> GIRLS – Sundays 10:30PM on HBO – Potential DVR Alert The lion’s share of attention paid to HBO goes to its splashy, big-budget, big-name projects like Game of Thrones, Boardwalk Empire, Luck and True Blood.  But at the same time, the network has consistently produced smaller, idiosyncratic shows that are more akin to independent […]

> A lot can happen between the creation of a TV pilot in the spring and the production of episodes for the regular season: a writing/producing team is hired, audience focus groups weigh in, networks and studios (which may have had their own turnover) give plenty of notes, helpful and otherwise, and critics begin to […]

NBC could have used Game 6 of the NHL Stanley Cup Final on Wednesday rather than Monday.  The 2.0 rating the concluding game generated Monday would have doubled last night’s rating for the regular NBC Wednesday line-up (instead of bumping a much higher-rated America’s Got Talent out of its pattern Monday night).  In any case, […]

  A steady return for BACHELOR IN PARADISE. DEMOGRAPHIC DETAIL: For each broadcast program (or hour segment), the chart below displays preliminary live+same day key advertiser demographics (adult 18-34, 18-49 and 25-54 ratings), audience skews (women 18-49, men 18-49 and adults 50+ shares) and total viewership (thousands of people over the age of 2). Ratings analysis […]

The ratings below are household ratings from the 56 television markets with local Nielsen meters for Saturday March 19 and Sunday March 20, 2016. The 56 markets (out of 210 total) cover about 70% of the US television population. Click here for sports ratings from the same calendar weekend last year. NBA Saturday 3.76 rating ABC 8:30 […]

Two networks competed last night, FOX and NBC, each ending with a preliminary 2.2 Adult 18-49 rating in prime time. FOX‘s Gordon Ramsay cooking combo of Hell’s Kitchen and MasterChef each averaged a 2.2 rating.  The Tuesday tracks for the reality pairing since June 5: Hell’s Kitchen (2.1– 2.2– 2.2– 2.2) and MasterChef (2.2– 2.1– 2.1– 2.2).  It doesn’t get more consistent than […]

Another Sunday with Game of Thrones probably beating everything on broadcast TV. CBS:  BIG BROTHER was the highest-rated show on the networks last night, with a 2.2 that was about 10% below the show’s Sunday premiere last year.  That wasn’t enough to give CBS the nightly win, because nothing else on the schedule was higher […]

The top cable programs of the week that competed against the early nights of the London Summer Olympics (True Blood on HBO Sunday, Keeping Up with the Kardashians on E! Sunday, VH1’s Love and Hip Hop Atlanta on Monday) were close to their normal levels, with the Kardashians slightly above normal.  Even with a 10 or 11 rating on a broadcast network, […]