Splitsider

Veep debuted to 1.4 million people (and 1.7 across the two airings) on Sunday night. This is slightly above the 10:00pm timeslot's normal 1.0 million average and ties last week's Eastbound & Down finale. It's also more than the MUCH talked about Girls debut, which, all kidding aside, isn't a surprise, considering that Julia Louis-Dreyfus was on one of the biggest television shows ever and Lena Dunham has only appeared in a film (Tiny Furniture) that most people have just hanging around in their Netflix instant queue.

Speaking of Girls, it held the entirety of its debut's 1.1 million viewers, which is actually quite impressive. It [...]

1.1 million people watched over the two airings. This is not a small number, this is not large number, it is just fine. Well, until you compare it to the 500 million who watched the first moon landing, which like Girls was an event that supposedly defined a generation. More than anything, these numbers suggest that Girls, despite being a show that launched 1,000 thinkpieces, is just another niche, premium cable television program; however, somewhat luckily for Girls, its niche is people who write thinkpieces about niche, premium cable television. Its numbers are less than Luck's debut and are identical to Bored to Death's premiere.

Did you [...]

While Conan's move from NBC to basic cable hasn't been a massive success — the show's ratings are generally near the bottom of all major late night shows — it's been on an upswing lately, at least according to TBS. In fact, the Conan audience grew by a generous 25% this quarter, helping deliver six consecutive months of improving growth in the coveted 18-49 demographic. TBS also claims that the audience's median age of 35 is the lowest of all late night talk shows, but it doesn't mention The Daily Show or The Colbert Report in its comparisons. Sure, anybody can beat Jay Leno's geriatric audience, but [...]

BFFs got off to a slow start, ratings-wise, last night, clocking in with a 1.2 rating and 3.9 million viewers. It lost a solid portion of lead-in Betty White's Off Their Rockers audience, which managed a 1.8 with 7.1 million viewers. But it still did better than soon-to-be-cancelled Bent, which ended the night with a 0.7 rating and 2 million viewers. But it was Bent's last episode, while there are still five more weeks of new BFFs episodes to come, so we'll see if it can't improve upon this initial showing.

The good news just keeps on coming to Greendale. The show's joined 30 Rock and Up All Night in the "more likely to be renewed than canceled" category, based on the ratio of new episodes' ratings among adults 18-49 to those of NBC's other scripted shows. Granted, it may be worth waiting till it's up against a new Big Bang Theory to go ahead and rent a monkey named Annie's Boobs for your renewal celebration party, but it might just be time to call a few zoos and start inquiring about what that would cost.

On Friday, I postulated that Community's recent ratings slide was the result of non-fans checking it out and just not liking it, but the New York Times suggests it's part of a bigger trend. They write:

"In the four television weeks starting March 19, NBC lost an average of 59,000 viewers (about 3 percent) in that 18-to-49 age category compared with the same period last year, CBS lost 239,000 (8 percent), ABC lost 681,000 (21 percent) and Fox lost 709,000 (20 percent)."

This collective nosedive is affecting the barely watched (i.e. NBC's Thursday Night) and the super popular (i.e. Modern Family).

Beyond the question of why is [...]

After getting solid numbers for a couple weeks after their hiatus, Community has seemed to level off, coming in with an 1.4 18-49 rating, same as 30 Rock. The first new Office in a month came in at a 2.1, 0.3 points lower than their last original episode, which isn't what you want to see when trying to pitch a major reboot. Still, a new episode of The Office offered some lead-in bump to the season finale of Up All Night, which was up 0.3 to a 1.5 rating. For fun, or more like not fun, let’s compare those numbers (8:00-1.4, 8:30-1.4, 9:00-2.1, 9:30-1.5) to CBS's (8:00-2.8, [...]

"Season three of Archer recorded its highest viewership ever, posting significant double-digit increases across all demos versus season two… This was Archer’s most-watched regular season ever across every key demo, with growth ranging from +24% to +56% over its prior season… Last month, FX ordered 13 episodes for Archer’s fourth season." — FX's Archer Records Its Most-Watched Season Ever

"On Monday, [Two and a Half Men] hit a series low in the advertiser-coveted 18-to-49-year-old demographic and finished with 10.4 million total viewers, its lowest total audience since May of 2007 and its second-lowest audience ever. The drop is part of a larger decline that began in January, when [...]

Community topped NBC's Thursday night ratings again last night, holding steady with a 1.7 rating with adults 18-49 even though it was up against a new Big Bang Theory. And with low 30 Rock,Office and Up All Night ratings, that kind of makes Community…not the underdog anymore? It's gotta be a confusing time for Dan Harmon and the rest of the writers. What do they even do with themselves if they're not desperately struggling to stay afloat?

Here's a fairly stunning look at how reruns of The Big Bang Theory helped boost TBS to the #1 cable network among 18-49 year olds, and how those reruns often get better ratings than new episodes of shows like South Park and Archer. We sure do love our physicist jokes, huh, America?

(Numbers are based on those reported TvByTheNumbers.Zap2it.com. Just the numbers are below the essay.)

We've reported a lot about Community's ratings issues, but I thought it was important to actually look at the numbers a little bit more closely. Of all the reasons a show could do poorly in a given week, the one least mentioned is also the hardest for fans to accept: people just don’t like it. Community had the most buzz it maybe ever had heading into its mid-March return and yet they ended back where they started — hell, they're currently worse than they started. Non-fans watched Community over the past six weeks and they all [...]

Last night, almost 7 million people learned what the “B” stands for in the title Don’t Trust the B— in Apartment 23 (it’s bee, oddly enough). With a 2.9 rating for 18-49 year olds, the show premiered to about as many people as Happy Endings usually brings in. These are good numbers, matching those of undeniable hit New Girl and trouncing any of the NBC comedies, including very sadly Best Friends Forever, which was down 25% to a dangerously low 0.9 for 18-49. Considering the monster lead-in that is Modern Family, however, this is hardly a slamdunk for renewal. We’ll see if the numbers hold up for next week's episode, in which that pesky bee finally [...]

These last couple of weeks have been pretty great for Community, which saw its ratings shoot up higher than ever before. But alas, what goes up, must come down — at least on NBC. Last night's (really great) episode lost a whole lot of last week's audience, hitting a season-low of a 1.3 rating and 3.1 million viewers. But hey, it could be worse for our friends from Greendale: every NBC show hit its season low last night, meaning Community still won the night for the peacock. And it's kind of tough to justify giving the axe to Community for a 1.3 when 30 Rock had a [...]

Okay, so maybe Community couldn't quite sustain the high ratings of its triumphant return last week. It was down a half point last night, even though it still hasn't had to battle The Big Bang Theory. On the bright side (kind of? Depending on how you look at it?), Community led the night for NBC, with both 30 Rock episodes and Up All Night down as well. And since they'll likely get renewed, this drop doesn't mean Community's chances for next year aren't still very strong.