I'm interested in the ratings for Pastique, too. Hope their respectable so that SV will go out looking as good as possible considering everything but low enough so that we don't get a S9.

I want the rating for next week to absolutely bottom out, but then they probably will just blame the GA as opposed to recognizing fans fleeing from what they saw this week.

Per Berman:


Not bad, Smallville.

Except a week ago, Smallville lost over 19% of their audience from the year before. Not good.

Preliminary market numbers

In terms of numbers (I'm bored at work today):

How Berman will react to ratings is unpredictable. I think it depends upon what he expects before ratings come out. I think he expected SV and SPN to fold completely so the fact that they didn't surprised him.



That is the decline I would have expected. In fact, this is what I posted last week:



No Justice League and the ratings go down in total viewers 280,000 and to a 1.7. No surprise.

But, that was with Doomsday's introduction (which I do think fanboys knew about since they seem to always know what is coming up regardless of how much publicity is doine like when they flocked to Cyborg despite hardly any promotion) and with a premiere people seemed to be somewhat positive about. Next week will be interesting. They're getting close to the 3 million range *MUCH* faster than I expected based upon old ratings' patterns. I don't know if 18-49 will go down or not. If so, I'm guessing 1.6.

It's still low too.

Last year, Kara had 4.56 million initially.

So it's a total of 460,000 viewers lost from last year at this time on top of the initial 280,000 they lost just from last week.

Next week Smallville also competes with the Vice Presidential Debate.

Next week is still tricky to predict with GA being featured, but I predict it to slump to 4 million next week .

FYI, for year-to-year purposes: Kara 4.56, 1.9 18-49. Although Fierce went up the following week.



Really? Oh well, then disregard the decline I expected. That's no competition for SV's audience. In fact, it is an incentive to watch the CW since the other competition will be gone. The CW likes it when the main networks cover political stuff like debates and presidential speeches bc their ratings go up.


Hmmm. tough call.

Half-hour breakdowns (I am really, really bored):

Wow. I am amazed they held on to that many viewers. Looks like SV just might stay north of 4 mil through this first set of episodes. I really, really didn't think they could pull that off sans MR and KK. Bravo SV.

I think the fact that the ratings are holding despite the better competition is because although the loss or MR is a huge hole to fill, people would rather have no Lex than the Lex of the terrible storylines from like late S5 up until he killed Lionel. Plus, it helps that all three new additions to the main cast (Tess, Oliver, Davis) are all extremely awesome characters, and No Lana has always been a good thing.

And I'm sure at least some viewers thought that the show would be about Justice League or at least feature some JL action. Oliver wasn't even in this one (which ... brilliant move guys).

Finals were 4.181 for SV.

Well, when you consider that HOUSE lost 7 million viewers from last years premiere then it's obviously not a situation that is only happening to Smallville.

No, viewing numbers are down across the board. In fact hasn't Smallville comparatively lost less of the audience?

The ratings actually seem pretty respectable.

FYI, as most of us know, the CW only cares about W18-34 because of how they've sold their advertising. Based upon performance in the 18-34 demos, here is how the CW shows stack up this week:

2.5/8 18-34 America’s Next Top Model 4.13 million; 2.1/8 18-49
2.4/7 18-34 Gossip Girl 3.33 million; 1.6/4 18-49
2.2/6 18-34 One Tree Hill 3.13 million; 1.5/3 18-49
2.0/6 18-34 90210 2.94 million; 1.5/4 18-49
1.7/5 18-34 Smallville 4.18 million; 18-49 1.7/ 5
1.2/3 18-34 Privileged 1.86 million; 18-49 0.8/ 2
1.1/3 18-34 Supernatural 3.17 million;18-49 1.3/ 3

Some of those were surprising to me. ANTM being the top performer was expected, but Supernatural apparently skewed older and male this week and took last place, even below Privileged which based on 18-49 demos looked originally like it did much worse, but that show skews young.

Last week's Thursday results:
1.8/6 18-34 Smallville 4.38 million; 18-49 1.8/6
1.6/5 18-34 Supernatural 4.0 million; 18-49 1.7/5

So even though it isn't in the demos they want, Smallville was The CW's top rated show for the week?

Taken from the Chlois thread



IA. The trailer for Plastique did nothing as far as advertising the newer Lois and Clark show. So the general audience would not be aware of a change in the general format of the program. Now that Plastique is past us and the potential new direction has been established for the general audience the next couple of weeks will be telling if it's something that will be embraced or will drive viewers away.

And this is where those Chlark moments of the first two episodes come into play. Given the spoilers it seems very likely that it will go nowhere. But by throwing the Chlark bone so frequently the unspoiled majority will keep on watching since from what we have seen until now it is perfectly logical to conclude that they will go the Chlark route.

The "Chlark bone." Clever.

Chlark fans may continue, but the trailer-of-the-week features Clois by cobbling together scenes from prior years, including the Clois Crimson crush, which may cause Chlarkers to make a mad dash for the crapper.

Dawn's still in control.

As a Chlarker I don't understand this statement. Could you explain please?

In the season six episode "Crimson" EDLois and Clark make out while on love juju and red K. Many of those clips are in this new Clois trailer put out by the CW.

I realize that. They were both on drugs. Nois on a drug that made her fall for the first guy she sees and Clark on RedK. Then Clark ditched her for Lana/Lex. "Crimson" proved nothing with respect to Cnois and I for one am not making a "mad dash for the crapper". Also, the CW loves triangles and makeout sessions as evidenced by GG ads so it's not surprising they'd include that. Jmho.

I don't know. I bet the Smallville ratings will not go down by that much. If anything, I am sure they will probably stay around the same this week because the trailer they showed on TV last week was all about Ollie. Most of the time Ollie almost == JLA and so most viewers will probably tune in for that. And I am convinced that as long as they keep throwing the Chlarkers a bone, the Chlarkers will continue to watch, plus they keep mentioning Lex, so even Lex fans and KK fans will continue to watch because we know that KK is coming back, and there are all these rumors that Lex will return. My bet is that Smallville ratings will not go down (sadly) and TPTB will assume that it's because of the new direction that the show has taken and will embrace that direction completely.

I am pretty disappointed in the ratings for Supernatural though. It's one of the most wonderful shows out there, IMO, great writing and it seems almost as if Dawn doesn't interfere with it (which is why I disagree that the direction SV takes is as a result of the network push), yet the ratings are pretty low for such an awesomely, well written and well directed show. Smallville on the other hand seems to survive with the worst story arcs, and worst lightswitches ever scene on TV.

If they can hover around 4 million, I think that's a win. They lost two of the stars of the show, so there is going to be a dip considering Lana fans and lex fans aren't going to tune in as much.

In CW terms 4 millions is a win in any imaginable way. Especially, when it is really true that they got Season 8 for the price of Season 1.

Does that mean season 9 is starting to look likely? Damm.

Sorry for the lateness; I tried to post last night, but the site kept timing out.


Well you might want to after viewing the Clois-fest.

What I was trying to say earlier is that Chlark fans, while viewing the new pro-Clois CW trailer consisting of bits and pieces of old film, including a shot from Crimson of CK hovering over a very busty LL in a bustier (redundant, no?), might feel as if they need to barf.

Not trying to promote "Cnois." The SV/CW staff seems to have that covered.

My guess is that the CW would be very much interested in a 9th Season as long as it is cheap and stays above 3 million viewers (that is, if the CW still exists next fall). The more interesting question is, if they would move on with another season without TW.

Thursday report:

pifeedback



Effect of debate (positive or negative) really prevents you from making too much out of these numbers.

3.95 million? From 4.10 million last week?

Next week will be the test for about if Chlarkers leave. The trailer is pure Clois. So if it goes lower it would be the Chlarker's leaving.

Perked back up to 4 million at the half though:

Smallville
8:00 p.m. V: 3.80 m, A18-49: 1.5/ 4
8:30 p.m. V: 4.09 m, A18-49: 1.6/ 4

Supernatural
9:00 p.m. V: 3.75 m, A18-49: 1.5/ 3
9:30 p.m. V: 3.40 m, A18-49: 1.4/ 3

Continues to Lose Steam:
Smallville (CW)

Rounding off the 8-9 p.m. hour were the CW’s Smallville (Viewers: #5: 3.95 million; A18-49: #4: 1.6/ 4), which dipped year-to-year by 640,000 viewers (4.59 to 3.95 million) and 16 percent among adults 18-49 (1.9/ 5 to 1.6/ 4)

Last week:

Smallville
8:00 p.m. V: 3.97 million, A18-49: 1.6/ 5
8:30 p.m. V: 4.24 million, A18-49: 1.8/ 5

This week:

Smallville
8:00 p.m. V: 3.80 m, A18-49: 1.5/ 4
8:30 p.m. V: 4.09 m, A18-49: 1.6/ 4

I'm commenting to enjoy the satisfaction of a good guess.



Also, I actually guessed 3.95 million on my lj which some of my lj friends can verify.

So week-to-week it went down 230,000 viewers (4.18 million to 3.95 million) and 140k in the 18-49 demo (strong 1.7 to rounding up to 1.6)

What's interesting to me is that no other show is picking up SV's lost viewers. They're not leaving SV because another show is pulling them away. They're just leaving it. They're choosing to watch nothing or do something else (maybe get online) over watching the show live. In fact, SV is up against much weaker competition this year. UB and MNIE are getting bad fan reviews this season (with declining ratings to match them) and "Hole in the Wall" is weak ratings-wise compared to "Are you Smarter than a 5th grader?" The problem isn't the stiff competition, the problem is SV is increasingly losing its appeal as a "must watch" show.

As a Noiscotter, I wish I could offer the 230,000 new members this week of the former SV viewers club something. Dumping the show ain't easy. A tshirt that says "I watched 7 seasons of SV for a payoff and all I got out of it was this lousy Tshirt and a slap in the face " perhaps?

Based upon pattern, SV's Ep4 usually gets a big hike in ratings. I'm not familiar enough with Maxima to know if she would draw in those comic book fanboys who tuned in for the premiere or if she might even pull in more viewers. By putting her in E4, it would seem the producers think she will be a big draw. I'll wait to guess how next week will go to see if there is a big publicity push indicating a lot of interest in her. I had never heard of her myself.



I think the BS about Chloe not being interested in journalism anymore and Nois and Clark being partners was a big blow to that fan base. Sure, there are plenty of Chlark/Chlois/Chloe fans still watching but if last week didn't run them off, I'm not sure that a trailer will hurt them any more. YMMV.

That's definitely what I'm doing. I don't watch anything else at that time, although I do record UB. I used to do the same for SV, but at this point, I'm totally sick of getting contrived Clois rammed down my throat. A lot of other former SV watchers and I were all talking on lj when the episode aired this week, so I'm obviously not alone.

Yeah, UB use to be a real conflict for me, too. But, UB has gotten really lame and Betty herself lost a lot of what made her appealing so I'm not watching anything on Thursday when SV airs. I will try to get home from now on to catch Greys (which has rebounded) and I have The Office on DVR setting so I never miss that. I'll watch bits of The Office generally during commercials for Greys and then watch the whole episode right after Greys.

Although I will admit the whole penis stunt on Survivor made me almost consider watching it this week. That was hilarious.

I use the time to get my kids tucked in so I can watch "Supernatural" in peace:-).

A question-- if SV's ratings go up in the second half hour, does that likely reflect the fact that people are tuning in to see "Supernatural," or is there some other reason?

I watch Bill O'Reilly instead. Yes News is much more entertaining then Smallville.

I take care of family stuff instead and zip thru the DVR version later like going to the dentist.

I'm usually working during that time, so I never get to watch live. But I had off last night, so I tuned in.

Yeah. I wish I'd been working.

Elly - While that is possible, in the case of SV/Spn, that doesn't seem to be the case. Almost all 7pm central/8 pm eastern shows go up at the half hour mark because people are late getting home or finishing dinner to start turning on the tv for their nightly viewing. See, the pattern is the same last week and this week with viewers going up at the half hour mark. If you go over past episodes, you would see the pattern is always present.



Now, sometimes the lead out show will provide a boost, for example, UB gets a boost from the much more popular Grey's Anatomy because some viewers will turn on their tvs to that channel before their main program (Greys) starts and that viewership gets credited to UB.

When the ratings go down at the half hour mark (which actually Nielsen will provide breakdowns at 10 minute intervals to their customers, but afaik there is no free access to that type of info online) then that is more a reflection of the show's content meaning that it wasn't able to keep those viewers for the whole hour whether it lost the viewers to another show (reality tv shows very often steal viewers away from other shows for their last hour as the results come in) or to fatigue with viewers turning off the tv to get ready for bed. The last show of prime time programming for the night (the 9pm central/10 pm eastern shows on the big four or the 8pm central/9pm eastern show for the CW) usually sees a drop off in the second half hour because viewers get too tired to make it to the end and go to sleep (sometimes recording the end for a later viewing) or because local programming comes on and they turn off the program before the hour is over and the sharp turn off gets rolled into that program's ratings. Generally the 8-8:30 pm central/9-9:30 pm eastern slot has the most available viewers as people who are going to watch have finally sat down in front of the tv and they're not yet thinking about getting ready for bed.

BTW, SPN seems to be hurt by the competition. Without Greys/CSI as competition, SPN's ratings go up. If the CW was smart, they'd use it to anchor the night when they put Reaper on during hiatus.

Finals:

Most of you are far more knowledgeable than me (Massen1, you're a star and your information is much appreciated), but at the moment this is still feeling like a ratings win.

I grow scared of season 9.

I do love that Smallville got 4 million again. I know that most dont want a season 9 and I sort of feel that way, but Smallville being the highest rated series on The CW right now pleases me to no end.

I still doubt where getting a season 9. The ratings are barely hanging onto four million and I don't see next week boosting anything up.

The SPN lover in me wishes SPN could lap them. Season five for them baby!

However, after NO promotion and roughly one billion annoying GG and 90210 promos on EVERY FREAKING CHANNEL, it makes me moderately appeased in some way. I just wish there'd been less OMFG and 90210 theme song all summer. But, please Massena if you're out there, please let me know about the way the ratings look. I know they look at demos and that, compared to last year, they are down. However, compared to about Sleeper-Arctic, they're a little higher. Did the drop still hold for their 18-49 group?

Teen Titan - You are totally mistaken. You probably tire of me saying this, and I tire of repeating it, but you have to look at the *demos* and look at that 18-34 decline from 18-49! That means the episode skewed older. Holy smokes. I don't think I've ever seen SV skew older. That's very freaky. The worst it ever does is stay the same in the two demos, but generally it goes up in the 18-34 demo from 18-49. That means more people 35 and older watched Toxic than 34 and under. Not good. Sometimes this is a trend with shows as their loyal audience naturally ages along with the show until they are out of the demos, but until now SV hasn't suffered from that problem.

Gossip Girl, OTH, 90210, ANTM and Privileged all skew younger which is what the CW wants. If one of those shows gets a 1.6 in 18-49, they can still get a 2.0 or higher in 18-34 to reach the quotas the CW has for them. The CW sells their ads, with promises to reach a certain minimum number of viewers in that 18-34 category. I mentioned last week that a BIG problem with Supernatural is that it skewed older last week which is the opposite of what the CW wants. Now, Smallville is doing the same and I've never seen it do that.

You have to think of this as a quota system with the demo ratings. The CW sets expectations for those numbers and those are the numbers that mean the most to them. I know I've said this repeatedly, but the overall viewer number is really only important for the press/publicity aspect to them. The general public doesn't understand demos so the main stream press reports overall viewer numbers and use them to label shows "winners" and "losers" and so that is why they're important bc of the impression they give. But, bottom line wise/business wise, the demos are what affect the CW's bank account. And those demos are what will be reported in trade periodicals to the CW's only customers - the media buyers - who focus in on them.



It isn't the highest rated series on the CW. In fact, SV is towards the end of the list in the category that matters to the CW which is 18-34 year old viewers. I mean it doesn't matter what we think, the media buyers and the CW know the deal and they will see those demos and they won't be happy at all. If someone wanted to be ambitious, they could pull all the 18-34 demos for the other CW shows this week from pifeedback.com and compare, but I would bet serious money that Smallville is on the bottom end of that list. Remember Dawn said she cut WWE Smackdown because it skewed too old and too male. The demos are what she is looking at because that is what her customers care about. Out of curiosity, I did it last week and this is how it turned out. You can see how the demos go up in 18-34 for most of the shows. That's what the CW wants to see more of. If you're male or a female under 18 or over 34, you're nearly irrelevant to them.

Last weeks 18-34 demos chart:




Tobi - The thing is that ratings for all tv shows go down in the Spring because fewer people watch tv in the Spring than in the Fall. Smallville usually loses 1 million viewers over the season (from the Fall to the Spring) and their demos go down as well.

The only SV episodes to ever go below 1.6 in the 18-49 demo


Notice they are all in the Spring. I don't have the 18-34 demo numbers bc they're not regularly posted. Travis at pifeedback will sometimes post them and sometimes he won't. The only other source for those numbers is futoncritic when they publish a CW press release on ratings which will always mention the demos as that is their "victory" that they are boasting about in them. However as I said above, the 18-34 demos have always been equal or greater than 18-49 whenever I have seen them posted.

So, in other words, Smallville's really doing much worse than it would appear. It may, nominally, be the number one scripted show on the network, but where it counts, it's really fifth place, and (if trends continue) falling fast.

Eep.

Ditto. I hate that SV might be taking hits like that, although I want it to end with S8.

Massena - thanks for the ratings explanation, again - very interesting, but it makes me sad for SV. This show, regardless how it ends, deserves to go out amidst fireworks, hooplas, streamers, and confetti. I'm not sure that will happen, which kinda breaks my heart. Looking forward to the final numbers - I think. :S

Not necessarily. Networks do love their target demographics, it's true. But they by no means discount a shows overall viewership.

As an example, CBS's programming tends to schew much older than ABC's. So if that whole, "Advertisers only pay for a certain demo," theory were true, you'd think ABC would make more in advertising. But, nope, CBS makes more advertising dollars. And while CBS is lagging behind ABC in "the demo," they have more viewers overall counting all demographics. I sense a connection.

Also, SV and SPN are in a sort of special situation being on Thursday nights. On that night, movie advertisers are looking to encourage people to go out and see the movies opening on Fridays. And for studios putting out action/horror/sci-fi movies, advertising during shows like SPN and SV is ideal. And the studios don't care how old their audience is. They just want butts in the seats.