Thursday Cable Ratings 6/29/23: The Match Rises from 2022 Edition, Project Runway Ticks Up, The Five Leads Cable News

Below are the top 50 programs on cable on Thursday, 6/29/23. Items of note include Project Runway on Bravo, The Match on TNT, and The Five on Fox News.

(Note: Click the names of the shows written in purple or blue to be taken to their pages in the TV Ratings Guide Cable Database.)

Thursday TV Ratings 6/29/23: Generation Gap and The Chase Rise in Premieres, The Blacklist Also Rises (UPDATED)


Ratings Analysis: Season two of game show 'Generation Gap' (0.35) got off to a healthy start on ABC. Though this was over a tenth lower than last year's debut (0.46), it was a few ticks higher than the show's September 2022 finale (0.32). At 9, 'The Chase' (0.30) went six-hundredths above its last original from February (0.24). A repeat of 'Press Your Luck' (0.25) closed out the alphabet network's night of premieres. On NBC, 'The Blacklist' (0.25, +0.04) rebounded and led into repeats of 'Law & Order: SVU' (0.18) and 'Magnum P.I.' (0.13). CBS's reruns of 'Young Sheldon' (0.32), 'Ghosts' (0.21), 'So Help Me Todd' (0.16), and 'CSI: Vegas' (0.14) crushed Fox's encores of 'Alert' (0.15) and 'Stars on Mars' (0.10). The CW had another round of repeats in the form of 'Walker' (0.04) and 'Penn & Teller: Fool Us' (0.03). 

Finals Update: The repeat of 'So Help Me Todd' (+0.1) adjusted up.

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Wednesday Cable Ratings 6/28/23: Grown-Ish Stable in Premiere, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia and Mayans MC Rebound, The Five Leads Cable News

Below are the top 50 programs on cable on Wednesday, 6/28/23. Items of note include the season premiere of Grown-Ish on Freeform, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on FXX, and Mayans MC on FX.

(Click the names of the shows written in teal or blue to be taken to their pages in the TV Ratings Guide Cable Database.)

Wednesday TV Ratings 6/28/23: Judge Steve Harvey, The Wonder Years and LA Fire & Rescue Drop, The Price Is Right At Night Repeats Coast to Victory (UPDATED)


Ratings Analysis: NBC's 'LA Fire & Rescue' (0.25, -0.04) took a pretty soft,14% dip in week two and remained a step above the reruns of 'Chicago Fire' (0.16) and 'Chicago PD' (0.15) that followed it. On ABC, 'Judge Steve Harvey' (0.27, -0.05) and 'The Wonder Years' (0.21, -0.04) dealt with their own set of unsavory declines. The alphabet network also aired repeats of 'Abbott Elementary' (0.17) and 'The $100,000 Pyramid' (0.18). Fox aired reruns of 'MasterChef' (0.23) and 'Food Stars' (0.17). CBS's reruns of 'The Price Is Right At Night' (0.44/0.48) led the network to Wednesday-night dominance. The 10 p.m. encore of 'CSI: Vegas' (0.23) also managed to top its hour. Dramas 'Nancy Drew' (0.03, 0.00) and 'Riverdale' (0.03, 0.00) were stable on The CW.

Finals Update: 'Judge Steve Harvey' (+0.1) and the 9 PM repeat of 'The Price Is Right At Night' (+0.1) adjusted up.

ZOEY’S EXTRAORDINARY PLAYLIST: EVERY EPISODE, EVERY RATING


The "Every Episode, Every Rating" series takes a look at the highs and lows of a program during its full run. Praise or criticism is in reference to the show's performance in the Nielsen ratings.

Photo Credit: NBC

More often than not, networks will decide against ordering musicals to air as part of their regular lineup. Whether it be due to the cost of licensing fees or the risky nature of the concept, it's quite a gamble to order a series of this nature. That gamble has paid off in some cases (Glee) but has also backfired spectacularly in others (Galavant). One-off showings like Hairspray Live! and The Little Mermaid Live! have had massive success in the Nielsen ratings, but the genre usually struggles in a weekly format. Enter Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist, an NBC dramedy with several song-and-dance performances per episode. Premiering in the first week of the new decade, the series was left to fend for itself on Sunday nights for the majority of its run.

Season 1 (2020)




    Airdate

Episode

18-49 Rating

Total Viewers

(In Millions)

01/07/2020

1

0.60   

2.66

02/16/2020

2

0.38

2.02

02/23/2020

3

0.46

1.96

03/01/2020

4

0.39

2.06

03/08/2020

5

0.35

1.93

03/15/2020

6

0.38

1.93

03/22/2020

7

0.42

1.95

03/29/2020

8

0.43

1.88

04/05/2020

9

0.43

1.94

04/19/2020

10

0.42

1.98

04/26/2020

11

0.35

1.70

05/03/2020

12 

0.43

1.98

Rating 

Average: 0.42

Viewers Average: 

2.00 million



    Change:


N/A


SERIES HIGH

Season Low




Winter/Spring 2020: Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist debuted on January 7, 2020 with a special preview episode that aired on a Tuesday night at 10 o'clock. The series began with a serviceable 0.60 rating in the Adults 18-49 demographic and just under 2.7 million in terms of viewership. Though retention from Ellen's Game of Games (1.1) was pretty lackluster, this served as a perfectly fine launching point for a series with such an unconventional concept. The problem here is that most of that initial audience disappeared by the time the show finally returned to air in its proper, 9 p.m. timeslot on Sunday nights. The February 16th installment of the program managed just a 0.38 rating and barely cleared the two-million mark in total viewership. The Jane Levy vehicle enjoyed a solid rebound one week later (0.46) but eventually dropped down to even lower levels (0.35 on March 8th). 

Though the series often had the misfortune of airing after random reruns, The Wall, or the deflated final days of Little Big Shots, it rarely built on the show that came before it. The dramedy stabilized in the 0.42-0.43 range during the early days of the COVID-19 lockdowns, but it never grew enough to signal that the pandemic had helped it find an audience. A drop to another 0.35 on April 26 seemed to spell doom for the future of Zoey, but a rebound on finale night (0.43) brought it back to semi-decent territory. It could only scrape together a 0.42 Adults 18-49 average, but NBC was willing to give the series another chance. Thus, season two was given the green light.

Season 2 (2021)




    Airdate

Episode

18-49 Rating

Total Viewers

(In Millions)

01/05/2021

1

0.52   

3.01

01/12/2021

2

0.46

2.66

01/19/2021

3

0.44

2.41

01/26/2021

4

0.48

2.31

02/02/2021

5

0.41

2.24

02/09/2021

6

0.43

2.19

03/28/2021

7

0.24

1.20

04/04/2021

8

0.23

1.18

04/11/2021

9

0.32

1.43

04/18/2021

10

0.26

1.20

05/02/2021

11 

0.29

1.30

05/09/2021

12

0.27

1.31

05/16/2021

13

0.26

1.28

Rating 

Average: 0.35

Viewers Average: 

1.82 million



    Demo Change:

-16.7%

Viewership Change:

-9%

SEASON HIGH

Series Low




Winter 2021: After spending most of its first season in a Sunday-night wasteland, Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist made the move to the 8 p.m. timeslot on Tuesday evenings. Airing right before the final season of This Is Us, Zoey began season two with a healthy 0.52 in the Adults 18-49 demographic. This was a higher Nielsen rating than anything the series ever posted on Sunday nights and marked the first (and only time) that Zoey crossed the three-million mark in total viewership. Zoey dipped a bit for episode two (0.46) and a touch more for three (0.44) but managed to climb all the way back to a 0.48 for a late-January outing. And while the last two Tuesday episodes seemed to descend closer to season 1 levels (0.41/0.43), the series never dipped below a 0.4 rating in this slot. In fact, the first six episodes of season two (0.46) actually had a higher average than the first six of the first season (0.43), an impressive feat for a series that seemed to be on the wrong side of the bubble in spring 2020. Unfortunately for Zoey, this momentum would completely evaporate soon after.


Spring 2021: Following a hiatus that lasted nearly two months, Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist was moved back to its 9 p.m. timeslot on Sunday nights. From the jump, it was clear that this was a fatal move. The series came back on March 28 with a putrid 0.24 rating, a number that was well over 50% below its January return and far lower than anything posted in season one. The dramedy dipped a bit lower for its April 4th installment (0.23) but then lifted itself all the way up to a 0.32 on April 11. From there, the series consistently stayed in the 0.26-0.29 range until the end, a far cry from the 0.4s and 0.5s it was putting up just a few months earlier on Tuesdays. Having reality flameout Ellen's Game of Games as a lead-in did not help matters one bit. The irony here is that the Ellen series that boosted its premiere just a year prior was now a dud that nearly lost to Zoey itself on most nights. Thanks to the awful stint on Sundays, Zoey was down nearly 17% on a year-to-year basis.

Photo Credit: NBC


Post-Mortem: Though a Christmas special entitled Zoey's Extraordinary Christmas was released on The Roku Channel streaming service in late 2021, it's safe to say that the broadcast run of Zoey has come to a permanent close. The series was ultimately canceled by NBC after two seasons in June 2021. Zoey was nowhere near a solid performer in season one, but the first-half of season two made it clear that the show had the ability to succeed if provided the right circumstances. We'll never know how Zoey would have held up if it was not placed on a pointless hiatus and shipped back to Sundays. Perhaps it was only leeching off eager This Is Us viewers who tuned in a bit too early. Or, perhaps it was truly growing a following before a meaningless break and timeslot change caused it to collapse. 



What did you think of this article? Were you a fan of Zoey's Extraordinary Playlist? Leave your thoughts in the comment section below.

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Tuesday Cable Ratings 6/27/23: Gutfeld! Tops Cable News, Love & Hip Hop Atlanta and WWE NXT Lead the Night

Below are the top 50 programs on cable on Tuesday, 6/27/23. Items of note include Love & Hip Hop Atlanta on MTV, WWE NXT on USA, and Gutfeld! on Fox News.

(Note: Click any show with its name in green or blue to be taken to its page in the TV Ratings Guide Cable Ratings Database.)

Tuesday TV Ratings 6/27/23: Daughter of the Bride Abysmal on Fox, Gotham Knights Ends on New Low, America’s Got Talent and Hot Wheels Also Slip (UPDATED)


Ratings Analysis: CW drama 'Gotham Knights' (0.03, -0.01) ended its run with a new series low, even as 'Superman & Lois' (0.10, +0.01) picked up a hundredth for its closer. Fox barely managed to rise above The CW's 8 p.m. offering with its broadcast of 2023 film 'Daughter of the Bride' (0.12). This rating is almost 50% lower than what the already meager 'Beat Shazam' (0.23) managed in this slot last week. On NBC, 'Hot Wheels: Ultimate Challenge' (0.25, -0.06) plunged to a new low in the 10 p.m. hour. 'America's Got Talent' (0.65, -0.01) shed a hundredth at 8. ABC had strong repeats of 'Celebrity Wheel of Fortune' (0.38) and 'Celebrity Jeopardy!' (0.30), but the 10 p.m. encore of 'Claim to Fame' (0.15) could not keep up with the other two. CBS improved as the evening progressed with repeats of 'FBI: International' (0.22), 'FBI' (0.25), and 'FBI: Most Wanted' (0.28).

Finals Update: The repeat of 'Celebrity Wheel of Fortune' (+0.1) adjusted up.