While Monday Night Football kept ESPN on top of the prime time adults 18-49 cable ratings for the week of October 26 – November 1, 2009, USA’s new drama White Collar gave enough of a boost, along with WWE Raw to help it edge into first for average cable primetime viewership. With the baseball NLCS over, TBS fell well back from its recent results.

Nickelodeon, remained atop the total day average cable viewership.

Prime-time Average Viewers (Live+SD) Week of  October 26 – November 1, 2009

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Over the weekend I posted about “Shark”  Robert Herjavec posting on his Twitter account that ABC had ordered additional episodes of Shark Tank.   It’s true.  Kind of.  The Wrap’s Josef Adalian gets to the bottom of it:

Over the weekend, one of the sharks tweeted that the network had renewed the show for a second season. But ABC insiders said: Not true.

What’s up?

Well, ABC still has three unaired episodes of “Shark” in the can. It’s also just agreed to use previously shot footage to put together two more episodes of the Mark Burnett/Sony-produced series, a network rep confirmed to TheWrap.

So, there will be additional episodes, but there wasn’t an order for additional production or any type of renewal, at least not yet.

11/2 Update: As it turns out, there will be new episodes, assembled from already shot footage, but no news on a new season as yet.

Courtesy of commenter “RJ”, according to Robert Herjavec’s Twitter account there will be more Shark Tank:

Great news – ABC has ordered more episodes of Shark Tank !!!! No air date yet – but it’s coming.

http://twitter.com/robertherjavec/statuses/5328661113

Robert’s Twitter account isn’t a verified account, but it seems legitimate enough, and this isn’t something I’m going to try and get confirmed over the weekend.  Shark Tank wasn’t exactly a ratings juggernaut, averaging a 1.7 (blended Live+7/Live+SD results) adults 18-49 rating for the episodes after September 21.  But Shark Tank did have some critical acclaim and it could be that the show also has a higher percentage of high income viewing relative to other shows, and apparently the foreign versions of the show (like Dragon’s Den in Canada) were slow ratings starters.

Hardly a surprise based on the ratings, and given the longer production times for animated shows, the timing of the announcement isn’t surprising either.

Via FOX press release:

HOT FROM FOX…

FOX SAYS “YES WE CAN” TO “AMERICAN DAD”

FOX has ordered a sixth season of AMERICAN DAD, the animated series featuring security-obsessed CIA agent and devoted family man STAN SMITH (Seth MacFarlane). Recently honored with an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Animated Program, AMERICAN DAD airs Sundays (9:30-10:00 PM ET/PT) on FOX.

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Our Renew / Cancel Index predicts potential renewal or cancellation for scripted broadcast primetime shows for the 2010-11 season (includes 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

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Castle’s received a back 9 order to complete the 2009-2010 season. That was never really in doubt for me, the ratings weren’t terrible and the Index predicts what will happen by the end of the season. However, Castle fans prone to fingernail biting might want to invest in sturdy gloves now. I can pretty much guarantee that the future of the show will not be known until the very last minute in May. It will likely attract the most frenzy of the ABC bubble shows because of a combination of its ratings and its fans.

ABC says Eastwick is a quiet success. I guess they’ll be quiet when they cancel the show, because it has zero chance of getting another season. But it does have a crazy fan “Save our Show” campaign!

Ugly Betty only returned to get enough episodes for syndication, which it will have by the end of this season. It’s ratings are dreadful. Could ABC keep it longer to produce even more episodes regardless of the ratings? It’s not 100% out of the question, but it’s a real longshot.

While the forgotten’s ratings have stabilized, they’ve stabilized in the “cancel me” zone and Hank is certain to be canceled as well.

The Middle has received an order for a full season from ABC, but I wouldn’t make plans to watch it next season. Its Index will continue to fall even if its ratings stabilize where they are now. The only reason it’s not red now is that I’ve learned to give half hour comedies a bit more slack until later in the season.

This is a breakdown of ABC scripted shows and their renewal and cancellation prospects. Here are links to the other networks:

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Update: my simple methods of modeling might overstate the number of ads by as many as 4-10 commercial spots, depending on what percentage of the ads are typically local rather than national spots, and what percentage is allocated to network promos.  The local ad load (even if the ads are for national brands) would  likely not be included.  I’m not sure what they will do with network promos.

We recently learned that the television networks’ plans with all the talk of  Nielsen competitors and convergence measurements were based on a pretty simple philosophy: for the first 3 days videos of shows are available online they will carry exactly the same national commercial loads as on television. The networks want to be able to charge for them online as well as offline.

So what is currently five or six spots when you’re watching Heroes on NBC.com or Hulu would balloon to around thirty-two thirty second spots if things go according to the plan.  That’s more than five times the commercials you currently have to endure online.

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Effective this Wednesday The CW is dropping the repeats of Melrose Place and will instead air repeats of The Vampire Diaries on Wednesdays at 9pm during November (except for the two hour America’s Next Top Model finale on Wednesday, November 18).

This is a move many people expected as The Vampire Diaries has been the brightest spot on CW’s lineup this fall and Melrose Place…hasn’t been.   Some are hopeful that Heather Locklear’s return in November will change Melrose’s fate.

What happens after November is another story, The CW has not yet announced its Wednesday plans for December.

In the light of the many gushing “Look At How Great Some New Shows Are Doing!” stories all over the TV media, I thought it would be interesting to look at which returning shows are down big from last season.

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