Only ONE NBC Show Cracks Top 25 As Network Limps To Season's End

NEW YORK — NBC is limping to the close of the prime-time TV season. Only one of the network's shows, "Law & Order: SVU," finished among the 25 most-watched shows last week, ranking No. 16, according to Nielsen Media Research. "Shark," a drama that CBS is canceling, was seen by more people last week than any other NBC show but "SVU."

The network's prime-time average of 5.5 million viewers last week, was just more than half of first-place CBS' average.

The showing during a ratings "sweeps" month points to the challenge NBC has in the next few months. One advantage is the network's coverage of the Summer Olympics in China, which should give promoters the chance to remind people of upcoming shows.

The prime-time performance makes it all the more impressive that NBC has managed to stay in first place for its evening news, late-night lineup and early morning.

For the week, CBS averaged 10.3 million viewers (6.7 rating, 11 share), ABC had 9.6 million (6.2, 11), Fox 9.2 million (5.6, 9), NBC 5.5 million (3.6, 6), the CW 2.7 million (1.7, 3), My Network TV 1.2 million (0.8, 1) and ION Television 320,000 (0.2, 0).

Among the Spanish-language networks, Univision averaged 3.6 million (1.8, 3), Telemundo had 990,000 (0.6, 1), TeleFutura 820,000 (0.4, 1) and Azteca 160,000 (0.1, 0).

NBC's "Nightly News" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 8.2 million viewers (5.6, 12). ABC's "World News" was second with 7.9 million (5.5, 12) and the "CBS Evening News" had 5.7 million viewers (4, 8).

A ratings point represents 1,128,000 households, or 1 percent of the nation's estimated 112.8 million TV homes. The share is the percentage of in-use televisions tuned to a given show.

For the week of May 12-18, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: "American Idol" (Wednesday), Fox, 24.86 million; "American Idol" (Tuesday), Fox, 24.77 million; "Dancing With the Stars" (Monday), ABC, 18.47 million; "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," CBS, 18.06 million; "Dancing With the Stars" (Tuesday), ABC, 16.99 million; "Desperate Housewives," ABC, 16.84 million; "Grey's Anatomy," ABC, 15.55 million; "House," Fox, 15.02 million; "NCIS," CBS, 14.88 million, "Without a Trace," CBS, 14.54 million.

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ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is a division of CBS Corp. Fox is a unit of News Corp. NBC is owned by General Electric Co. Telemundo is owned by General Electric. TeleFutura is a division of Univision. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks.

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On the Net:

http://www.nielsenmedia.com

Comments

[Ides]

"I have an idea, how about we screw the writers and put on more reality television! That'll show 'em!"

Idiots.

And they're canceling Shark even though it did BETTER than all of their other shows? Policy driving results much?

[pinkyboo]

I stopped watching SVU a while ago, I've got L&O fatigue. I can't believe the Office or 30 Rock didn't make it - 2 of the funniest shows on TV.

[mredder4]

The networks deserve their lower numbers. Allowing the writers strike to happen over some short-term money is now going to cost them more in the end. How else can the expect to sell lower levels of viewers to advertisers this fall? Way to let short-sighted greed have a chance to kick you in the butt in the years to come, networks.

I for one just bought a Wii. Who needs television?

[Maanu]

All the networks are hurting due to the strike, so the numbers for NBC should be taken with a grain of salt. What is telling is that they still lead in the nightly news, which means they do have some public trust. Brian Williams has a lot to do with that. The problem is all the other shows. Growing up a huge comic book fan, I watched Heroes. Yeah, it's a soap opera trap, but so are comics by nature, so I'm fine with it.

The CW network seems to be coming to a close, I saw in an article. Their two biggest shows are One Tree Hill and Gossip Girl. I've seen neither of these shows, ever. They, like most network tv offerings, are saccharine affairs of poor writing, starring plasticized white actors with trivial dilemmas and faulty moral compasses. This is not the America and reality we are living in, if you haven't noticed.

I personally like to delay watching a show until after the initial hype subsides a bit, so that I can judge it on it's merits. Shows like the Wire, which all my friends are caught up watching. My homeboy just told me he couldn't look at any other cop drama the same afterwards, and this of course includes Law & Order, the cash cow that is spun-off, exploited and essentially shark-jumped to no end.

[letsgetsmart]

Who are these people who watch these shows? I haven't watched any of the major networks in years. If a playoff game is on one of them, I may watch but definitely not fox. I will happily mow the lawn rather then watch the super bowl if it is on fox.

[wm1066]

TV executives do not understand the viewing audience and what drives a person to sit down in front of a tv after a hard day. People would like to be told a story, humans have been doing this after supper story thing for thousands of years. Having a story "arche" is important also ,( having a story with a beginning middle and end). Alot of storeries are extended soap operas that go on and on, Dynasty and Dallas did this well in the early 80's but it has been taken to far lately. The viewer likes an ending, not on an on and on an on.... To many times during a work day this is the way it is , things don't get resolved. We need to see someone having a happy ending at the end of our day, it gives us hope. Seeing warped people doing bad things to people and getting away with it just pisses people off too. TV executives don't understand what the viewer wants, they try to cram crap down our throats then wonder why viewership is down. Give us Murphy Brown and Andy Griffith instead of your "reality TV"

[AurigaRa]

looks like lots of folks are still watching ABC after all the crap they pull

Well I dont - truth is more important than watching Desperate Housewives

[Chavez08]

It's nice to know that I can find "Law and Order" at any time of the day on at least (5) different stations though I don't know anyone who actually watches the show. At least once in awhile we get a break between that and "True Crime", "Forensic Files", :"Scariest Police Chases" and "American Justics"

I really like the "Law and Order" commercial promos where the shows stars laugh about torture.