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| "Empire" is Fox's new smash hit and they desperately need to build on that. |
Network upfronts –
where the networks all come together to announce their fall schedules and pitch
their new shows to advertisers – are here, which means the 2014-15 television
season is quickly coming to a close.
I’ll probably have a season wrap-up post at the end of May, but I wanted
to take a quick look at each network and its shows before upfronts hit. Next up is this season’s almost certain last
place finisher: NBC.
It didn’t happen in one season or even two, as did NBC’s
ascension from last place to the top, but in a span of three short years Fox
has gone from a decade of ratings dominance to last place of the four major
networks. And, frankly, it wasn’t even close. At the beginning of the season I posited that Fox and ABC would be in a head-to-head race for third place, but
Fox is going to end up almost ten percent behind in nearly all measures.
And the sad thing is, there’s a lot to love about the state
of Fox programming right now. The NFL
gives the network a nice Sunday boost during the fall. Empire
is a runaway hit and is putting up the best relative numbers of any show in a
decade. Even American Idol, while not the mega-hit it once was, has been capable
of keeping its average rating above 2.0, something few scripted shows can do
anymore. But now former executive Kevin
Reilly’s plan to abandon pilot season in favor of upfront orders seems to have
backfired massively. The problem Fox
found itself with this season was that most of its new shows tanked completely
and there was nothing in the bullpen to replace them.
And so it happened that Red
Band Society, Weird Loners, Mulaney, Glee, Backstrom, Gracepoint, and
Utopia combined to air 53 hours of
sub-1.0 rated programming in 2014-15, roughly one-third of the total of all
four major networks combined. That
doesn’t even count The Following, New
Girl, The Mindy Project, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and Bob’s Burgers, all returning series which, at some point this
season, dipped below the Mulaney Line.
Questions
So what does Fox do?
How do they come back from what can only be described as a disaster of a
season? Clearly the first question is “What
will Empire do in the fall”? The show made ratings history this year,
debuting to big numbers and only going up from there, literally. Every single episode of Empire that aired drew more same day viewers than the episode
before it. Only once did the demo rating
go down and only once did it stay the same from week to week. I don’t think it will come back to the
ridiculous 6.9 rating it put up in the finale, but Fox has a once in a decade,
maybe once in a lifetime megahit on its hands and as goes Empire, so goes Fox with it.
The other big question is how will Fox build hits in the
fall? Sunday nights are likely to stay
the same and Fridays have turned into something of a dead zone for the
network. That leaves four nights needing
four lead-ins, but Fox really only has two: the aforementioned Empire and Gotham. Sleepy Hollow dropped off tremendously this season, as did Bones and neither seems able to support new
programming. Both actually seem like
they’d be a good fit for Friday night.
It’s likely that the network will need at least two self-starters this
fall. Unfortunately, they tried the same
thing last year, only to see Utopia
crater.
The Numbers
NBC’s Live+Same Day average currently sits at 1.47. Given current trends, I expect it to end up
somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.45, representing a 25% fall from last season
and, I’m fairly sure, representing the worst annual average in the history of
the four major networks. Even the
spring, usually a high point for Fox thanks to the return of American Idol, was incredibly unkind
this year with the network currently on pace for a 1.0 average during May
sweeps. Outside of Empire, Gotham, and kind
of The Last Man on Earth, there is no
painting over just how dreadful Fox’s year was.
The good news, at least, is that they have a lot of room to grow, if
they can find the right shows.
The Schedule
(Titles in BOLD have already been
renewed for next season; titles in strikethrough have already been
canceled)
Monday –
7:00pm – Gotham (2.17 average rating)
8:00pm – Sleepy Hollow (1.54) – The Following (1.18)
Gotham did
perfectly fine leading off Monday nights in its rookie season. Sure, it would have been nice to see it hold its
fall ratings into the spring, instead of falling about 40%, but given all of
Fox’s other problems, it’s tough to complain about a show that can pull decent
ratings for a full 22-episode season. I
fully expect to see Gotham right back
here this fall. The bigger question is
what will get the lead-out. After a
stellar first season, both critically and in terms of audience, Sleepy Hollow backtracked quite a ways
in both in its sophomore campaign. And The Following, after debuting as the
number one drama on broadcast two years ago, has been shown the door,
continuing Fox’s now decade-long run producing only one drama that aired more
than 50 episodes: Fringe. Fox really doesn’t have a lot of options, so
they’re probably just going to slot in one of their two best drama prospects.
Tuesday –
7:00pm – Utopia
(0.80) – MasterChef Jr. (1.66) – Hell’s Kitchen (1.28)
8:00pm – New Girl (1.30)/The Mindy Project (1.05) – New Girl (1.30)/Weird Loners (0.62)
Tuesday and Thursday were complete dead zones for Fox this
year so really anything is possible.
Current rumors have New Girl
being held for midseason, which could indicate an intent to abandon comedy
entirely in the fall. I’m not sure of
the production schedule for Gordon Ramsey’s shows, but with Hell’s Kitchen airing this summer, MasterChef Jr. seems like an obvious
choice here as the one show that did halfway decently on Tuesdays last year. Then again, this seems like the night Fox is
most likely to abandon so, again, anything goes.
Wednesday –
7:00pm – Hell’s Kitchen (1.28) – American Idol (2.08)
8:00pm – Red Band
Society (0.83) – Empire (5.09) – American Idol (2.08)
The big story here is Empire
and its absolutely ridiculous 5.09 average rating. Presumably it will be coming back to
Wednesday nights in the fall, the only real question is whether Fox keeps it at
the less-family friendly 8:00 hour or puts it at 7:00 in an attempt to create a
lead-in for a new drama. Clearly NBC is
banking on the latter, renewing The
Mysteries of Laura only to keep it at 7:00 as fodder for the Empire beast. Either way, this looks to be Fox’s strongest
night of the week next fall.
As for the spring, rumors have American Idol coming back for an announced final season. The only question there will be if it airs
two-hour episodes on Wednesdays again with Empire
ending its season early, or if it moves to another night. Don’t be surprised to see Idol move its two-hour shows to Thursday
to accommodate the network’s new hit.
Thursday –
7:00pm – Bones (1.28) – American Idol (2.32) – Bones (1.28)
8:00pm – Gracepoint
(0.84) – Backstrom (1.01)
As I mentioned above, Thursday was another black hole for
Fox. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Bones return here as it did okay in the
fall but, again, anything’s possible on this night.
Friday –
7:00pm – Utopia (0.64)
– World’s
Funniest Fails (0.87)
8:00pm – Glee (0.66)
Fox has basically abandoned Friday nights in recent
years. There’s a chance that it could be
revived at least a bit with the right combination of veteran dramas (I’m
thinking Bones and Sleepy Hollow), much the way they did
with Fringe for a few years. But it’s just as likely that they’ll fill the
night with reality and repeats and focus on fixing the more important holes
elsewhere on the schedule.
Sunday –
7:00pm – The Simpsons (2.24)/Brooklyn
Nine-Nine (1.74)
8:00pm – Family Guy (2.18)/Mulaney (0.75) – Family Guy (2.18)/Bob’s
Burgers (1.26) – Family Guy (2.18)/The Last Man on Earth (1.64)
The spring schedule of The
Simpsons, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Family
Guy, and The Last Man on Earth
actually did surprisingly well for Fox, given all of their other struggles this
year. I expect it to be back in its
entirety.
So that’s the Fox network in a nutshell. Unlike in past years I don’t really have a
recipe for improvement for the last place network. At least ABC last year had several hits to
build its schedule around, but Fox really only has Empire and Gotham. They’ll need to choose their new programming
carefully to make sure they don’t waste their prime timeslots.
Tyler Williams is a
professional library and amateur television critic. You can reach him at tytalkstv AT gmail DOT
com or on Twitter @TyTalksTV.
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