No Laughing Matter So far, new comedies are faring better than their older siblings
My Name Is Earl
The state of returning comedies has not been pretty in the new TV season. Consider the year-to-year decline in these shows:
— ABC's According to Jim, which moved from 9 pm to 8 pm on Tuesdays, is off 26 percent compared to the first three weeks of last year. Its 8:30 companion, Rodney, has dropped 22 percent.
— CBS' Two and a Half Men has had an uphill battle trying to the big shoes of Everybody Loves Raymond. The network is down 20 percent in the time period from a year ago.
— As for NBC's much-maligned Joey? Ugh. It's off 46 percent compared to last year and has taken the Must-See TV network to new lows on Thursday nights.
But before this turns into another "Is the sitcom dead?" column, let's look at the bright side: Last week NBC's My Name Is Earl was the top-rated comedy among viewers 18 to 49. Other first-year sitcoms are also on track to make it through the full season. UPN's Everybody Hates Chris has already been picked up. On CBS How I Met Your Mother has improved on its lead-in from The King of Queens. Critics may not have liked it, but fans of The Simpsons are sticking around on Sunday to watch The War at Home on Fox.
Are we seeing the next generation of comedy hits beginning to bloom? It's too early to say, but this isn't a bad start.
"None of these is a major hit," said one network executive. "Every network would like to find a couple of comedies, and [because] none of these is sucking in the ratings, we're all holding on to them. We've got to start restocking."
Here's what was hot and what was not in the prime-time ratings for the week ended Oct. 9:
Hot:
NCIS: When the first round of postseason baseball starts on Fox, as it did last week, nonbaseball fans sample the other networks' offerings. This CBS drama was a beneficiary and drew its largest audience ever, 16.9 million viewers, and won among 18-to-49-year-olds, too.
Prison Break: This Fox drama's ratings have been hanging tough on Mondays at 9 despite strong competition and a less-than-stellar lead-in from Kitchen Confidential. Last week it scored its best ratings so far with viewers aged 18 to 34.
Commander in Chief: Ratings were up for the second week of ABC's White House drama, but with Fox's House preempted last week, it's still early to become a big hit with the 18-to-49 audience ABC sells to advertisers.
Without a Trace: The CBS procedural will now go down in history as the first show to take down NBC's ER in the 18-to-49 demo — a first since 1994.
Grey's Anatomy: ABC's medical drama retained 72 percent of its Desperate Housewives lead-in, its best performance so far this season.
George Lopez: Going the against the trend of other returning comedies, the season premiere was its best since 2002.
Not:
Related: Do we see a post-Friends curse developing here? Producer Marta Kauffman's new series about four sisters in the city didn't do much business for WB in its first outing.
Close to Home: The new CBS crime drama didn't fare well against Law & Order: SVU and ABC's Boston Legal.
The Apprentice: Martha Stewart: It's not a good thing when your struggling show is moved to 9 pm to compete against ABC's Lost.