Top Ten SciFi Show Ratings week of 4/21-4/27

[grapeshot]

Okay, just because I'm darned proud to have remembered to do this, I'll post the ratings I saw at SciFiWire:


SHOW __________________ HHR
End of Days ______________1.3
Pitch Black ______________ 1.1
Stargate SG-1 ___________ 1.1
Interceptor Force ________ 1.0
Scare Tactics ____________ 0.9
Alien Fury _______________ 0.9
Alien Cargo ______________ 0.9
Unknown Encounter _______ 0.8
Replicant ________________ 0.8
Waterworld ______________ 0.8

Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report, 4/21/03 - 4/27/03

[Stargate2077]

This is the first week without Tremors, right?

It looks like Sci-Fi's ratings have been deteriorating considerably over the past month or so.

[LadyCrais]

I could have sworn we just had this discussion two days ago. Someone must have posted them ahead of you Grapeshot. I asked the same question SG, and was informed it was the last week that Tremors aired. Rumor was it got a 0.6, which wouldn't have made it onto the list, and was unceremoniously yanked the following Monday.

But I could be wrong. Keeping track of time is not my best suit to say the least. :D

[CosmicTheorist]

Tremors was last seen on April 25th.

;)

[Stargate2077]

Ok. Thanks guys!

[StephX]

Was this a new ep. of Stargate? Isn't that really low for that show?

[Stargate2077]

New episodes of Stargate SG-1 are not coming until June 13. Though for a rerun, the ratings have been slowly slipping. We will see how Stargate SG-1 is really doing once the new episodes come in June.

[CosmicTheorist]

It depends on your perspective whether or not that was low for Stargate. That was the highest number for the block of 4 episodes that run every Monday night. They finished cycling through the first 4 seasons of Stargate on Mondays a few weeks ago and started again with season 1.

I think the Monday episodes were averaging about 1.5 for their highest rating (the highest number is the only one Scifiwire publishes). So it does look like the 2nd time through the seasons 1-4 episodes may be lower then the first, which is what would be expected. I believe that is still a very good number for a repeat.

If you are interested in these numbers, here are the 4 weeks prior to 4/21/03 - 4/26/03:

RATINGS: Top 10 SCIFI Programs
SHOW HHR
Tremors: The Series 2.0
Stargate SG-1 1.5 (Season Four/Season One)
Crocodile 2 1.3
Marabunta 1.2
Tremors 3 1.1
Crocodile 1.0
Tremors 2 0.9
Gremlins 2 0.9
Primal Force 0.9
Tracker 0.8
Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report, 3/24/03 - 3/30/03

RATINGS: Top 10 SCIFI Programs
SHOW HHR
Scare Tactics 1.6
Cube 2: Hypercube 1.4
Stargate SG-1 1.2
Tremors: The Series 1.2
Hell Swarm 1.2
House of Frankenstein 2 1.0
Route 666 0.9
Tracker 0.9
Horror Show 0.9
Phantasm IV 0.8
Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report, 3/31/03 - 4/6/03.

RATINGS: Top 10 SCIFI Programs
SHOW HHR
Scare Tactics 1.4
Riverworld 1.4
Red Planet 1.4
Tremors: The Series 1.3
Stargate SG-1 1.2
Battlefield Earth 1.0
Cleopatra 2525 0.9
Wing Commander 0.7
Beyond Belief 0.7
Roar 0.6
Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report, 4/7/03 - 4/13/03

RATINGS: Top 10 SCIFI Programs
SHOW HHR
Threshold 1.5
Stargate SG-1 1.2
Tremors: The Series 1.2
Scare Tactics 1.2
The Beast, Part 2 1.0
Mimic 1.0
Crocodile 2 0.9
Octopus 2 0.9
Pumpkinhead 2 0.9
Body Snatchers 0.8
Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report, 4/14/03 - 4/20/03

Cleopatra 2525 must have been less then or equal to the 0.8 that Body Snatchers earned since it did not make it into the Top 10 for the week of April 14.

SciFiWire publishes these lists every Monday; they appear in the left sidebar. I checked with scifiwire; they overwrite these lists on Wednesday with the Top 10 SF Syndicated Series lists; they do not keep these lists archived. If you want this data, you have to copy it before it changes; or do like I've done and snurch it from someone else's copies.

;)

[CosmicTheorist]

Here are Skiffy's top 10 for the first week without Tremors in the Friday night line up:

RATINGS: Top 10 SCIFI Programs:
SHOW .................................... HHR
Silent Warnings ........................ 1.6
Stargate SG-1 ......................... 1.4
Red Planet .............................. 1.0
Species .................................. 1.0
Target Earth ........................... 1.0
Species .................................. 0.9
Threshold ............................... 0.8
It Came From Outer Space 2 ...... 0.8
Silent Warnings ........................ 0.7
Scare Tactics .......................... 0.7
Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report 4/28/03 - 5/4/03

Stargate was on 6 times that week, 4 times on Monday and 2 times on Friday. There is no indication here which night had this rating since Scifiwire publishes only the highest number for series that have multiple showings during the week.

;)

[grapeshot]

But then, why is "Species" listed twice? Is there a Species I and a Species II??

Sorry, I see you said SERIES, and I think "Species" is a MOVIE.

[Dominar of Action]

Scare Tactics ... 0.7BWAHAHAHA-FRELLING-HA!! :lol :lol :lol :lol

[CosmicTheorist]

That is exactly how it appears on the Scifiwire sidebar. You are probably correct that they meant both Species movies made their top 10; they just aren't telling us which did better.

If you'd like, you can email them and ask for them to correct their list. Scifiwire is remarkably fast and polite in responding to email requests. I emailed them a question about these lists a couple of weeks ago and got an answer within a couple of hours. The first response I got was the automated one that everyone gets, but shortly after that I got a real editor to give me a real answer to my question ( I asked them if they archived these lists and if so could I get a copy of them; they don't archive them; the lists get overwritten every week).

You can get to the Scifiwire page with this link:

http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/

Funny thing about the automated response, so funny I actually laughed when I saw it . . . I'll just post it so you can read it yourself:

"Thank you for writing to SCI FI Wire. Please note that this is the e-mail address for the online news service of SCI FI, and we do not respond to inquiries about programming, scheduling, individual series, or other matters not directly related to SCI FI Wire. If you are looking for information on SCI FI Channel shows such as FARSCAPE, please visit:"

See what I mean; after all these months Farscape is the ONLY Skiffy show mentioned by name. Do you think this means we've been bugging these guys?

;)

[LadyCrais]

Originally posted by CosmicTheorist
Here are Skiffy's top 10 for the first week without Tremors in the Friday night line up:

RATINGS: Top 10 SCIFI Programs:
SHOW .................................... HHR
Silent Warnings ........................ 1.6
Stargate SG-1 ......................... 1.4
Red Planet .............................. 1.0
Species .................................. 1.0
Target Earth ........................... 1.0
Species .................................. 0.9
Threshold ............................... 0.8
It Came From Outer Space 2 ...... 0.8
Silent Warnings ........................ 0.7
Scare Tactics .......................... 0.7
Source: Nielsen Galaxy Report 4/28/03 - 5/4/03

Stargate was on 6 times that week, 4 times on Monday and 2 times on Friday. There is no indication here which night had this rating since Scifiwire publishes only the highest number for series that have multiple showings during the week.

;)

And Scare Tactics has almost fallen off the bottom this week. It's heartening to see that no amount of advertising can hold up the ratings for complete and total dren.

I just spent a couple of hours collecting SciFi's ranking versus other cable channels for 2002-2003 as published at www.medialifemagazine.com. I'll have to sort it out and post charts elsewhere, but suffice it to say that there has indeed been an obvous drop since Farscape went off the air. I've gone back to the same periods last year, back several months to the hiatus between 411 and 412, etc. In the 25-54 demographic, they were virtually always in the top 10 for primetime, often in the 4-8 range (always while Farscape is on). Since W/E 3/23 they have only had one 8th, two 9ths, two 10ths and otherwise not in the top 10. 18-49 shows the same trend, but lower numbers (er higher numbers meaning ranked worse). 18-34 hasn't been in the top 10 since Farscape went off the air. They rarely are anyway except for the weeks ending 3/16 and 3/23. Was that Children of Dune?

[BillFrugge]

Yup. It looks like Sci-Fi's strategy to reach a new audience is working....

Unfortunately for them, it's a smaller audience without their long-term audience.

Frelling Einsteins! Those ratings are going to go so low that Nielsens won't bother with such a piddling small network.

[CosmicTheorist]

Children of Dune Part I was the top rated show for the week ending 3/16, and the other 2 parts are the top and 3rd highest shows for the week ending 3/23 with Riverworld taking the 2nd highest spot.

;)

[grapeshot]

LadyCrais, it looks like you're on the way to answering what would have been my next question. Thanks for your efforts (and I'm very humbled to be in the company of such hardworking and smart people!) I eagerly look forward to the results of you research!

[LadyCrais]

Originally posted by grapeshot
LadyCrais, it looks like you're on the way to answering what would have been my next question. Thanks for your efforts (and I'm very humbled to be in the company of such hardworking and smart people!) I eagerly look forward to the results of you research!

LOL! I'm just doing the grunt work collecting numbers. I ALWAYS need someone else to tell me what the frell was going on at the time to make the numbers have any meaning. And ya'll excel at that. Without you, they'd just me numbers in a vacuum.

[MediaSavant]

Originally posted by LadyCrais
I just spent a couple of hours collecting SciFi's ranking versus other cable channels for 2002-2003 as published at www.medialifemagazine.com.

That's a good source. I didn't spend half the time collecting data that you surely have, but one analysis that is common and appropriate in the industry is the "versus year ago" comparison.

This is done because viewing and programming tend to be seasonal in nature.

At least for the last three weeks measured, it appears SciFi is running 24% ahead of last year at the same time for households delivered in Primetime:

(week of)
4/29/02: 512 thousand
5/6/002: 630 K
5/13/02: 535 K
Average: 559 K

4/28/03: 706 K
5/5/03: 717 K
5/12/03: 651 K
Average: 691 K
Difference from a year ago: +24%

I wanted to do the last four weeks, but they didn have SciFi's numbers for 4/21/03 on that database.

FYI, Farscape reruns ran at both 9 and 10PM on Friday night last year in those 2002 weeks above.

Though we are focussed on Farscape here, we often forget--I think--that it wasn't the only thing on SciFi's schedule in the past.

While Farscape did run on Friday nights, so did shows like Lexx and Strange World, which didn't exactly light big Nielsen fires last year. Even if Farscape's direct time period replacement does worse, if SciFi is doing better in other time periods, their overall ratings can still be up.

Right now, though, it is Stargate that has Farscape's old time period and Stargate reruns usually beat Farscape reruns handily.

[10SCgal]

Media Savant, since you reference number of HOUSEHOLDS, could ratings and/or share equally be DOWN because more cable franchises carry SciFI but it hasn't proportionally kept up in the new markets?

[waltersgirl]

that time last year, Skiffy didn't air Taken and Children of Dune and Riverwold, and thus didn't have the media blitz advertising that came with it, so yeah, it's easy to be ahead of what you didn't promote the hell out of last year.

LC and grapeshot, thanks for the stats. good work.

[MediaSavant]

Originally posted by 10SCgal
Media Savant, since you reference number of HOUSEHOLDS, could ratings and/or share equally be DOWN because more cable franchises carry SciFI but it hasn't proportionally kept up in the new markets?

Households viewing is what that site publishes.

The household population grows by only a few percentage points a year. Similarly, SciFi is topping out and it has only gained a few percentage points from coverage growth. A 24% growth is far greater than both.

[MediaSavant]

Originally posted by waltersgirl
that time last year, Skiffy didn't air Taken and Children of Dune and Riverwold, and thus didn't have the media blitz advertising that came with it, so yeah, it's easy to be ahead of what you didn't promote the hell out of last year.


That's the beauty of looking at the last three weeks. Neither 2002 or 2003 were periods that were promoted heavily. Apples to apples. It's a comparison of basic programming.

[LadyCrais]

Not really MS. They have promoted the hell out of SG1 and Scare Tactics in the last month, and before. You can't turn on a single show on that network without being blasted by both of them, not just in practically every single commercial break, but all over the frelling show as well. Last year they didn't do a fraction of that kind of promotion for anything, and least of all Farscape.

However, Friday nights, as you say is not everything on the channel. We're looking at the channel overall. But I think even with that, we're seeing infinitely more promotion of everything than there was a year ago. Which just goes to show that their promotion strategy works just fine to draw people in. It's a shame they have nothing worth watching to keep you there.

[LadyCrais]

I'm going to try to load these charts. They are by rank, not by number of viewers. So this is not a comparison with self. It's how they're doing against their competition compared to last year.

Basically, on the total household charts, they went up to 25 MOST of the time. If the point is missing, the chart only went to 10 that week.

On the 25-54 charts, they only go to 10. With the exception of the week ending 3/30/03 (yeah I know, week 422 aired) and the last two weeks of Dec 2002 (I know, the marathon), all of the data is present. So if a point is missing, it's because it did NOT rank in the top 10 that week.

I also only collected continuous data from 1/5/2002 - 5/26/2002 and 11/3/2002 - 5/18/2003. I did some spot checks of 1 to 2 points a month in between.

I did manage to pick up a couple of year to year comparisons, but they're all 2002 to 2001.

May 2002 vs 2001 Prime Time Average = 0.7 both years. 0% change

All Year 2002 vs 2001
18-49 Prime -3% Total -1%
25-54 Prime -1% Total +3%

Summer 2002 vs 2001 Prime Time
Total HH 0.9 (2002) 0.8 (2001) +13%
18-49 539,000 (2002) 486,000 (2001) +11%

Those huge jumps are because the numbers are so small to start with. 0.1/0.8 * 100 = 13% (actually 12.5%)

[LadyCrais]

2002 vs 2003

[LadyCrais]

25-54 All Day & Prime Time

By the way, Week 1 is Jan 5 or 6 and Week 20 is May 18 or 19 in all the charts that have weekly numbers instead of dates. (the two before this one and the one after this one)

Ignore that 2002 in the legend. It's wrong.

[LadyCrais]

25-54 Prime Time 2002 vs 2003

[LadyCrais]

This was supposed to be up higher.

Jan 2002 - May 2003 Total HH Rankings.

[Selena]

I am but a mere plebe but it looks to me like those skiffy stats suck! I mean as far as it being a good viewing audience (not the posted graphs which are great).

That list for the week doesn't seem to have any 1.5 or 1.8?

[grapeshot]

no, these stats don't suck. They do pretty well confirm SciFi's boast that their audience grew for almost a year - or at least that their ranking increased from the ranking of the same week of the previous year. However, it also seems to show that they've lost their rankings in May. It's too soon to say if that means anything, or if it's anything more than a temporary blip.


edited to correct poor grammar. Aaargh.

[Silent_Cid]

They would see if they did good after the quarter is finished

[MediaSavant]

"More Gains for Sci Fi Channel:
The Sci Fi Channel also had plenty to crow about in May with now 13th straight months of ratings growth (its 0.9 in primetime was up 29 percent over May 2002). Fueled by programming like Stargate-1 and original action movie Silent Warnings (and based on entertainment related cable networks only), Sci Fi placed in the top 10 in adults 18-49, adults 25-54, men 18-49 and men 25-54."

[MediaSavant]

Originally posted by LadyCrais
Not really MS. They have promoted the hell out of SG1 and Scare Tactics in the last month, and before. You can't turn on a single show on that network without being blasted by both of them, not just in practically every single commercial break, but all over the frelling show as well. Last year they didn't do a fraction of that kind of promotion for anything, and least of all Farscape.


I'll have to trust you on this. I haven't been watching the channel to know what they are promoting or not promoting.

And on the rare occasions that I do watch, I zap through the ads with my Tivo.

I do remember Farscape commercials in May last year, though, because that is when they started doing the dual Stargate/Farscape ads preceding the June premieres that people complained about. I also vaguely remember the May 31st marathon of Farscape getting some promotion.

We fans were really excited about that marathon.

A year ago this week, we were also excited about the Farscape article in TV Guide and it being on the cover of TV Guide's cable edition. That thing was on my bulletin board at work for tne months.

[MediaSavant]

For the week ending May 25th. Looks like SciFi had a decent week:

Medialifemagazine cable report (http://www.medialifemagazine.com/news2003/may03/may27/4_thurs/news5thursday.html)

[LadyCrais]

Originally posted by MediaSavant
For the week ending May 25th. Looks like SciFi had a decent week:

Medialifemagazine cable report (http://www.medialifemagazine.com/news2003/may03/may27/4_thurs/news5thursday.html)

Yeah, I looked it up and put them in your other thread. I asked you a question there too.

On the advertising, I'm watching Roar on Wednesdays. I've got it Tivo'd too, but I can only go double speed and stop in time, so I'm seeing the ads for Scare Tactics and SG-1 in every single break. As well as all over the screen while it's playing, just like they did during Farscape. Now it seems to be SG-1 on the splash with heavy promotion of the new episodes starting. And then just over and over and over again of This Week on Scare Tactics with that bitch cackling in my ear. These are hard to miss because it's the last commercial before the show starts, so I invariably catch the last 5 seconds of the fool thing. There's also heavy promoting of whatever movies are on that week. I'm just picking that up by fast forwarding thru the ads on one show a week. God forbid I should actually listen to any of them. ;)

We've talked about the so-called advertising of Farscape before last summer's season any number of times. Yet again, technically it was promoted. For a fraction of the time, always in combined ads when it once was the full ad, and with footage that was disastrous, distorted and with no bearing on the content of the episode, to say the least. So again I'll say, yes technically. Badly, always in combination with SG-1, and for a mere 5-10 seconds versus the 15-30 seconds of the year prior, but yes.

[MediaSavant]

Originally posted by LadyCrais
We've talked about the so-called advertising of Farscape before last summer's season any number of times. Yet again, technically it was promoted. For a fraction of the time, always in combined ads when it once was the full ad, and with footage that was disastrous, distorted and with no bearing on the content of the episode, to say the least. So again I'll say, yes technically. Badly, always in combination with SG-1, and for a mere 5-10 seconds versus the 15-30 seconds of the year prior, but yes.

IMO, promoting it along with another show is not a bad idea.

Qualitatively, people can always argue about whether an ad was appropriate or not....whether they like it or not. I didn't think it was that bad. And I'm not just saying that now, but I said it back then, too. The real issue to me is ... did it work?

The rating the premiere got was a good one. You'd have to come up with a convincing argument to prove that "Farscape-alone" ads would have made any difference rating-wise. Farscape got exclusive advertising and promotion the previous April and the rating was a little lower and the year prior--when you say it was promoted the way you consider "ideal"-- it wasn't a better rating either. It was about the same.

Crichton Kicks: 1.6
Thanks for Sharing: 1.5 (June 2002)
I Yencsh, You Yench: 1.3 (April 2003)

Furthermore, promotion isn't just advertising. The TV Guide thing was Farscape and Farscape alone. And how many magazines and newspapers wrote articles about Farscape and not Stargate?
Most of them that wrote about SciFi at all.