Our Renew / Cancel Index predicts potential renewal or cancellation for scripted broadcast primetime shows for the 2010-11 season (results through October 25, 2009):
- Likely To Be Canceled By May, 2010
- Some Danger Of Being Canceled By May, 2010
- Likely to Be Renewed For The 2010-11 Season
| Program | Renew/ Cancel Index |
| The Beautiful Life: TBL (P) | 0.49* |
| Melrose Place (P) | 0.65 |
| Smallville (F), (P) | 0.83 |
| 90210 (P) | 0.88 |
| One Tree Hill (P) | 0.92 |
| Gossip Girl (P) | 0.93 |
| Supernatural (S), (P) | 0.93 |
| Vampire Diaries (P) | 1.28 |
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Smallville fans wary of the motives of CW Chief Dawn Ostroff should be sleeping easily. With the relatively good ratings its getting on Friday (relatively better for its network than any other Friday scripted show on any network), she’s not going to be able to cancel it. Of course, if the producers or stars don’t want to continue that’s another story.
The Renew / Cancel Index for CW shows is likely to look pretty much as it does now for several months, with Melrose Place the only show certain to be canceled and all the rest in good shape. That being the case, just like last season with Privileged I’m certain that there are entertainment bloggers out there that will raise the (false) hopes of fans (and their pageviews) with ridiculous “There’s Hope For Melrose Place!” stories.
Who do you think will be first?
*I have frozen The Beautiful Life’s Index at its value the week of cancellation.
This is a breakdown of CW scripted shows and their renewal and cancellation prospects. Here are links to the other networks:
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Notes:
The Renew/Cancel Index is a show’s Season To Date adults 18-49 rating divided by its network’s Season to Date average 18-49 rating. If a show’s season to date 18-49 ratings average equalled its network’s 18-49 average, the show would have an Index of 1.00. Without special factors, scripted shows that were more than 10% below their network’s average are typically canceled by the end of the broadcast primetime season.
Factors that could cause a show to be renewed with well below average index:
- (F) -Fridays: Shows airing on Fridays have been renewed with significantly lower than average Indexes.
- (S) – Syndication: Shows nearing syndication (66-88 episodes), often have economic factors that trump ratings leading to renewal.
- (T) – Third Party: Shows that have a portion of their cost underwritten by a 3rd party can be renewed with substantially lower ratings.
- (P) – Produced by the network’s production company – For shows on the bubble, being produced by the network’s corporate production company can be a survival advantage. For real losers, it’s unlikely to help.
While I initially tried to designate shows with “plum” timeslots, I think that’s hard to make that call at this point in the season. It’s likely still a factor, but will have to be an “after the fact” call.
What’s the History of the Index and How Did It Do In the Past? Check out the results from the 2007-8 season and the 2008-9 season.
Nielsen TV Ratings Data: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved. All ratings used are Live+Same Day viewing.
Thanks for the article, Bill! Very good news for this Smallville fan hoping for a Season 10. The showrunners, Tom Welling and Erica Durance are all on record as being on board for a tenth season, so hopefully the future looks bright! =)
Hey Bill, personally I see the show getting renewed because of the WB. The show makes alot of profits in other places(DVDs, itunes, foriegn markets) for the WB, so as long as those places cover some of the expenses for the show it most likely will find it’s way for a S10.
Let’s face it I really don’t see anything the CW can put on Fridays that would get 2M viewers other then Vampire Diaries and the Top Model show(and I don’t see either moving there anytime soon). Any new series the network put there would most likely fail.
I hope they get a Season 10 and make it the last. Plan it from the beginning as the last season and go out with a bang!
Finally, good news about SV. I’ve been worried about the show. It’s my favorite show but I haven’t been able to watch it religiously as I used to because of the Friday schedule. I still DVR it though! I have all the seasons on DVD and I want a season 10!
Thanks for the awesome news & even better “title”.
This is Smallville’s best season to date writing/acting wise. Budget was a little more enjoyable in earlier seasons…but I’m NOT complaining as long as we get season 10!!
I hope the ratings continue to rise.
I agree. Carry it through to ten seasons, and go out on a high note (hopefully) with the series finale of season 10.
I agree. Season 10 should be the series finale. I never thought I would say this, but I am hoping for a 10 because this season has been good.
Welling might not be wearing the suit, they may be calling his alter ego the blur, the blur can’t fly, but for all intents and purposes he is finally Superman in spirit at least.
I’d like to see them have one more season with these kinds of stories then call it day!
W 18-34 avgs (6 eps for Thursdays, 7 for others):
GG 2.80, Vampire 2.72, Model 2.50, 90210 2.34, Hill 2.27, Place 1.68, Super 1.53
Gossip Girl this week was better than the last 2 eps which were devoid of anything really worth my time. So glad that it was boosted a bit. Might be because they actually focused on Jenny/Jonathan/Eric a little bit as I’m a tired of boring VDRL & increasingly annoying B/S/C/N interactions.
Smallville still is not the same without Michael Rosenbaum.
Smallville does better than any show on any network on a friday?
With 2.6? When it always comes in 3rd or 4th place?
Stop lying, please.
Sorry to say, but the hope being raised for MP isn’t false. They’re doing a lot to improve the show and it’s going to work. Dawn loves MP. Get used to it.
Learn to read, KCN.
Smallville gets better ratings relative to its network’s average.
Robert, Dawn loved Privileged too. Unless the miracle that is Heather Locklear can cause Melrose Place ratings lightening to strike twice, get used to the predictions that Melrose Place will not be renewed!
KILLCASTIELNOW, I’m sorry, but perhaps you’re too slow to understand the concept of “relative” performance. Smallville does better on Fridays vs. the rest of the CW line up than any other Friday show does vs. their own network. But I wrote that in the post. I’m not sure why I’d expect you to suddenly figure it out after I wrote it here.
My only question is will the stars of Supernatural want to keep going without Kripke.
Not bad at all for a show that only has 2 of the original stars from when it first premiered oh so long ago.
I hope the changes work. Finally got rid of Ashlee Simpson. Should never gave signed her thinking tabloids will attract viewers.
CW loves the women 18-34 for Melrose Place. I guess there thinking Heather Locklear can bring in mom’s and maybe there daughters will watch as well.
Shouldn’t OTH have a higher index score than GG since it had higher ratings this week?
i dont want season 10. both season 8 and 9 are terrible. mallville without lex and lionel is jst so booring!
It was posted this week in Ausiello’s blog that Melrose Place is giving Ashlee Simpson the boot as well as Ella’s boss. Heather Locklear is going to be Ella’s new boss. Should be great! Can’t wait.
Smallville has a really good chance for another year, it all depends on what CW wants to do. They could also keep Melrose is they really want the franchise to survive. SInce CW’s ratings are garbage, no one knows what will happen but every green series will be renewed.
I don’t think this is the best season of Smallville at all…
But I’ve really enjoyed it and love the fact that he wears an S o his chest now. The return of Green Lantern was awesome as well. I like the new episode angles. First the zombie one, and now last weeks was a ‘The Game’ / ‘Eagle Eye’ type plot… what’s next!?
Season 7, 8, and 9 are by far Smallvills best seasons, i have a feeling they already have a idea for the season 10 series finale and im sure they will go out with a bang! Tom and Erica already signed for season 10, although chloe hasnt and im sure this is her last season!! love this show.
Eric, you mean Green Arrow. Lantern hasn’t shown up yet. Neither has Batman or Wonder Woman. They’ve talked about having Batman on the show since season 2. Where is he?
Bring back Michael Rosenbaum for season 10 and go out on a high…
Oh ya. I duno why I typed Lantern.
They mentioned something about bruce wayne or gotham or something earlier on in the series, maybe in reference to Oliver (the other rich powerless wonder).
I liked Impulse/Kid Flash too. bring him back!
My favorite villian in the series so far is Bizzaro.
I know the creators of the show (who have since left) said no tights, no flight…but I think EVERYONE would be ok with him flying in season 10. That could be a great multi-ep arc for the show.
CP: WB Features won’t let Batman appear on Smallville (the Smallville producers have said this at various comic cons over the years). Batman is their big movie franchise right now. You can bet any hero in film production isn’t likely to show up on Smallville.
Until Superman Returns bombed Lois Lane on Smallville wasn’t allowed to be a reporter or get anywhere near Clark romantically. Miller and Gough were very upfront about the restrictions due to the movie being in production.
As it is right now, the movies trump tv.
I used to love Smallville so much. But this season is pure unwatchable garbage. Clark and Lois are in love Just Because. Oliver Queen is a murderer. Neither of the villains get any screen time and spend it plotting, um, something, offscreen. I think it’s hilarious that they are talking about a tenth season when half their audience from last year left after that horrific Doomsday finale. Dream on, Smallville, and please die this year.
Yes! Thanks for posting! We just got to the best season yet, and I really hope we get one more of this kind of quality.
Oh and yes, I’m talking about Smallville! Come on CW…one more!
Sarah, u have got to be the worst smallville fan ever u shouldnt even be aloud here. I think that smallville has a better chance of going 10 seasons then dieing this year considering all the episodes so far have gotten better VIEWERS and RATINGS then they thought they would. And the only reason people left is because it was changed to fridays and some of the fans cant make it to each and every episode but i doubt u stopped watching the show because if you did u wouldnt be talking about smallville here. SO LAY OFF AND LEAVE!
Interesting thing about this is that all of these shows except Vampire Diaries have a lower R/C index than Reaper did last year with a 1.15. I think we should still be wary of them getting rid of one or two more shows to do some new cheaper stuff. OTH, 90210 and Smallville could all be possible targets.
Chris, Reaper wasn’t canceled because it was expensive, but because it didn’t attract enough young women and its overall ratings weren’t overwhelming.
I think Smallville is just doing too well with a broader demographic on Friday to get axed. That’s my point in this post.
And like last season, the bulk of the CW’s shows are so close together in the ratings that there’s no chance that any of the others (except MP) are going to get canceled unless there is a complete clean house, including management, which I rate as unlikely.
Smallville will renewed for season 10, because that would put the series at 200 total episodes, and that is the perfect number for synication. They could run it year in and year out, without showing repeats. Big bucks like Friends, and Sienfeld.
So far, this season of Smallville has been awesome! I’m really hoping for season 10, although I’m still waiting for Clark to finally put on the suit and fly! That would be so awesome!
Tom Welling, Erica Durance, Cassidy Freeman and Callum Blue are already signed for the next season, so that wouldn’t be an issue. I’m not sure if Justin Hartley is signed but I think he is. Allison Mack as far as I know is not signed yet. But all you really need to get a new season of Smallville is Clark Kent after all.