As I predicted on Friday over at the Cancellation Watch Twitter Site, NBC has pulled new series Do No Harm from their schedule after the second episode sunk even further than the first. Last Thursdays airing of the Jekyll and Hyde show pulled only a 0.7 rating in the 18-49 demographic and a paltry 2.2 million total viewers. Those numbers might not keep a show alive on The CW, let alone one of the Big Four broadcast networks. So by Friday afternoon, NBC announced that Do No Harm will be exiting their schedule. Of course that probably seems like a pretty harsh move considering it had only aired two episodes, but after it had the lowest premiere ever for a Prime Time drama, then dropped even further the following week, I guess they figure why bother with it any more. It’s not a particularly bad show, I got around to watching the pilot and it showed some promise even if it was flawed. But apparently scheduling, lack of star power, and what was deemed an unappealing concept all worked against (I’ll be doing a full post mortem on the show in the next week or so). I’ve seen no word on whether NBC will air out the remaining episodes, but it seems like they could do worse than giving it a second chance in the post-Grimm Friday 10 PM EST slot when that show returns next month. Other than that, they might burn off the episodes in Summer or just make them available online. There were twelve total episodes planned, though I’m not certain if they completed filming all of them.
Another genre show receiving bad news this last week was FOX’s Touch which returned for its second season with some pretty poor numbers. The Season 2 premiere on Friday pulled only a 1.0 rating and 3.8 million total viewers. That’s a long way from the 3.3 rating that the show debuted with last year, but not too far from the 1.3 score that it ended its season with. And the low debut for its second season should come as no surprise based on its downward trend last year as well as the fact that FOX shuffled it all around the schedule this year before finally letting it out of the bag this past Friday. Now some may point out that numbers similar to what Touch had with its Season 2 premiere were enough to win Fringe a renewal the last couple of seasons, but that was a much different situation. That show already had several seasons under its belt and the Season 4 renewal gave it enough episodes for a syndication run with the Season 5 renewal padding that out (and from what I understand, Fringe‘s studio gave the show to FOX for next to nothing its last two seasons). Touch is only just starting its second season after only having completed thirteen episodes so far (it was a mid-season replacement last year and it also had a “bonus” episode before the current season began). And it also only has thirteen for this season, so it’s a long, long way away from the magic number of 88 episodes that the syndication market looks for. And almost certainly its ratings will only go down from hear because that’s the trend we typically see. None of this is surprising and it follows my predictions from before this season began. Expect me to be writing a post mortem on this one as well before too long.
As for the rest of genre shows from the second half of last week, Arrow improved to a 1.0 rating as did Supernatural, and The Neighbors improved to a 1.7 rating. On Thursday, Vampire Diaries slipped to a 1.1 rating and Beauty and the Beast sank back to a 0.6. Person of Interest remained relatively strong with a 3.1 rating, and on Friday Nikita actually improved a bit to a 0.5 rating.
Keep an eye out later today or early tomorrow on the Cancellation Watch Twitter Site for the numbers from the return on The Walking Dead as well as Syfy’s airing of Battlestar Galactica: Blood and Chrome (which was already aired online as a web series). You can see the Cancellation Alert status of all the shows currently airing plus the final results from prior seasons at my Cancellation Watch page. And for questions on how the ratings work and my Cancellation Alert statuses, you can see the Cancellation Watch FAQ.
Ratings Results for the Week of Feb 3:
Once Upon A Time (ABC Sun 8 PM) Rating: Preempted | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: Low
The Walking Dead (AMC Sun 9 PM) Rating: On Hiatus | Trend: Steady | Cancellation Alert: Renewed
The Following (FOX Mon 9 PM) Rating: 2.9 | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: Low
Being Human (Syfy Mon 9 PM) Rating: 0.5 | Trend: Steady | Cancellation Alert: Low
Arrow (CW Wed 8 PM) Rating: 1.0 | Trend: Up | Cancellation Alert: Low
The Neighbors (ABC Wed 9:30 PM) Rating: 1.7 | Trend: Up | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
Supernatural (CW Wed 9 PM) Rating: 1.0 | Trend: Up | Cancellation Alert: Low
Vampire Diaries (CW Thu 8 PM) Rating: 1.1 | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: Low
Person of Interest (CBS Thu 9 PM) Rating: 3.1 | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: Low
Beauty and the Beast (CW Thu 9 PM) Rating: 0.6 | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
Do No Harm (NBC Thu 10 PM) Rating: 0.7 | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: Cancelled
Nikita (CW Fri 8 PM) Rating: 0.5 | Trend: Up | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
Touch (FOX Fri 9 PM) Rating: 1.0 | Trend: Down | Cancellation Alert: High
Revolution and Grimm will resume in March. Lost Girl and Continuum not as heavily tied to U.S. ratings
Ratings Source: TV by the Numbers
Why Were They Cancelled?
The Plight of Science Fiction and Fantasy Television in the Face of the Unforgiving Nielsens and Networks
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This past weekend I happened upon “Do No Harm”, which ran as a 7 episode marathon. I thoroughly enjoyed it, longed for more and went searching for additional episodes. Sadly I discovered it had been cancelled even before it really got started …oh well, another one bites the dust. Perhaps the SyFy Channel or another channel will pick it up down the road. My thing is, why tempt us with stuff only to let us down????