New Show Hit/Miss Spring 2017 - Imaginary Mary

ABC's newest comedy Imaginary Mary premieres tonight at 8:30 before moving to its regular time of Tuesdays at 9:30.


What May Cause Imaginary Mary to be a Hit?

Premiere on Wednesday
To start it off, Imaginary Mary gets the network's second-biggest lead-in with The Goldbergs, and its biggest lead-out with Modern Family. Additionally, it shares some DNA with that lead in...

Same creator as The Goldbergs
Creator of The Goldbergs Adam F. Goldberg is one of the creators of Imaginary Mary, which makes it more likely that the ABC audience would be interested in the show.

On-brand-ish
It isn't a traditional ABC family comedy, but that might be just what the network needs. Typical family comedies may lead to overexposure. However, this show isn't totally off-brand, because the main character is dating a guy with kids. So it may be on-brand enough, just the right amount.

A lot of promotion
Thanks to the fact that Imaginary Mary is premiering a few weeks after ABC's other spring premieres, the network has been able to give sufficient promotional attention to Imaginary Mary, and they have. ABC's viewers should be totally aware of the show.


What May Cause Imaginary Mary to be a Miss for ABC?

Too different
While viewers probably do not want carbon copies of their current shows, they may rather have something more similar than Imaginary Mary. New comedies Speechless and American Housewife were successful, and they both had moms with many similarities to the moms that were on in the half-hour before their show was on. However, a CGI imaginary friend might be too different than the other ABC comedies.

Difficult regular timeslot
Of all of ABC's seven single-camera comedies that are airing a full season, the lowest-rated is Fresh Off the Boat. Unfortunately, that will be Imaginary Mary's lead-in. Also, since it is at 9:30, it won't have the benefit of being between two comedies. And, its lead-out isn't even well-rated. ABC is deliberately favoring its other comedies over Imaginary Mary.

ABC doesn't need it
With seven single-camera comedies likely to return next season, ABC is unlikely to be very kind to Imaginary Mary if its ratings aren't very strong. It won't be getting time to grow, it has to prove itself in these nine episodes or it's out.


What to Expect for Imaginary Mary?

I think that being too different could harm Imaginary Mary, but the real killer will be the timeslot that it has to air in. However, the amount of promotion it has received could potentially cancel out the effects of the timeslot it has to air in.


Which factors do you think will be most important in causing Imaginary Mary to be a hit or a miss? Leave your thoughts in the comments!

Share this

Related Posts

Previous
Next Post »