| Scoreboard |  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total Viewers (million) | 7.73 | 5.45 | 5.13 | 4.94 | 1.69 |
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-49 | 2.2/7 | 1.8/6 | 1.3/4 | 1.4/4 | 0.7/2 |
CBS’ three scripted shows carried the night for the network, but only Ghost Whisperer made any real noise. CBS averaged 7.73 million viewers and a 2.2 demo adults 18-49 rating, followed in both cases by ABC with 5.45 million and a 1.8 demo adults 18-49 rating.
Ghost Whisperer increased last week’s audience by 100,000+ and its demo rating by a tenth while humbling the rest of the competion at 8pm in both viewers and the demo. Smarter Than A Fifth Grader upped its demo rating by a tenth too, and Wife Swap increased it audience by about 500,000 and its demo rating by two tenths. Even struggling America’s Toughest Jobs posted audience and demo increases. Not Everybody Hates Chris though, it lost 16% of its audience and a tenth in the demo. I think the CW put their two comedies on Friday night to die. It’s working! Although, The Game held steady from last week.
Deal or No Deal added about 300,000 viewers, but held steady in the demo. The Ex List lost over a million viewers from its premiere, but only a tick in the demo winning the hour for adults 18-49 (Disgruntled Moonlight fans, we await your tenuous cause and effect comments!). Supernanny was up 800,000 viewers and 0.3 demo points. Don’t Forget the Lyrics added almost 500,000 viewers, but was flat in the demo.
Numb3rs was down just a bit from last week, and 20/20 was up just a bit. Enough for the two to tie in the demo at 10pm, while Numb3rs had a million more viewers. Life is showing very little of it, dropping 500,000 viewers and 0.3 demo ratings points. Friday 18-49 wasteland or not, it’s doomed.
Looking for Friday Night Smackdown ratings? We no longer get them with our overnight data, but you can see the latest weekly ratings here.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | Viewers Live+SD (Millons) | 18-49 Rating/ Share |
| 8:00 | CBS | Ghost Whisperer | 9.45 | 2.6/9 |
| FOX | Are You Smarter Than A Fifth Grader? | 5.79 | 1.4/5 | |
| ABC | Wife Swap | 4.28 | 1.5/5 | |
| NBC | America’s Toughest Jobs | 3.95 | 1.2/4 | |
| CW | Everybody Hates Chris | 1.76 | 0.7/3 | |
| 8:30 | CW | The Game | 1.90 | 0.8/3 |
| 9:00 | NBC | Deal or No Deal | 6.52 | 1.5/5 |
| CBS | The Ex List | 5.71 | 1.9/6 | |
| ABC | Supernanny | 5.02 | 1.8/6 | |
| FOX | Don’t Forget the Lyrics | 4.87 | 1.4/5 | |
| CW | America’s Top Model (repeat) | 1.42 | 0.6/2 | |
| 10:00 | CBS | Numb3rs | 8.03 | 2.2/7 |
| ABC | 20/20 | 7.03 | 2.2/7 | |
| NBC | Life | 4.92 | 1.4/4 |
——————————
Shows are sorted by viewers in each time slot. Timeslot demo winners are in bold.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2008 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved. Source Marc Berman/Mediaweek.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101.
I thought Ghost Whisperer would decrease:|
Good news on it increasing
friday is dead for tv nothing good here.
Well, as I said last week, Life is Dead.
Everybody Hates Cris and The Game aren’t looking good either.
All I can say about the ex-list is DANG!
Supernanny/Wife-Swap nothing notable here.
Deal or No Deal was decent as was Are you Smarter than a fifth grader.
Don’t forget the Lyrics was a bit concerning, but I think it’s cheap enough to survive. I think Numb3rs might be on its last season. Kudos to Ghost Whisperer
I am one of the Moonlight fans you are awaiting. I hate to see any show falter as I know the time, money and effort that goes into it. I don’t like to see any person without a job. With that said it is bittersweet to see Ex List slipping. I will never believe ML was cancelled because of ratings (especially if Ex List is renewed ). It was all about playing or not playing CBSs game of control. To me that was proven when the creator/showrunner left The Ex List. Just my opinion.
Looks like the GW hype and promotion for this season is working. The rest. Oy. Flashpoint will be on by November sweeps.
Ex-List skews younger than Moonlight. Strange
CBS is making money with those scripted shows and those ratings? Supernanny and Wifeswap are dirty cheap and SN almost beat Ex-List.
Clean, Friday is definitely a night where different strategies are being tried this season. CBS is going all scripted, ABC and Fox all unscripted, NBC and CW a mix.
With the herd mentality being what it is in television, I’d expect whatever proves the most profitable to be the Flavor of the Week come next season.
I would like to go on record here. The success or failure of any show on CBS or any other network is sad, but it has no effect on Moonlight and Moonlight has no effect on them. Those who believe otherwise are simply kidding themselves. Moonlight was special and I feel bad for anyone who missed it or its specialness. We were lucky to have it for as long as we did during a year that was fraught with strikes and unease in the industry. I believe it is a huge loss when actors put heart and soul behind a project and it still fails to be renewed. I am sure there are many reasons for this to happen. Moonlight was not a failure, CBS was not the bad guy. Everyone lost but that is not why the Friday night shows are struggling and their struggles will never bring Moonlight back.
I’m a Moonlight fan who no longer watches CBS. Many “Moonlight” fans are concentrating on what other networks have to offer, hoping they will be kinder and more supportive of new shows than CBS is, the network that canceled “Moonlight,” even though it won its timeshare consistently, won a People’s Choice Award, the star, Alex O’Loughlin won an award for “Sci-Fi Guy,” it has been #1 on “Hey ! Nielsen” for months, and Season Two was okayed, then pulled back. Add to “Moonlight’s” hardship the writer’s strike, when CBS didn’t re-run “Moonlight” episodes (OK–two) to famiiarize people with the show after they missed it the first time around! (Canada is running it every day currently!) We are mad, and we don’t watch a network who treats its “freshman” shows so badly! Only 16 episodes, but it’s hit all over the world, and they still ignore us. Therefore, we don’t watch their shows any more. I HOPE they are noticing! They have lost so much money and good will with this terrible decision!
Not one to disappoint…it is now 3:08 pm, I am watching Moonlight on the WBLA and Mick just admitted to Josef that he is in love with Beth, and I don’t see myself being unhappy that the Ex-list is sinking like an albatross in its time slot – any time soon.
I don’t want to see anybody loose their job, it would only be fair since all those people on Moonlight, the better programme, lost their jobs when that show was canceled as well.Nina Tassler, suck it up and bring back Moonlight NOW.
Hope you enjoyed my rant Bill!
Hi there, i have a question. Here in Holland (The Netherlands) are Friday, Saterday and Sunday for television the biggest nights, en then there are big shows. Why is in US that not? And why are in the US so mush series? Because we don’t have much series…
Reading Moonlight fans’s posts is such a pleasure. Those posts are crazy funny
@Seriefreak
The second question is easier: different cultures.
At the first question the answer is harder to give: i also find it strange that fridfays and saturdays are almost dead here in US when all over the world saturday brings the highest viewing numbers. It’s not like in Europe everyone stays at home in weekend and in US everybodu goes out
Thanks Ben Silverman for moving Life to Fridays!
Seriefreak, Bob, I didn’t know that about TV viewing in the rest of the world. Very interesting.
In the US, Saturday and now Friday are becoming a bit of a chicken and egg situation. Are broadcast ratings down because low quality/cost programming is shown on those nights? Or have the networks reacted to low audience numbers by only putting low quality/cost programming on those nights?
As far as the rest of the world, my understanding is that unscripted television has a much higher share of the broadcast time than in the US (although the share in the US is on the increase), but I have to admit that’s just an understanding based on some random reading and no first hand experience.
i think why Fridays/Saturdays are failing is because people don’t stay home and watch tv on those nights! (I know I dont’). And all you Moonlight fans boycotting CBS are not making any headway. CBS is still the #1 network, your boycott is pointless.
Johnthemon, it’s not like in other parts of the world people don’t go out, but over there the networks are scheduling their top shows on weekend so many are still watching TV
Johnthemon – it would be poitless either way because I am not even American, I am from Trinidad in the West Indies…as long as I feel good about it, why should you care…or anybody else for that matter.
As far as I am concerned I fall into the 18-34 female demographic that Nielsen touts to poll – other than the fact that I am black… for the exec big wigs to say that they know what I want, a rabid scifi/fantasy/romantic fiction fan all my life would want, they can not only kiss my booty, they the lick it too FULLSTOP!
It is not so much that they ended the series, but they apparently left it on a Cliffhanger note, they could have at least done a two hour season finally tying up loose ends. That is what pisses me off the most.
Bill,
Where are your 18-34 numbers?
Johnthemon, I can’t speak for all Moonlight fans, only myself, but I’m not boycotting CBS to try and hurt them. I’m doing it for a number of reasons. One reason is the comments made by people at CBS that were dismissive and insulting to me as a Moonlight fan. I don’t support businesses that are rude to me, especially when I have a wide variety of other entertainment alternatives. But the main reason I don’t watch CBS is that it doesn’t have any shows that really make me want to watch. I went to college and for four years watched “The West Wing” because NBC was the only network I could get reception for. When I moved back home for grad school I found that the shows I had used to watch weren’t entertaining now that I was out of the habit of watching them. With Moonlight I found a show that I liked the characters, was interested in the plots, and most importantly excited about subsequent episodes. And it got me back in the habit of watching other shows, such as Ghost Whisperer, Numb3rs, NCIS and Criminal Minds because I’d see the promos or even hope for a Moonlight promo during them. Without Moonlight I really have no reason to watch CBS. I’d rather watch a movie, read a book or just chat with friends online. If CBS starts failing I’m not going to lose sleep over it, but my not watching them isn’t about hurting them but following my personal preferences.
Andrea, unfortunately we don’t see 18-34 data for Friday and Saturday nights until Monday morning and given the time elapsed and traffic the older posts get, it’s not worth going back and adding the data later. Sorry :-/
Does anyone know how “The Starter Wife” did?!
Ghost Whisperer/Moonlight was a much better fit for Friday nights. The Ex-List is a pointless show. At least with Moonlight, CBS appeared to be thinking outside of the box for once. I have said it before and it merits repeating, with those ratings, The Ex-List should disappear faster than a doughnut @ a Weight Watcher meeting.
With the Moonlight fans, I think it’s about making a statement. Nina Tassler said some pretty offensive things to fans of the show. And these are loyal watchers of CBS. I mean, in business, isn’t it about pleasing the customers? So is it surprising that these “loyal” viewers are no longer loyal? So it’s more than just canceling Moonlight that has ticked off Moonlight fans, it’s the way the fans themselves have been treated by the network.
CBS may be number 1 on Friday nights, but it’s not like there’s a lot of competition. Also, I don’t wish the losing of jobs on anyone. But The Ex List is a sexist show. With Moonlight gone, the numbers for that same time slot, as well as Numbers have gone down considerably. In fact, Numbers are starting to get Moonlight ratings from last season. And Moonlight never had any real advertising by the network. The fans did that themselves, because CBS was never really behind it.
So people can laugh at Moonlight fans all they want. But it’s their prerogative to not watch a network that is disrespectful to its audience. Plus, is there any proof that Moonlight fans boycotting CBS in The Ex List time slot hasn’t worked? The Ex List did get only 5+million this week. Moonlight never went under seven million. And it almost always won the demos. And it seems Numbers is losing viewers as well. So…prove to me that it’s not related. Sure, I’m not dumb enough to think that there might be other reasons. I think there’s probably a number of reasons. This is just one of them. 1 Less viewer here, 1 less viewer there. My guess, eventually that’s going to leave a mark.
Another Moonlight fan here. Just sad to see that CBS replaced Moonlight with a loser at a time when Twilight is getting ready to hit the theaters next month (the only other mortal/vampire romance tht a a whole family can watch that I know of). I have CBS blocked on my television and not because I consider it a boycott or because I think CBS cares. I do it because I don’t do business with a company who is disrespectful to those whose business they seek, and their public statements were insulting to me. It just pleases me not to watch their programming and after all, we watch television to please ourselves. That is why I watched Moonlight as well as GW and Numbers all last year. It is why I watch my downloads of Moonlight every Friday night.
CBS really blew it with the Ex-List. Moonlight was a good show with good ratings. Hope you’re happy CBS. You should have listened to the fans.
Just a word to the pathetic Moonlight fans: so far EX-List is doing better tham Moonlight in the demos, and that’s what counts. And even if it’ll do worse in the future Moonlight’s numbers were terrible and CBS didn’t have any option but to cancel the show
PS: nobody saves a show beacause a movie with the same theme will arrive in theaters. BTW Twilight will bomb as well
I agree with Gwen, Amber, Terry, and the many Moonlight fans here that are “boycotting” CBS. Their treatment of the end-use consumers – fans of their programs – has been dismissive an sometimes elitist. However, I’m not so much boycotting as “not watching due to lack of interest.” Moonlight, Jericho, and Shark were the three strikes that called CBS “OUT” in my book. These three well-crafted dramas fall victim to CBS’s knee-jerk reactions to Nielsen ratings (I know, Nielsen’s still the best metric we have, yadda yadda yadda). I’m dreadfully bored with criminal procedurals. The CBS comedies have never interested me; I’d rather watch Seinfeld reruns than pretty much any sitcom on any broadcast network these days. Nielsen families may be an accurate representation of the general viewing public, but with the amount of CBS they watch, Nielsen homes don’t represent me whatsoever!
Gwen, I support you 100%. The thing is I love scifi and fantasy, I really don’t watch anything on tv these days, not even GW, I grew up reading star trek tng novels, christoper pike and all those paper backs that rule that genre, I even own a very thick encyclopedia of magical creatures, scifi and fantasy is my thing. Even as I grew up I realized that my interest still veered in that direction-I read mostly brenda joyce novels because of the fantasy elements in them such as House of Dreams and The Third Heiress, I would sooner visit the theatre to watch a will smith scifi movie than his engaging Happyness flick. Not that I don’t like Will, but I love scifi fantasy romance even more.
Infact, I complain a lot that there is not enough scifi/fantasy romance movies days, and finally we get a great tv series that appeals across the board with viewers and the Network cancels it after only 16 episodes. I am sure fans of the genre, or the 8 million plus world wide viewership would have waited a year even, while they fillmed the show to bring it back on. But they choose to cancel it whining about how our engrossing sentiment was due to a minor infactuation with the lead actor, excuse me I did like Alex O’laughlin all that much, In fact in the beginning I didn’t like him at all – and I suppose all the men who enjoyed the series were gay? Those watching it with their wives, sons and daughters every Friday night? Were the sons gay too?
http://www.tvsquad.com/2008/07/21/nina-tassler-responds-to-moonlight-fans-sort-of-tca-report/
She has slighted me personally, slandered my integrity as a member of her viewing audience, her comments have cut me to the quick and there is not method of apology that can chide my malcontent towards this female prick who succeeds herself to be above us all in what we know of ourselves.
And that is simply how it is.
OOps, meant to say didn’t like Alex O’Laoughlin all that much, NO OFFENCE ALEX, YOU SORT OF GREW ON ME, BUT THAT TYPE OF SILVESTER STALLONE METHOD OF ACTING, EVERY DAY GUY COMBO, NOT MUCH OF A FAN. NOTHING AGAINST YOU PERSONALLY, OBVIOUSLY A LOT OF WOMEN LOVE YOU, BUT THEY COULD HAVE PROBABLE CASTED MICHAEL BOLTON IN YOUR ROLE AND I WOULD NOT HAVE BATTED AN EYE, trust me love fantasy/romance that much.
Gee Bob, better take off those blinders before a snowball hits you full frontal, Exlist is disintegrating before your eyes, twilight won’t tank – their marketing strategy is a well oiled machine – infact I suspect that the theatrical release would only perpetuate a growing interest in the fantasy romance drama, not only that but the failing economy supports involved escapism and both Twilight and Moonlight supports these circumstances. Nina Tassler is going to find this to be an issue with the higher ups as I suppose she is the reason why Ostroff can’t bring the series to the CW. How would it look if a fantastic series that you failed were to resurrect substantially on another network?
No need to get yourself exasperated on the subject bob, but in my country they have a saying, no need to be wrong and strong, when you’re wrong – you’re wrong.
I am also one of those Moonlight fans that get raked over the coals just because we loved an excellent show and can’t understand why it was canceled (To Bob: Moonlight’s numbers were not “terrible”. It always held its own in an awful time slot.)
Officially I am not boycotting CBS as it wouldn’t make an difference to their ratings since I’m not a Nielsen household. But I will say without a doubt that I will never get hooked on another CBS show since they show such little respect to their audiences. Why would anyone want to watch and enjoy a new show when they know it won’t be given a chance to develop?
I will watch CSI since I love that show, and any new show that Alex O’Loughlin develops for the network. But otherwise there is nothing on CBS that even slightly interests me. I’d rather watch Animal Planet on Friday night that such a lame premise as The Ex-Files.
@ Bob
Twilight will bomb? Are you freaking kidding me? There is no way it will bomb. It might not break $100 million US box office, but it will definitely not be a bomb.
@Johnthemon
Are you kidding me? 100 million? This movie has nothing going for it: vampire shows have bombed on TV, vampire movies work only when the word “Dracula” is mentioned in the title, it has no star power, and the most important: almost no one has heard about it. If i wouldnt’ve red Moonlight fans’s posts on TV forums i wouldn know this movie exists
I don’t think The X-list fit on a friday night…..it will be better if it was The Mentalist or The Eleventh Hour on that time slot.
I am one of those Moonlight fans that keep getting raked over the coals because we loved this excellent show. I am not boycotting CBS since it wouldn’t matter anyway not being a Nielsen household. But that doesn’t mean I will ever let myself get hooked on another CBS show since they have so little respect for their audience.
I will watch CSI (Vegas), since I love that show, and whatever new show Alex O’Loughlin develops for the network, but I will watch Animal Planet on Friday night rather that that lame premise, The Ex-List.
Oh and to Bob: Moonlight did not have “terrible” ratings. It held its own in its time spot even considering what an awful time spot that was.
What did Friday Night SmackDown score last week on My Network TV? I am sorry if it’s posted on the site i did not see it
Thanks
Bob, The Ex-List isn’t doing much better than Moonlight in the demo. Moonlight’s worst demo performances were the four episodes after the writers strike and ranged from 1.8-2.0. Their worst was the finale which was 1.8/6. The Ex-List’s performances have been 2.0/6 and 1.8/6 which is essentially what Moonlight was doing after a writer’s strike that saw viewership down overall. The Ex-List is doing it at the beginning of the new season.
@ Bob
Twilight as a book was a New York Times best seller and won several literary awards, while you may not have heard about it, the book (which is apart of a trilogy) is pretty popular
I had such great wanderings about Moonlight, about how it would be great if Mick and Beth had a baby, how Mick would contemplate telling his child one day that his father was a vampire, about how it would be difficult for him if other vampires discovered that he had indeed fathered a child, it would certainly put his whole family in jeopardy, maybe lance would hunt them down and try to kill beth and the baby in order to protect their secret – maybe lance had once murdered his offspring as well in the past to protect the cure and he was eager to do the same to Mick as well – I was all for jumping the gun on this storyline when Nina Tassler up and Nixed it, equating her decision on the cesspool of hormonal tantrums over a male role – god she vexes me to no end. I didn’t even enjoy Alex O’Laoughlin all that much, I just wanted to see Beth get her man, and I love their great chemistry on the small screen. Don’t you just love it when she raised her arm to show him the bite marks and she tells Mick “I fed you!”
ONCE AGAIN ALEX, DON’T MEAN TO CAUSE ANY OFFENSE YOUR GENTLE SWAGGER SLOWLY STARTED TO APPEAL TO ME, COMING CLOSE TO THE END OF THE SERIES THIS I SWEAR!!
HOPE I’M NOT DISAPPOINTING BILL!
Another Moonlight fan here. CBS really made a colossal mistake replacing Moonlight with that drivel. It’s so boring I couldn’t stand to sit through more than the first 5 minutes. I ended up turning the TV off and reading a book. I still tune in for Ghost Whisperer but I don’t know how long that’s going to last since Jamie Kennedy doesn’t exactly fit the show as well as Jay Mohr did and there’s only so much I can take of him.
It really is a shame that they let a good show with excellent ratings for a Friday night and plenty of good buzz go for something so dull. I love romantic comedies but I’d rather see those in the theater. Why drag something that silly out over a whole season when the whole plot could be resolved in a 2-hour movie and be way more entertaining?
I’m not laughing at those Moonlight fans. I pity them. Because their show, which was the ultimate creative and commercial failure was canceled back in May, but they choose to dwell on and come up with ridiculous theories. Twilight would not have saved Moonlight. Had it stayed on the Friday night sked it would have tanked much worse then Ex List. It’s a nische show, and it’s appeal is limited. So is True Blood, but at least HBO are aware of it. I have no idea what the PTB at CBS thought when they greenlit Moonlight to begin with. VERY mediocre show with limited appeal.
I am another Moonlight fan. We pleaded with CBS. Moonlight fit perfectly with GW. What were they thinking? I don’t feel sorry for them….
I hate to break it to the many ML fans still coming here just to see the ratings in their vacated time slot. …but the success or failure of The Ex-List has no bearing on ML. ML still had ratings near the bottom of CBS’ weekly list. It’s sad, but no one who looks at it logically can blame CBS for trying something new there – especially given how poorly ML did compared to the series it replaced.
“Susan says:
October 11th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
I’m not laughing at those Moonlight fans. I pity them. Because their show, which was the ultimate creative and commercial failure was canceled back in May, but they choose to dwell on and come up with ridiculous theories. Twilight would not have saved Moonlight. Had it stayed on the Friday night sked it would have tanked much worse then Ex List. It’s a nische show, and it’s appeal is limited. So is True Blood, but at least HBO are aware of it. I have no idea what the PTB at CBS thought when they greenlit Moonlight to begin with. VERY mediocre show with limited appeal.”
SUSAN, HBO RENEWED TRUE BLOOD AFTER ONLY TWO SHOWS SO THEY KNOW THEY HAVE A GOOD THING ALREADY AND IT WILL LET TRUE BLOOD GROW AND BLOSSOM AND THE FANS DON’T NEED TO WORRY ABOUT FALLING FOR THE SHOW AND THEN HAVE HBO CANCEL IT LIKE CBS DID MOONLIGHT. I DON’T TRUST CBS AT ALL I KNOW THEY HAVE GOOD SHOWS AND I ONLY WATCH THEM ON A SITE THAT CBS DON’T GET MONEY FROM LIKE THEIR INNERTUBE SITE. I ALSO TOOK SHOWTIME OFF MY CABLE SYSTEM AT THE SAME TIME IN MAY AND I AM ADORING HBO RIGHT NOW IT IS MY FAVORITE NETWORK
TO LES AND NINA MAY YOU GET HIT WITH THE SACRED ASS PADDLE AND I HOPE YOU LOVE THE KARMA THAT IS COMING TO YOU 
Life should be #1
Susan, it was the script and Joel Silver that made Moonlight Moonlight, and that is an exceptional Television Programme that had mass appeal. They thought of everything with that script, when micht went to see his friend in the basement and mentioned how he knew Josef, he friend quipped about how mick never introduced them, then Mick told him how he never leaves his basement. The last four scripts were the best. If CBS had committed to promoting this show half as much as the Scifi Channel does with Eureka it would have been a categorical success. The viewership, which was big and won its timeslot for the Friday night, would have been greater if the narcissistic Nina Tassler was not calling the shots.
If you were a fan of scifi then you would have checked out the writers page for Eureak Unscripted and follow up on the Network agreement they had with Degree Deodarant, sure the Ads were obtrusive and they had to created a whole episode around the Degree (the advertiser whose name should not be mentioned within the show) but at least they got a great timeslot, diehard audience, and 21 episodes for this season. You can visit scifi/Eureka website and download podcasts for almost each episoed, you can visit the website and watch pictures of on set happenings like the cast and crew celebrating Jaime’s Birthday on set. The promotional tactics for Eureka are remarkably impressive, but for Moonlight (and Jericho I must add) CBS utterly and totally are loosing track of what they need to do to motivate this type of fan base that has been under utilized for the past decade.
As for Nina Tassler and for what she had to say it really hurt me: http://www.tvsquad.com/2008/07/21/nina-tassler-responds-to-moonlight-fans-sort-of-tca-report/
I study Creative Writing for a living, to think that there would be moments in my life that I would be breathing the same air that she used to utter such BS is enough to make me gag, and hold my breath ’till impunity.
Also it looks like Direct TV’s investment is working for them,
http://www.tvweek.com/blogs/tvbizwire/2008/10/lights_draws_few_viewers_on_di.php
Susan, it was the script and Joel Silver that made Moonlight Moonlight, and that is an exceptional Television Programme that had mass appeal. They thought of everything with that script, when micht went to see his friend in the basement and mentioned how he knew Josef, he friend quipped about how mick never introduced them, then Mick told him how he never leaves his basement. The last four scripts were the best. If CBS had committed to promoting this show half as much as the Scifi Channel does with Eureka it would have been a categorical success. The viewership, which was big and won its timeslot for the Friday night, would have been greater if the narcissistic Nina Tassler was not calling the shots.
If you were a fan of scifi then you would have checked out the writers page for Eureak Unscripted and follow up on the Network agreement they had with Degree Deodarant, sure the Ads were obtrusive and they had to created a whole episode around the Degree (the advertiser whose name should not be mentioned within the show) but at least they got a great timeslot, diehard audience, and 21 episodes for this season. You can visit scifi/Eureka website and download podcasts for almost each episoed, you can visit the website and watch pictures of on set happenings like the cast and crew celebrating Jaime’s Birthday on set. The promotional tactics for Eureka are remarkably impressive, but for Moonlight (and Jericho I must add) CBS utterly and totally are loosing track of what they need to do to motivate this type of fan base that has been under utilized for the past decade.
As for Nina Tassler and for what she had to say it really hurt me, she basically chalked up all my 25 plus years of reading and loving scifi fantasy as hormone driven.
I study Creative Writing for a living, to think that there would be moments in my life that I would be breathing the same air that she used to utter such BS is enough to make me gag, and hold my breath ’till impunity.
Also it looks like Direct TV’s investment is working for them,
http://www.tvweek.com/blogs/tvbizwire/2008/10/lights_draws_few_viewers_on_di.php
Oy. I have loved and lost many shows way too early, which upset me as much as I’m sure you Moonlight fans are upset. But once the show is gone, you suck it up and move on. All you are doing is casting your fellow fans in an extremely poor light. The Moonlight fandom doesn’t need even more negative publicity. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, go check out http://www.journalfen.net/community/fandom_wank/)
Joe, You can keep up with the weekly WWE ratings here:
http://tvbythenumbers.com/category/ratings/top-sports/wwe-ratings
Here are some facts from 2007.
From this site, around October 26 last year:
8:00 NBC Deal or No Deal 10.5 2.3/8
CBS Ghost Whisperer 9.87 2.7/10
ABC Grey’s Anatomy (Repeat) 4.31 1.3/5
CW Friday Night Smackdown 4.61 1.4/5
FOX The Next Great American Band 2.87 1.2/4
9:00 ABC Women’s Murder Club 8.9 2.0/6
CBS Moonlight 8.56 2.4/7
NBC Friday Night Lights 5.88 2.0/6
10:00 CBS Numb3rs 9.68 2.7/8
NBC Las Vegas 8.18 2.4/8
ABC Men in Trees 6.51 1.7/5
From a Variery article, November 13, 2007:
Net also continues to shine Friday, where rising rookie “Moonlight” (2.5/7 in 18-49, 7.90m) seems to be lifting the shows surrounding it. “Ghost Whisperer” had its best showing since February (2.9/9, 9.85m) and “Numbers” (2.8/8, 9.94m) matched its season highs in demos.
On January 18, 2008, which was the last episodes shown for thes shows until they came back after the strike in April
GW 2.8
ML 2.4
Numb3rs 2.5
These demos were from Marc Berman’s site.
When the shows came back, in their run from April to May, they all diminished in viewers and demo, although actually Moonlight didn’t diminish that much in viewer numbers, but it fell to the 1.8/1.9 demo in its very last episodes.
Think what you want. However, what a difference a year makes, and not necessarily a good one. Ghost Whisperer is more like Numb3rs, Numb3rs seems more like Moonlight in its “numbers,” and The Ex-List, unless something really changes, seems to be nowhere, and will probably be nowhere on a tv schedule quite soon.
Please don’t tell me The Ex List is doing good in Demo. Only got 5.71 millions this week, lost almost 1 million from last week, I bet advertisers must be happy.
But some people just don’t get it. The problem was not just Moonlight cancelation , it was how it was made. CBS misleaded us with a sure 2nd season , put a good for nothing demo phone line to trick us , said we almost not send letters or mails , we were called whiners , actor centrics….So you bet , this is more than just a show being canceled, it is about a total lack of respect for us from CBS.
You can bet probably between 1.5 or 2 million people are not watching CBS in Fridays like us , and these type of numbers for a Friday are enough to kill a show.
CBS left us with a show with no closure, with not proper ending, and we did not deserve that. We were loyal, with just 16 episodes..The show won a People’s choice award and won always it’s time slot. The show did not deserve cancelation and us viewers deserved a little more of respect from CBS.
For us , no more CBS fridays Nights until we get what we deserve, a proper ending in our Moonlight story.
There a lot of channels to spend Fridays nights, and if not we always have our Moonlight recordings.
Exactly, and Susan, I don’t watch Pushing Daises but I woluld not presume that it was a bad show just because of meager ratings, and you shouldn’t talk that way about another person’s favorite show either.
The fact is CBS is continuing to marginalize this fan base in their programming. They thought that this was the direction TV was going into when they sighned on Joel Silver, but they decided to broaden their procedurals instead, now scifi/fantasy has taken a back burner. They did not even pretend to promote the show, it aired and that was it. If a show like this airs without my taking notice of it – then something is wrong with its marketing. CBS has failed its audience.
The point is that CBS, concerning this one spot on their schedule, has got tunnel vision, or something. No matter what one thinks about Moonlight, CBS keeps on stupidly trying to find something to do better in that time slot on Friday night, and they keep on doing worse. Yes, in retrospect they should have kept Close to Home-they should have kept Christian Kane on the show, what a doll he is-but they didn’t, and at the present time it looks like they should have taken the chance on the second season of Moonlight. Perhaps Moonlight would have “tanked,” but it may have gained viewers who take a look at shows that make the cut to see if they missed something and like the show themselves, and perhaps it may have kept the viewers it did have. All moot, at this point in terms of Moonlight, yes, but CBS keeps on crashing and burnning concerning this. Actually, it could be considered four shows if you included Close to Home’s predecessor, Threshold, which, unless the Ex-List is cancelled soon, was canceled faster than the rest. To be fair, CBS did try to salvage Threshold, but it didn’t help any at the time.
I think a post of mine got eaten by the spam filter.
byeu says:
October 11th, 2008 at 6:26 pm
“Actually, it could be considered four shows if you included Close to Home’s predecessor, Threshold, which, unless the Ex-List is canceled soon, was canceled faster than the rest.”
CBS swapped ‘Threshold’ and ‘Close To Home’, moving the former from Friday to Tuesday (with the latter moved from Tuesday to Friday).
As for moving ‘The Mentalist’ or ‘Eleventh Hour’ to the Friday night 9 E/8 C time slot: unless if you are looking for the early demise of either show, I would advise against such a suggestion.
Julia, it did…not sure why since it only had the one link. usually there is rhyme and reason to it, but not always, sorry. i de-spammed it.
GHOST WHISPERER IS A GREAT SHOW, SO GALD CBS KEEPS IT ON FRIDAYS!
The EX LIST is HORRIBLE TRASH!
Moonlight was such a good show, and great to be on after GW, too bad CBS made a huge mistake and let it go, it had alot of fans and viewers!
CBS , next time listen to the fans!
If cbs had had two brain cells to rub together, they would have promoted Moonlight the way they do The Ex-List and Moonlight would probably still be on the air. Unfortunately, I believe cbs wanted Moonlight to fail from the get go. I saw NO advertising of Moonlight. I happened upon the show by accident but from the first two minutes, I loved the show. If you want to sit there and bash a show you’ve never watched, be my guest, but have the guts to say you didn’t watch it. As for The Ex-List, I have not watched it simply because of it’s premise of a woman not being complete without a man. I am the complete package, men are just the accessories.
Bob,
I think you’ll find that Twilight does Harry Potter numbers at the box office. Every teenage girl in the U.S. is going to see it and probably more than once.
The Ex list lost viewers and Numbers is not doing as well this season. Methinks the Moonlight fans were helping Numbers. The Ex List is sure not helping anyone. CBS made a big mistake cancelling Moonlight. I try to stay away from CBS shows as much as possible. Color me bitter, disgruntled-why yes!
Sue, interesting theory, but Ghost Whisperer did *better* than it did the comparable day the previous season, were the Moonlight fans helping or hurting there? Or perhaps, like with Numb3rs, there is some other explanation.
That points out the silliness in many of the Moonlight comments. Very little, if anything, that happens to CBS, or on Friday nights can be explained by what happened or didn’t happen to Moonlight for god sakes.
Mr. Gorman, you guys argue facts and figures on this site. OK. I truly wish that many Moonlight fans would quite trying to argue the merits of the quality of the show-the storyline, the romance, etc.-because that is totally subjective. Some people don’t see the appeal, and their minds are not going to be changed. You and Mr. Seidman could certainly block out anyone who you feel is undesirable as posters, if you decide to.
However, by the figures from this site, Moonlight, last year, along with Ghost Whisperer and Numb3rs, won the night for CBS all season, such as it was, in both audience numbers and demographics. Yes, Moonlight was the slowest runner in the race, so to speak, but in a race it doesn’t matter whether you beat your competition by a tenth of a second or five minutes, it matters whether you cross the finish line first, with maybe a few exceptions. Moonlight had low demographics, but it beat out everything that was put against it, even it was by just by degrees. It usually stayed somewhere between 2.1 and 2.4. Those are the facts. CBS did cancel the show, for whatever reason, and now they have an even lower performing show in its place-even Moonlight usually got 5 million something viewers on its reruns, not a first run show. Whether or not the fact that Moonlight is not on the schedule is having an effect on Numb3rs performance this year is not, at least easily, I assume, “quantifiable,” but even though it can’t be said that it has had an effect, it can’t be said definitively that it hasn’t, either. At this point, it’s just an opinion, either way. Whatever the reason, Numb3rs certainly, so far, is not performing like it did the year before, and that is not good for that show, obviously, and hopefully it won’t degrade further in its numbers.
I think that it would be to CBS’ great advantage from a public relations point of view if, the next time they do “cancel” a show, they take a more sympathetic, mea culpa tone, and explain that, since their audience is older, they simply must have the large numbers, like NCIS, or the ones The Mentalist has gotten so far(even though The Mentalist was 3rd in the demo in spite of its big audience)to satisfy the sdvertisers. It probably won’t suit everybody-that’s not possible, but it would soften the blow and they would come over less as “corporate meanies” that just spend millions of dollars on productions that they have no intention of trying to allow to find an audience, and take a tax write-off or something on it, and then start the process all over again, with the catch-all excuse of “It’s just business.”
byeu, you seem to be saying that CBS needs to try to please its audience. I think you mean this in a keep the customer happy sort of way. But you forget, CBS’s customers are the advertisers. They did keep them happy by canceling Moonlight.
The idea that CBS should apologize to fans of every show they cancel is laughable. Every season shows get canceled. It’s the way the TV industry works. Not many shows make it and fewer are real hits. If the audience of any show decided to take that personally, that is their own problem, not that of the network.
And don’t try to argue that it should be CBS’s problem because LOOK! The fans won’t watch CBS so one show is doing poorly! There are shows every season that do poorly, and this season, one of them is The Ex-List. Last season, one of them was Moonlight. It’s simply the way things work. Even if there were a correlation between Moonlight getting canceled and The Ex-List doing poorly, there is absolutely no way to prove it and CBS doesn’t really have much to worry about when they are still winning the night, and much of their Fall lineup is up.
So, sorry, but it’s just business.
As far as “The EX List” goes, I liked what’s her name when she was on Grey’s Anatomy, but does anybody really believe she can carry a show? Forgive me, but at the risk of appearing rude, she just doesn’t have the chops! Nevermind the fact that it is a show about a girl who can’t be complete without a man…pardon me, but since when are women incomplete and desparate if they happen to be single? How demeaning and insulting! No, the Ex List will become an EX alright from the look and sound of what I’ve seen so far. It can’t hold a candle to Moonlight. And, for the record I no longer watch CBS anymore either! Do they care? Probably not…but I care…especially when we are mislead and outright lied to, not to mention shown a shocking lack of respect…Bye bye CBS!
Just have to add to the crazy funny Moonlight fan comments.
The Axe List is history! VvvV
I’ve now got HBO at home and I’m enjoying True Blood.
A lot of people are groaning over Moonlight Fans comments, but the fact of the matter is that Moonlight was a better show, just read the reviews. I think that it was zap2it that referred to it as a snooze -o-rama. When it boils right down to it, it is a bad show that is simply doing poorly in its timeslot. Too bad Nina squashed Moonlight, if she was not so set in her ways, Moonlight would be on the CW, or they could have run reruns by now. I wonder how it does in its WBLA timelsot, probably not all too hot though, considering they don’t even advertise the show. They advertise Bigshots, a show that has maybe 11 episodes to its name and produced by another network, but not Moonlight, is there some conspiracy going on here? If I didn’t have the bad habit of leaving the TV on mute while I do other things, and constantly flipping through channels during commercials, I would have never have seen Moonlight and have missed out on one of the greatest fantasy/romance experiences of my lifetime.
Dear Moonlight Fans
Yes there is a conspiracy by CBS to lose money by throwing away those shows that have a little fanbase. They are doing it to deliberately anger each one of you personally.
Guys, face it, if CBS could have made money they would have, Moonlight wasn’t going to make money for them or the CW. Now move on and find something else to obsess over.
Please stop blaming CBS for cancelling someone that not enough of you liked, they need the mass market with some good demo scores, Moonlight did not provide it to them
THE EX-LIST: SNOOZORAMA READ HERE http://blog.zap2it.com/ithappenedlastnight/2008/10/the-ex-list-sno.html
THEN COMPARE IT TO MOONLIGHT: http://www.ramblingsofatvwhore.com/2007/09/20/a-moonlight-review/
Moonlight got some bad reviews, but mostly based on rumor, by mid season it was great, something to look forward to on a Friday night, would it have done better if Nina Tassler decided to up the budget on promotion the way Scifi did with Eureka, Oh Year! Believe me. It started off as, but looked like it could turn into a prolific Buffy the Vampire Slayer fave instead. Incidentally the same guy who created Beauty and the Beast created Moonlight, it had a chance at a pretty much extensive run. It is a real shame, one worth crying over.
Eureka episoed review: http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethebox/2007/09/feeling-hot-hot.html
Eureka scifi site: http://www.scifi.com/eureka/
check out the podcasts on the downloads page it is really awesome.
So glad GW is doing so well.Jennifer is really good in it her acting has really improved.
Tonny Tonny Tonny, it wasn’t that they took it off the air, it’s the fact that they led us to believe that the show would be back for a second season, that the story line would continue and instead is taken off the air for one of the executives friends ideas of a woman who isn’t complete without a man. Doesn’t that way of thinking go back to the 15th century? Honestly if that was the way the world felt, there’d be a whole lot of women out there visiting those “fortune tellers”. I wouldn’t be one of them because I am the complete package, men are just the accessories. Oh yeah, VSRRR!!!
“Please stop blaming CBS for cancelling someone that not enough of you liked, they need the mass market with some good demo scores, Moonlight did not provide it to them”
I blame CBS for not promoting the show, for lying to fans, and for disrespecting fans. Whether canceling Moonlight was a good decisions I can’t say because I know that I’m biased. However, canceling Moonlight to put on The Ex-List I think is something that I think we can all agree, based on the numbers, was a bad decision.
When the season started last year, Mr. Gorman noted “overall ratings for network television were considerably softer compared to one year earlier.” He theorized that increased DVR usage was one explanation and I think the looming writer’s strike could also have played a role. Especially given GW’s bounce from last year (although the marketing campaign by CBS also likely helped). But while GW is up from last year, Numb3rs,a show that is more likely to be affected by its lead-in, is down by about 1 million viewers. For all its faults, Moonlight never did that but The Ex-List does. And this is despite facing less competition than Moonlight did at this time last year.
Gwen, almost everything, across the board is down. In all likelihood, Moonlight’s numbers would look just like The Ex-List or even worse if it had returned.
Thanks Bill for the WWE ratings link
i hate all you guys for not watching Life
sorry raz, but like I said before I hardly watch anything on tv anymore, ‘cept the occational Monk marathon on USA, Eureka, and reruns of Moonlight – I’ll check out Life for you next week, but that probably won’t do any good considering I live in the Caribbean.
Why hide it? I am gloating that The Ex-List is getting even worse numbers than Swingtown! I took one look at the concept and predicted no one would want to watch it.
It is a waste of time and money for CBS to keep trying out series after series, when they had a obvious winner with Moonlight. CBS failed to promote Moonlight adequately, and didn’t give it a chance on another evening (Wednesdays would have been good, there is often nothing worth watching on Wednesdays).
CBS should take the Ex-List off the air and rerun the first season of Moonlight. Meanwhile, they should start making the second season. Then they should spend a lot more effort marketing the series.
I have heard that CBS is STILL shopping Swingtown around to cable networks. I have heard that some of the sponsers are refusing to back it anymore! Why don’t they put some of that effort into marketing Moonlight?
A good example of what they can do is the way that NBC is promoting CHUCK, a cute, quirky comedy that they were considering cancelling. NBC decided that CHUCK was a good bet after all, and they stepped up the marketing, including having the star promoting other shows. They also created an animated graphic novel series on the website that is really cute!
CBS imagines themselves to be forward thinking, but I think they can take a lesson from other networks!
Tonny
I disagree with you. I say that Moonlight would have started making money for CBS if they had marketed it properly and given it another season to prove itself.
Seinfeld was not a big hit right away: it took a couple of seasons to catch on! Once it did, it was unstopable.
Moonlight is a very entertaining high quality series, with fantastic writing, amazing art direction, a charasmatic cast who have wonderful chemistry with each other, great photograhpy, gorgeous lighting, and belongs to a popular-and-growing genre of vampire romance. Moonlight took the audience through the full gamit of emotions, offering us romance, joy, laughter, romance, sorrow, suspense, tension, action, romance, nostalgia, love, really evil bad guys… did I mention romance? Moonlight is the ONE truly romantic show I have EVER seen on television. A love story is not the same as a romance. This is something that most studio executives can’t get through their heads. Good romance has a major element of suspense to it, and it is the suspense that arouses the passions of a woman, not people meeting and junping into bed like trained fleas. Wham, bam, thank you m’am just doesn’t make my putter flutter!
Why does CBS think that some shows gather a strong fanbase while being so-so in ratings? That seems to be a huge mystery to them. As a viewer who, despite loving many shows, found that NOTHING I had ever watched achieved what Moonlight does, I think it’s pretty clear: those shows raise passions because they are excellent, but don’t get huge numbers of viewers because of blatant lack of promotion. Myself, and the majority of ML fans I blog with, feel that we were so lucky to discover Moonlight. I used to watch CBS very, very regularly at the time, and only saw a couple of promos for the show before it premiered. Compare that to the effort they put in with say swingtown, to take a famous example. Not to mention that they remained clueless why the show was succesful, and interfered negatively by trying to push the procedural envelop, presumably because it works so well for CSI (sure it does, but that does not imply that everything that works works for that reason). Recent comments suggesting that Moonlight’s appeal was purely due to its lead could not prove more eloquently that they did not understand why those who love it do. Moonlight definitely has the potential to be a big ratings success.
The smart thing to do right now if possbile in practice would indeed be to rerun the first season of ML, (sure reruns don’t do well in ratings either, to be sure, but then again that would cost them less money), and get season 2 ready to kick in right after that. (And no it would not be like what happened with Jericho: Jericho had like 6 eps shoved in the middle of the summer before it carried on this year).
Here’s what everyone is missing: CBS showed a real arrogance towards its viewers, and that disrespect has made many “Moonlight” fans leave forever. This is not just bad manners, it’s BAD BUSINESS. Read any of C.K. Prahalad’s papers on “co-creation” and you’ll see what I mean. (Yes, I’m an academic–actually a doctoral student right now.) My point is that the “we’re the experts and will choose what we offer you” business philosophy is FAILING in America–look at GM and a lot of other US businesses and how they’re going down. The hottest thing in business right now is the “co-creation” idea where customers actually get involved in the development of the products they buy–and CBS had a perfect opportunity here to do that with a very involved fan base and multiple “Moonlight” web sites. Mine the web sites for fans’ ideas for plots and the show’s direction. Figure out what they like and what they want.
Sorry CBS, you not only blew it with “Moonlight”, but you blew it with nearly everything you are doing, from the fans to the writers to the producers and to the sponsors. The bad taste left from the abrupt cancellation of “Moonlight” will last a very long time for a lot of viewers.
angelscrest
You are funny, putting Moonlight on Wednesday. In what timeslot, 9h00 to 10h00 or 10h00 to 11h00?. Of course CBS would have to move Criminal Minds or CSI:NY two its best performers in the ratings this season, 16.00Millions viewers with demo 4.3 for CM and 15.90Millions viewers and 4.0 demo for CSI:NY to make way for Moonlight with its 8.00millions viewers and 2.0 demo….right with that decision Nina Tassler would have lost her job!
As for how NBC did promote Chuck well it isn’t paying that much Chuck is at the bottom of the rattings, it started the season with 6.84Millions viewers and a 2.7 demo and a week later it lost 1Millions viewers and 0.4 in the demo.
Looking at how well CBS is doing, I say CBS was right to cancel Moonlight to try something else, something that would have performed better, at least to ghost whisperer and Numb3rs level. Unfortunately for people working on the Ex-List, the show isn’t getting any ratings that would justified keeping it on the schedule. So if 11th hour isn’t doing better in the upcoming weeks, I think CBS will move 11th hour on Friday in the Ex-List spot.
Ed,
What’s your thesis on, conspiracy theories and misinformation?
Moonlight’s cancellation was not abrupt. Indeed, even its fans were worried about it and bracing for it weeks in advance of it actually happening.
It’s you who is being arrogant. Co-creation is BS proliferated by dopes like you. CSI, Two and a Half Men, The Mentalist, Criminal Minds, NFL Football — oh gosh golly, CBS is blowing it soooo bad. But how come none of those shows is hurting as a result of the Moonlight fans not watching CBS?
Tiger Woods being injured impacted CBS ratings more than a few crazy and disgruntled Moonlight fans who claim to not watch any shows at all on CBS anymore.
Given the economy, it’s going to be fairly bleak for all broadcast networks as far as advertising revenue goes. You gonna blame the Dow falling over 20% on CBS’ decision to cancel Moonlight, too?
I am also a Moonlight fan. It was because of Moonlight that I started watching CBS on Friday evenings. In the past I would only watch Ghost Whisperer if there wasn’t anyting else on TV on Friday nights. Once Moonlight was on, I watched Ghost Whisperer every Friday. As far as I Numbers is concerned, I had only watched about three episodes the whole time it has been on the air. I don’t care for the CSI shows, because in my opinion they are all alike. I don’t watch Big Brother or Survivor, and in my opinion they are not good shows for children to watch. Should children really learn how to backstab and manipulate other people into getting what they want? I don’t think so. The Ex-List is degrading to women. At least with Moonlight the whole family (children over the age of 10) could sit down together to watch it. It is a comedy, romance, detective story, and good winning over evil all in one show. When the hour long episode ended every Friday it left you wanting more. It wasn’t just Alex who kept me glued to the set every Friday. It was the on screen chemistry of Alex, Sophia and Jason in my opinion that made the show work. If Nina Tassler is the main person doing the programming at CBS, she has a lot to learn. I no longer watch CBS. Why should I bother when I can find better programming on another station, watch a movie, chat on line with my friends, or just enjoy a good book. This is just my opinion, and we are not all going to agree.
Well, Cindy, it seems like you didn’t really have much of an effect on CBS by turning off your TV. Ghost Whisperer has gone up in ratings since you swore CBS off. And you never really watched Numb3rs, so that can’t be your triumph either. But good work!
R Viewer
OK, so let them try Moonlight on a different night. I find Wednesdays is empty of anything I want to see, so I picked Wednesdays. I really don’t care, because I was happy with it on Fridays. Moonlight is a better show getting better numbers on Fridays than either Swingtown or Ex-List, and I still say that CBS made a huge mistake by spending all the money and effort trying out lousy shows to replace it.
You are not going to be able to tell the true viewership of Chuck until later in the season, when Dancing With the Stars scales back the number of hours it is on the air. Anything you put up against that show is going to suffer.
I still like the campaign that NBC is doing with Chuck. It is worth going to their website and taking a look at the animation. Chuck is the only really clever, original action/comedy on the air. All the other so-called comedies consist of people sitting around in one room trading insults. Zzzzzz! I was over that before Cheers was cancelled!
Cindy– I am just like you, except that I didn’t even watch Ghost Whisperer before I found Moonlight, and only watched it because I didn’t want to miss a second of Moonlight. I left the TV on and also watched numbers. But now, I don’t watch GW or #s, because they just don’t interest me enough.
I am eagerly awaiting Crusoe, because it looks like it was written with someone who has at least 2 brain cells they can rub together!
Moonlight is history-sad for some of us, but true. According to your own flipping facts, Mr. Seidman, the show won the demo last year-how ever marginally-consistently. That is a fact. Was it enough for CBS? No, that is also a fact, but it doesn’t negate the fact that the show did beat its competition all season in either actual numbers, demo, or both, whether it was Women’s Murder Club, Friday Night Lights, or Dateline. Why is that so difficult to acknowledge? It was probably the behind the scenes turmoil that caused CBS to really give the show the axe. Perhaps without that they would have given it at least another partial season, but that is conjecture, as no one will ever know.
The Mentalist is supposed to be a success, even after two shows, because of its huge numbers, I assume. However, as much as I like Simon Baker, his show still, so far, has not beat its competition in the demo, coming in third behind Fringe, on Fox, and Dancing With the Stars on ABC. Maybe the big numbers will insulate it for a while, but if its demo the CBS wants, The Mentalist, so far, isn’t delivering that, either. Perhaps when the Dancing show finishes that will help The Mentalist, depending on what takes its place.
Robert I would love for you to ask Nina Tassler why they did not promote Moonlight or show off Alex and Jason on the Late Show or the Late Late Show? I am willing to bet you that she don’t have a valid reason for doing so. Don’t tell me that from September when the show premiered and May when it left the air did you see Alex or Jason or Sophia on Ellen or any other talk show? They did not even make it to the Early Show till Fated to Pretend was going to air did Alex show up. So go to it Robert let me know what you find out.
Ayla
Bill, can you please never mention Moonlight in future Friday overnight reports again?
These fans are completely nuts, and it wouldn’t surprise me if they arrive here by continually searching news.google for the show title. (Frankly, the show was amazingly poorly written garbage anyway. Personally I wanted it renewed just to see how incredibly bad it could get and what new depths it could plunder.)
I feel the way a lot of loyal Moonlight fans feel. I don’t watch cbs any longer, because of what Nina said about the fans. I don’t want to watch a network who is so disrespectful of their fans and their opinions, and why get hooked on one of their shows when it might be cancelled before it is even given a chance. They seem to do that more than the other networks do.
Jack, it wouldn’t matter. Anything that has even the most tenuous connection with Moonlight including anything about CBS, Friday night, other “similar” shows (so broadly defined at times to mean almost anything) draws them out. Since it cannot be helped, I simply decided to have a bit of fun.
*Humbled* thank you for the tacit acknowledgement there Bill, you have moved me a great deal.
Moving on (well sort of) two things have perked my interest. Two shows that Universal Studios produce are being sponsored more unconventionally this season, most likely due to the cause of the writers strike – That is Eureka by degree deodorant, and Friday Night Lights by Direct Tv, I realize that NBC is down ratings wise, But how do these shows match up against the overall competition so far. I mean Eureka signed up for 21 episodes with Scifi, but only 8 aired during the summer. And how did Friday Night Lights do in its timeslot. Are people really going through the trouble to switch in the States just because of FNL?
Do you see this as a real trend happening even though it is just Universal going this far at this stage, or simply a necessity of the writers strike?
Oh, and this weekend I have decided to stop watching my reruns of this series and to take a little break. I am just going to wait until Christmas eve at midnight after its a wonderful life – I’m going to watch all the episodes of Moonlight, maybe then I’ll be able to let go of the series. *Sigh* I feel as though my fanatasism has taken control of my life
Good for you for acknowledging what we’ve been telling you, moonlightfan. Now if only your friends could realize it, too.
I can’t recall the exactly rating for FNL, but I saw it somewhere and it was very very small. I believe it may have been 200,000? Possibly as much as 500,000. I can’t find where I saw it.
^^According to the NY Times “TV Decoder”, it was 400,000 (I don’t want to post the link since the spam filter doesn’t seem to like that).
I wonder whether that’s good or bad, really. I doubt we’ll ever know what the deal was, so it will be hard to judge unless DirecTV does it again next season.
byeu, Winning the demo in a timeslot can be a factor, but it isn’t a major factor. Last year, CBS had a show that never even came close to winning the demo for its timeslot. It would have a slight edge on overall viewers, but loose by at least a full demo point. Still, there is no way CBS would have canceled it in favor of keeping Moonlight, which won in the demo even when it lost in viewers. Why? Because, despite loosing to Grey’s in the demo each week, CSI was still the highest rated show on the network. Moonlight won in the demo, but was still the lowest rated scripted show on the network, and that’s why it got canceled.
The last airing of The Mentalist got TWICE as many demo viewers as the last airing of Moonlight.
Holly, sorry about our spam filter. The way it’s *supposed* to work is to catch only comments with more than two links. Usually it does behave as it should, but sometimes it acts as irrationally as a spurned Moonlight fan. Sorry.
Julia, I know about the amount of viewers who watched FNL but I wonder if it is that important since it did in the 100 thousands? Maybe it is better to see how it does when it airs on NBC mid-season. Lets see if word of mouth really helps it out. A lot of sites said it was a good show, and that it was 10 more minutes longer than usual. I guess the demo would only be something to talk about once it starts airing on NBC. I hope that this would become a real trend though, maybe future shows we care about so much would not get canceled because of fabricated excuses dolled up by the execs. I believe that if Moonlight was a Universal show it would have come to this point as well, they would have found a sponsor just like they had for Eureka and FNL. Two great shows that are being given a chance to prosper and grow.
Watching Moonlight made me crave Forever Night and Beauty and the Beast from my childhood again. I would really like to check out True Blood. Sanctuary was ok, but I’m in the market for something more upbeat I guess on a Friday, and less dark. Like Moonlight. That is why I love Eureka so much, all the outside scenery, it truely captures the essence of a home town feel in the wilderness. I hope I can get hooked on True Blood like I had Moonlight. FNL premier on NBC would be something to see.
Check out Eureka Unscripted: http://eurekaunscripted.tumblr.com/
I find that it is really cool that tv show cyber stalkers such as myself can get this much material to become preoccupied with. ><
Don’t know if nebody seen this one, but here is an over the phone conversation with the show runner that quit cbs. I knew cbs was a bad employer, never knew they were this bad??
http://www.nj.com/entertainment/tv/index.ssf/2008/09/sepinwall_on_tv_diane_ruggiero_2.html
Doubt the Israli version would turn out to be any better. It has to do with the premise of the show, the fact that she has to go back and revisit all these guys is what makes it seem so lame, like the character is a whore or something. Women tend to like it when they have to choose between two guys, both enamored with the female lead. But I guess this show won’t last long enough for the producers to get a clue.
I cannot help but observe that last season “Friday Night Lights” averaged a 1.9 rating and a 6 share on NBC from Sept 07-Feb 08, before considering its significant DVR+3 day audience, which boosted the rating another 20 percent or so. Look at NBC’s pitiful Friday night now! 1.2/4 for “Americas Toughest Jobs,” 1.5/5 for the overexposed “Deal or No Deal,” and 1.4/4 for “Life.”
How is this an improvement? NBC has to wait until February to air “Friday Night Lights” again as its hard-core fans are already enjoying it if they subscribe to Direct TV. Who is running the show over there at NBC???
“Disgruntled Moonlight fans, we await your tenuous cause and effect comments!”
I don’t have to explain cause and effect to folks who are supposed to be adults. The Numbers Speak for themselves. LAST YEAR, I watched Ghost Whisperer and Numbers just BECAUSE I was sitting watching Moonlight. In my opinion, it was the BEST show on TV, and when it was dropped – I left CBS cause nothing else they had was worth my time. I believe they made a huge mistake not working to keep that show. Yes, I believe their “lost viewers” are a result of this choice. Myself – I will not go back to CBS until Moonlight is returned with Munson’s & Koslow’s storyline and with it’s cast intact. MY Choice.
“Reality Bites!”
OlWolf, I rate that an 8/10 for tenuous cause and effect!
Ghost Whisperer is UP compared to last season, so your anecdotal “I abandoned CBS on Friday” isn’t exactly widespread is it?
Bill- I know that Ghost Whisperer did well this past week, but it didn’t have any competition. I am very interested in seeing how it does up against NBC’s Crusoe, (starting this Friday with a 2 hour premiere, I believe) which looks much better, has a hunky star and a classic, well-known storyline, and does not have the baggage of offending viewers that CBS has.
As I said before, GW did not interest me except as a lead in to Moonlight, and after Moonlight was cancelled, I never once felt the pull to watch it. I have watched some of their other shows, such as NCIS, Without A Trace, and CSI Miami, but don’t care enough about GW to keep watching it with no Moonlight to follow.
It will be interesting to see what happens when there is actually something worth watching on Friday nights.
Yes, Holly that’s true, since The Mentalist had twice the viewers as the last Moonlight, period, so that the odds of half of them being the required demo is certainly high, I would think. It still was the third demo behind its competition(Fringe-4.0, DWTS-3.7, Mentalist-3.5) but I like Simon Baker, so I hope that CBS certainly cuts the show some slack because it does have that big audience. Having said that, no judgment call CBS would make would surprise me. I believe that they made a judgement call on Moonlight, one I don’t agree with, obviosly. It’s one many of you do agree with, however, I can respect that, on the merits. There are lots of shows that other people love that I don’t give a fig about, but that’s ok, but I won’t criticize them just because I don’t like the show. However, there is a legitimate criticism of we Moonlight fans that the public venting needs to stop. I have always, personally, tried to argue the facts, as I have said, and not debate somebody because I happen to think it was a good show, and the other person didn’t. I still think the show should have had a shot, others don’t think it deserved one, so we can respectfully(I hope)agree to disagree. There still are times that referencing Moonlight can be a legitimate part of a debate.
“Co-creation is BS proliferated by dopes like you.”
Thank you, Robert. With as hard as I’m working on the academics while working a full-time job, I really appreciated the mock-out.
If you carry an iPhone, the next time you download one of the apps for your phone developed by other people than Apple, think of co-creation.
I think you’re a rude person. I’m done here.
To compare co-creation of software to broadcast network television is completely moronic.
Open source Wordpress with a bunch of people co-creating is awesome. That’s NOT CBS’ model, and to suggest that it is — just freaking stupid. That might not always be the case, but for now, and probably years and years to come — it will be. Perhaps you’re working too hard to think straight but that’s your problem, not mine. So, you’re an arrogant idiot and I’m rude. Life will go on.
“Swingtown” is a Summer show. Has nothing to do with the 9PM. Friday slot. That was a move by Tassler for the dull “Flashpoint” at 10PM. I don’t personally know what happened to “Moonlight” or why it wasn’t picked up by another station but “Swingtown” is going to Bravo for its first season re-airings, and apparently was picked up very quickly. Creator/producer Mike Kelley has a two year contract with CBS-Paramount. The media is still talking about “Swingtown.” CBS has not made any official statement of it being terminated or renewed as of yet.
But by all means, I’m enjoying the vampires feasting on Ex List’s slowly rotting carcass.
Some cross-polinating of ideas into different areas is a well-established source of breakthroughs. That’s why many teams formed by knowledge mangement savvy companies like HP and others often have one or more members from an entirely different discipline. Might even work for TV…
Nice use of hot words like “stupid”, “idiot” and “moronic”. Good job name-calling. Nice manners.
Ed, stop being an idiot in public and nobody will ever call you a moron.
P.S. I thought you were done here. So you’re an idiot and a liar. So typical.
Another Moonlight fan here. Do I want more Moonlight? YES! Will I watch whatever venue it is on? YES! Do I care one iota if anthing on CBS succeeds or fails? NO! I am one of many who are not going to be treated bady by anyone, including CBS, and continue to support that enterprise. Especially when said enterprise offers nothing remotely enticing to this customer! They have tanked too many good shows, I don’t trust them and won’t risk getting involved in a good show only to have it pulled in a rush. In the end its not about CBS. It is about the power of the individual to decide where to spend their time and advertising dollars. Until CBS gets their collective head on straight, I’m not buying whatever they are selling.
I WILL NOT WATCH CBS. I LOVED JERICHO AS WELL AS MOONLIGHT AND I HAVE MISSED THEM. I BELIVE WHAT BGC SAID IN THE COMMENT ABOVE. THERE IS NOTHING MORE TO BE SAID.
GMC
Wow–gotta clean off my computer screen–lots of venom spewing going on here. After being on the “boards” with other Moonlight fans since May, I’ve found them to be mostly genuinely good, kind, caring people–much like the actors in the show, who also seem to be genuine and humane. Moonlight was definitely a cut above the rest of TV as far as the quality of the show, the caliber of the cast, and the type of viewer it attracted. I realize that the networks would rather have cheese-puff munching, non-working folks with no disposable income but what the government sends them every month, watching their TV shows! Hey–as long as they fit the “demo,” who cares if their houses have wheels? I’ll never understand the demo thing; as a Baby Boomer with lots of cash to buy everything the advertisers show me, I don’t get that I’m 50 and don’t count in the demo! Why is it better to have 18-year-old viewers who have to borrow mascara money from Mom? I can buy a Lexus, and I even buy Pampers for the grandkids. But I digress.
–
Moonlight was, simply put, the most addictive show I have ever watched in my long life as a TV viewer. CBS has always been my favorite network. Moonlight was trashed before it had a chance to get going, so for all kinds of reasons listed above, I don’t watch CBS anymore. I’ve seen Swingtown go down in Moonlight’s time slot, and I see Ex-List tanking as well. Who can say we “disgruntled fans” are not making life a little miserable for CBS? Are you so sure about that?–all of you wise dispensers of viper juice and snarkiness? I’m proud to be among the viewers who recognized Moonlight for what it was and always will be: a beautiful show, shot in a “noir” style that was different (!) from the other mediocre fare, with brilliant actors who meshed exactly as you want a cast to do, which had an actual HERO every week pitting himself against evil and winning! and this made it the best show on television, whether people found it or not.
Yup CW put these two comedies on Friday nights and its a shame. I wish there was something I could do, but I cant, CW will never listen!!