Unless otherwise noted, the ratings numbers below are based on the final overnights and may vary slightly from the preliminaries reported on the Cancelled Sci Fi Twitter Site.
Ratings results for the sci fi / fantasy shows airing Tuesday 7/28 thru Thursday 7/31:
Ratings Results: CBS freshman series Extant leveled off its declining ratings on Wednesday as it pulled another 1.1 rating in the 18-49 demographic with 5.9 million total viewers, though this time in its new timeslot one hour later at 10 PM EST. I wouldn’t call those great numbers, but at least it did not fall any further after taking a big drop last week. And it’s kind of hard to say at this point if the time shift helped (by stopping the decline) or was just neutral (same numbers as last week). I’m leaving this one at a moderate Cancellation Alert for now and still have it On the Bubble. If it weren’t for the Amazon connection (they are picking up part of the costs for exclusive streaming rights), I would have the show at a higher Cancellation Alert, and I still question whether CBS will be interested in keeping this show on their schedule next year with tepid ratings like these. Keep an eye on the numbers over the coming weeks to see if they change either up or down. And for those interested, the new ABC series The Quest–which gives us a Game of Thrones/reality series hybrid–debuted pretty low on Thursday as it pulled a 0.7 rating with 2.8 million total viewers. The network’s spin department tried to make it sound like a good debut, but I have to believe those are disappointing results, even for a reality series which typically has lower production costs. I don’t plan on tracking this one on a weekly basis, but thought it was at least worth mentioning the show’s premiere numbers. The rundown on the rest of the sci fi / fantasy shows from the last few days is below.
In Case You Wanted to Know: Syfy’s Sharknado 2: The Second One outdid the performance of the first Sharknado movie–which hit last Summer–pulling a 1.3 rating in the 18-49 demo with 3.9 million total viewers and it won Wednesday night among cable shows. It was also the Number 1 entry on Nielsen’s Twitter Ratings for the night and according to Syfy’s PR department it had 1 billion(!) Twitter impressions. Not quite certain where they are coming up with that one billion number because Nielsen showed the impressions at 67 million (still pretty impressive). The PR guys over at Syfy also proclaimed it as “the most social movie on TV ever”. So what does all this mean? You guessed it: Sharknado 3 is certainly on the way and a lot of people are questioning just how series Syfy’s commitment is to delivering “real” science fiction as the have claimed.
Following are the full ratings results* from the last few days with my comments and keep an eye on the Cancelled Sci Fi Twitter Site for the latest numbers and any breaking news.
The Wil Wheaton Project Syfy Tue 7/29 10 PM
Rating: n/a | Tot Viewers: n/a | StD Rating: 0.2 | Target: n/a | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
This one remains outside of the Cable Top 100 and Futon Critic no longer has access to the final ratings results like they did, so this is just showing season to date numbers thus far.
Extant CBS Wed 7/30 10 PM
Rating: 1.1 | Tot Viewers: 5.9 | StD Rating: 1.3 | Target: 1.4 | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
A new timeslot, but same low ratings as last week. Not sure if this will be enough for sci fi-averse CBS to bring it back for a second year. Amazon could keep it going, though.
Defiance Syfy Thu 7/31 8 PM
Rating: 0.4 | Tot Viewers: 1.5 | StD Rating: 0.5 | Target: 0.6 | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
It dropped this week when its numbers need to be going up. I’m keeping it On the Bubble.
Dominion Syfy Thu 7/31 9 PM
Rating: 0.5 | Tot Viewers: 1.5 | StD Rating: 0.5 | Target: 0.6 | Cancellation Alert: Moderate
It improved this week, but those are still tepid numbers for what is likely and expensive production. It is remaining On the Bubble as well.
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*Metric Definitions:
Rating: Overnight rating in the 18-49 demographic for same day viewing based on the final numbers unless otherwise noted
Tot Viewers: Estimated total viewers to tune in to the episode for same day viewing
StD Rating: Season to date average for the rating metric tracked above.
Target: The estimated average rating that the show needs to sustain to get renewed.
Cancellation Alert: My prediction of the likelihood that a show will get cancelled. From least to most likely the statuses are Low, Moderate, Medium, Elevated, and High.
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Ratings Source: TV by the Numbers
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2014 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
