hungover from the afternoon of watching games to watch TV.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:57:00 +0000

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:55:00 +0000

How does this compare to day one of the tourney last year?

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:55:00 +0000

How does this compare to day one of the tourney last year?

By: Jon737

Jon737 — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:52:20 +0000

haha flashforward. those are heroes ratings.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:40:00 +0000

Say what? Mentalist on ABC? Somethings wacky…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:40:00 +0000

Say what? Mentalist on ABC? Somethings wacky…

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:40:00 +0000

What has been the general ratings trend for the mentalist this season? Has it ever been that low before? Because even with bastketball (there were so many excellent games last night!)…ouch.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:40:00 +0000

What has been the general ratings trend for the mentalist this season? Has it ever been that low before? Because even with bastketball (there were so many excellent games last night!)…ouch.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:38:00 +0000

What has been the general ratings trend for The Mentalist? Have the show ever dropped that low before? Because ouch…even considering basketball.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:38:00 +0000

What has been the general ratings trend for The Mentalist? Have the show ever dropped that low before? Because ouch…even considering basketball.

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:37:00 +0000

flashforward could have been worse in ratings, but hopefully the good feedback from the episode will bring viewers back.

wasnt that off from Dec 3

By: Anonymous

Anonymous — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:37:00 +0000

flashforward could have been worse in ratings, but hopefully the good feedback from the episode will bring viewers back.

wasnt that off from Dec 3

By: Holly

Holly — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 15:34:40 +0000

btw did you notice that NBC was second in every half hour? wow

Which means their full slate of originals beat precisely one show with original episodes....