Ratings Report: Syndication Stays Flat
Not a lot to report this week, so we’ll move through this week’s ratings report quickly. Week four’s ratings are basically flat with a few exceptions. The only shows to increase are Wheel of Fortune, Jeopardy!, and Fifth Grader. Wheel and Jeopardy! both went up 2% to a 6.5 and 5.5. Fifth Grader recovered a bit from its last brutal week. It’s up 11% to a 1.0 rating. I don’t think that’s enough to get the show to a third season, but we’ll see.
Family Feud and Who Wants to be a Millionaire are both flat, at 2.2 and 1.5. Family Feud told us their ratings overall are up 40% from last year so that’s great news for Steve Harvey and the crew. Don’t Forget The Lyrics! received a 0.8 rating. In foreign ratings news, if The Cube doesn’t get a third season I’ll be stunned. The show yet again averaged around 5.4 million viewers and peaked at 6.4 million viewers and it’s regularly getting an audience share of over 20% which is fantastic. Congratulations to that entire crew. Glad their efforts are rewarding them.
I just saw The Cube today! It was awesome! I wouldn’t even call it a British version of Minute to Win it. I think that would be an insult to The Cube.
“Fifth Grader” and “Lyrics” are the weak contenders right now. If they stay where they are after November Sweeps then they might get canned.
Merv Griffin’s Crosswords got renewed for a second season with a 1.0, but then it was decided to make the second season reruns of the first season. I suspect they’ve taped an entire season’s worth of Fifth Grader and Lyrics by now, no? Lyrics’ VH1 scheduling, weekdays in a double run from 11AM-Noon EST against TPIR, and 7-8PM EST against Wheel and J! in most of the country, can’t be helping it either.
That could be true. However, 5th Grader’s problem is that viewers can’t find it or are unable to watch it because it’s (depending on the market you live) either moved to an undesirable time slot, either late nights or a time slot against other game shows, or moved to another station (in most cities, stations that air 5th Grader have a duopoly with another station).