NBC Shows It Has 'The Voice' For Ratings
However, there was little Super Bowl boost to the rest of its shows
Is this a preview of what to come? Or did "The Voice" just get a temporary boost from the Super Bowl?
"American Idol" is no longer television's No. 1 show, but if the numbers for the returned "Voice" on NBC hold, it could actually lose its place as the No. 1 reality competition show, too.
Including its post-Super Bowl broadcast, "The Voice" premiered to an average of 13.3 rating/21 share, according to Fast National overnight ratings from The Nielsen Co., while "American Idol" averaged just a 10.3/17. Even if you take the Super Bowl broadcast away, "Voice" is still averaging a 10.0/15, which would be lower than "American Idol," but still keeping pace.
"Voice" is already doing much better than it did last season, up 108 percent from the year before, when it averaged a 6.4 household rating. Even the normal Monday broadcast following the Super Bowl was up 61 percent over last year.
That helped give a good push to "Smash," which NBC heavily promoted (but had also been showing the episode to anyone with an Internet connection ahead of the broadcast). The musical series from Steven Spielberg starring Katherine McPhee, Debra Messing, Megan Hilty, Christian Borle and Anjelica Huston, premiered to a 7.3/12, the best series premiere for the network this season behind the preview of Betty White's "Off Their Rockers."
Yet, all those strong ratings only helped pull NBC out of the bottom, not really have it compete as the top network for the week. Those shows provided no bump to the rest of the programming, and NBC finished second to CBS with a 5.5/9. That was up 62 percent from last year, and 90 percent from the week before.
ABC and Fox fought for third place, with ABC just winning by a hair despite a weak premiere from its new horror series starring Bruce Greenwood, "The River."
There seems to be nothing stopping "NCIS," which hit a new season high this week with a 12.7/19. That now brings its season average up to a 12.0/19 for CBS, easily the No. 1 show on television, even ahead of "American Idol." That's helping its lead-out show "NCIS: Los Angeles," too, although it dropped 4 percent last week to finish below the 10.0 household rating threshold.
Also continuing strong is "Big Bang Theory" for CBS on Thursdays. It matched its season high set the week before with a 9.7/16. "Two and a Half Men," however, continues to slip. It finished this week with a 7.9/11, up slightly from the week before, but down 18 percent from its average and 13 percent since Dec. 12. It finished No. 12 this week, and just ahead of ABC's top comedy, "Modern Family."
"The Voice" was tops for NBC with a 19.9/33, while "Modern Family" was the winner for ABC with a 7.6/11. On top of CBS was "NCIS" with a 12.7/19 while "American Idol" was the winner for Fox with a 10.8/17. The CW was led by "Vampire Diaries" with a 2.0/3.
CBS leads the overall race with a 7.7/12, followed by ABC with a 5.7/9, Fox with a 4.6/7, NBC with a 3.5/6 and The CW with a 1.2/2.
CBS, NBC and ABC were all up year over year, while Fox and The CW were down.
Top Networks, Week of Feb. 5 -- [Audience Loyalty Index rating]
| 1. (1) | CBS | 7.9/12 | [62.2] |
| 2. (4) | NBC | 5.5/9 | [27.8] |
| 3. (2) | ABC | 5.0/8 | [65.2] |
| 4. (3) | Fox | 4.9/8 | [45.7] |
| 5. (5) | The CW | 1.0/2 | [50.5] |
Top Network Shows, Week of Feb. 5 -- [ALI]
| 1. (-) | The Voice (NBC) | 19.9/33 | [100.0] |
| 2. (-) | NCIS (CBS) | 12.7/19 | [94.7] |
| 3. (1) | American Idol (Fox) | 10.8/17 | [92.5] |
| 4. (-) | The Voice (NBC) | 10.8/16 | [100.0] |
| 5. (2) | American Idol (Fox) | 10.4/17 | [97.6] |
| 6. (-) | NCIS: Los Angeles (CBS) | 9.9/15 | [93.1] |
| 7. (3) | Big Bang Theory (CBS) | 9.7/16 | [92.7] |
| 8. (-) | The Voice (NBC) | 9.2/14 | [100.0] |
| 9. (4) | Person of Interest (CBS) | 9.1/14 | [88.1] |
| 10. (5) | The Mentalist (CBS) | 8.9/15 | [92.8] |
Top New Shows, Week of Feb. 5 -- [ALI]
| 1. (1) | Person of Interest (CBS) | 9.1/14 | [88.1] |
| 2. (-) | Unforgettable (CBS) | 7.6/13 | [84.5] |
| 3. (-) | Smash (NBC) | 7.3/12 | [100.0] |
| 4. (-) | 2 Broke Girls (CBS) | 6.9/10 | [87.6] |
| 5. (2) | Rob (CBS) | 6.6/10 | [88.9] |
| 6. (4) | A Gifted Man (CBS) | 5.8/10 | [89.1] |
| 7. (-) | The River (ABC) | 5.1/8 | [92.2] |
| 8. (-) | Last Man Standing (ABC) | 4.7/7 | [71.4] |
| 8. (-) | Last Man Standing (ABC) | 4.7/7 | [71.4] |
| 10. (-) | Suburgatory (ABC) | 4.4/7 | [84.6] |
Least-Watched Big Four Network Shows, Week of Feb. 5 -- [ALI]
| 1. | Fringe (Fox) | 1.9/3 | [93.3] |
| 2. | Kitchen Nightmares (Fox) | 2.2/4 | [90.5] |
| 3. | Up All Night (NBC) | 2.4/4 | [95.2] |
| 4. | Are You There, Chelsea? (NBC) | 2.5/4 | [69.5] |
| 5. | 30 Rock (NBC) | 2.6/4 | [89.0] |
| 6. | Whitney (NBC) | 2.7/4 | [77.0] |
| 7. | Raising Hope (Fox) | 2.8/4 | [78.3] |
| 8. | Wipeout (ABC) | 3.0/5 | [76.7] |
| 9. | Parenthood (NBC) | 3.1/5 | [77.7] |
| 9. | Grimm (NBC) | 3.1/5 | [81.0] |
Fast Nationals usually provide a snapshot of what Americans are watching by pulling numbers from the top urban markets that include both live viewing and same-day timeshifted viewing. A rating point generally represents more than 1.1 million households while the share indicates the percentage of televisions turned on that was tuned to the specific program. These numbers typically shift when final ratings are issued.
Data collected from The Nielsen Co., as distributed by Zap2it. GenreNexus tracks non-news, non-event programming, and figures for this story reflect airing of new episodes only. For more information on the Audience Loyalty Index, click here.
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