We are closing in on the final days of the 2012-2013 television season. FOX's Bones and The Following aired their season finales last night, with one definitely doing better than the other. Castle and Revolution were well down on last week, and CBS's Monday line-up was back to full strength
8pm saw NBC's The Voice and ABC's Dancing With The Stars taking 26.1 million viewers between them in their two hours from 8-10pm. The Voice earned a 4.3 adults 18-49 rating and 12.67 million viewers - well down on last week's 4.9 rating and 14.15 million viewers. Dancing With The Stars' ratings equaled last week's 2.1 effort, and shed 320,000 viewers on last week's audience, down to 13.45 million viewers this week. The Voice still sees large fluctuations in its ratings while Dancing With The Stars continues to drop, though it looks like it might hold steady for now
On FOX at 8pm was the eighth season finale of Bones, which earned a 2.1 rating and 7.36 million viewers. If anything this shows that the Pelant arc has long surpassed its best before date. Last year's finale fared worse, at a 1.9 rating and 7.21 million viewers, but with this season's season high rating sitting at 2.6, and audience at 9.25, last night's finale didn't come anywhere near those numbers as a finale normally should. Bones will be back later on this year though, having already been renewed by FOX
CBS's comedy duo of How I Met Your Mother at 8pm and Rules of Engagement at 8:30pm did ok, with the former earning a 2.7 rating and 6.21 million viewers, and the latter earning a 2.1 rating and 6.21 million viewers.
9pm saw FOX's The Following air what I thought was a pretty solid first season finale. The ratings agreed, with 7.82 million viewers tuning in, pushing the ratings to a 2.7. This is the highest rating and audience for the series since the eighth episode, and caps off an impressive ratings comeback on the series low 2.1 rating and 6.36 million viewers just a fortnight ago. FOX will feel a lot better about their early decision to renew The Following for a second season. Live+7 ratings for The Following have consistently been in the top 5 for ratings and audience growth too. The Following was the equal second best rated show of the night, sharing that position with How I Met Your Mother, behind The Voice which held the top spot
Two more half hour comedies on CBS took up the 9pm hour on CBS. 2 Broke Girls claimed the ratings win between them, earning a 2.6 rating and 7.85 million viewers. Mike & Molly claimed the audience win with a 2.4 rating and 8.14 million viewers. Both shows were up 0.2 of a ratings point on their last original episodes a fortnight ago. 2 Broke Girls has two episodes including the finale left this season, while Mike & Molly has three
Moving on to the 10pm timeslot, where ABC's Castle won over its rivals Revolution and Hawaii Five-0 on NBC and CBS respectively, despite dropping 0.3 of a ratings point and 1.2 million viewers on last week's episode. "Still" is definitely my favorite episode this season for Castle, and ratings may have taken a small hit thanks to the week early release of the episode on European iTunes stores, and the fact that it was prempted thanks to the events in Boston. A 2.0 rating and 10.53 million viewers is right in line with the season averages in both data points. Last week saw Castle beating Dancing With The Stars in ratings, but this week it wasn't the case, with Castle just 0.1 of a point behind its lead-in this week
NBC's Revolution sunk below the 2.0 ratings mark for the first time in series history, with last night's episode earning a 1.8 rating and 5.46 million viewers in an episode which didn't really further the whole storyline at all. Revolution is clearly heavily dependent on its lead-in, The Voice, to draw a large number of viewers in for it, and its 0.6 ratings point, and 1.5 million viewer, drop on last week won't have helped. There's still time for a turnaround though, with 5 episodes remaining this season, all airing back-to-back
Finishing thing off for the evening on CBS was Hawaii Five-0 - CBS's lowest rating show of the night. Coming off a fortnight's break, Hawaii Five-0 earned a series low 1.7 rating, and 7.76 million viewers. The show has already been renewed for a fourth season which means fans can relax somewhat. It'll be interesting to see whether ratings pick up in the remaining three episodes of the season, with last night's episode being the first of four straight episodes including the finale on May 20
Finally, the results of the Guess The Ratings polls I ran a couple of days ago for Bones, The Following, and Revolution.
Just 10% of voters guessed the correct 2.7 rating for The Following's season finale, with 60% of the total vote split between 2.8, 2.6, and 2.5. See the results of the poll here
Voters were much more spread when it came to guessing the ratings for Bones' season finale, but only 11% were correct in guessing the 2.1 rating. The 2.6 or above category was the most popular, with the 2.2 category taking the next spot. See the results of the poll here
Guessing whether Revolution's ratings would fall below the 2.0 mark was a very popular poll with plenty of discussion. Voters were split clean down the middle, with just under 49% correctly guessing the ratings would dip below, while 51% guessed that they wouldn't. I for one didn't expect the poll to be that close! See the results of the poll here
That's all for Monday. Remember you can find comprehensive ratings and analysis data on my website, www.seriesmonitor.com. Share your thoughts about how your favorite shows performed on Monday, and follow me on Twitter
Follow me on Twitter
Thanks for reading!
Jimmy
The episode of Castle, Still, was posted on some European countries iTunes by mistake. A lot of people saw the episode online and perhaps chose not to watch it live. One other thing that may have caused the down bump in Castle's ratings is that some stations replaced the episode with a rerun. Those stations were in the Boston area. I feel bad for those viewers, because Still is one of the best episodes ever.
ReplyDeleteI was right about Revolution, can't say I'm surprised.. and I think it will sink even lower by the end of this season.
ReplyDeleteYeah. Considering there were no actual explosions in "Still" it's a wonder they moved it in the first place, let alone didn't actually show it in Boston at all
ReplyDeleteI agree with you both on the ratings (I think those 2 factors affected it) and on how amazing this episode is:)
ReplyDeleteI'm a huge H50 fan, I mean, fan of the formula that made it a great successful show: I'm talking about the Steve/Danny relationship, about the team interaction, about the feeling of Ohana. Lately i'm feeling like they kind of sidelined these dynamics... in the second season there were Lori and Joe, in this season Catherine and Doris... these characters and these storylines changed the balance of the show in a negative way. Pointless and boring love interests, too complicated and dragged out storylines didn't do any good to the show. I really hope the next season will be fully back to the dynamics I love: emotions, action, character development, more focus on the Steve/Danny relationship, more screen time for Chin and Kono, for the team as a whole. I'm sure that if they'll go back to the original formula the show and its ratings will shine again.
ReplyDeleteI LOVE Bones, but I agree that the Pelant story line has expired. They need to move on from this or I think viewers will start turning away. :( I certainly hope they don’t plan on carrying him through next season and use him as ANOTHER season finale! 1) because having him close 3 seasons in a row would seriously lack in creativity, 2) my wish for finale’s are that the show ups the ante and gives me something extra special, Pelant has been overused and exhausted IMO, making him no longer finale material, 3) After waiting almost 6 full season to have B&B together I don’t want to watch any more trouble between them that lasts for more than an ep or 2, carrying Pelant to the end of S9 would likely carry the tension of Booth turning Bones proposal done with it. (I’m sstill waiting for a good bedroom scene, if they spend the whole season pissed at each other that’s not likely to happen!! ;)
ReplyDeleteI have to agree. The premise of this show was interesting to me, but I don't really enjoy where they've gone with it. The problems from the first half of the season haven't really been addressed and they've taken away elements that I enjoyed, while adding those I find unintriguing, such as digging into love interests past, present and future for Miles. I enjoyed Rachel's character during the first half of the season and really wanted to see where that went, and don't like the direction they've taken with her since reuniting with the group, which is a shame because when a show you had high hopes for turns south, it's so disappointing. Tom Neville is really the only part I'm liking lately and I can't say I'm going to keep watching if it doesn't turn around soon.
ReplyDelete