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GOOD WEEK/BAD WEEK: September 27, 2014

Check below this post for my review of How to Get Away with Murder!

GOOD WEEK: THE NEWBIES
The first week of the new fall season saw strong performances from nearly all the new shows except for week two of Red Band Society. On ABC, How to Get Away with Murder and Black-ish were the top two new shows in the demo with stellar debuts while Forever surprised everyone by growing on its second night of a two night premiere after a lackluster first night. On CBS, Madam Secretary, Scorpion, and NCIS: New Orleans have all gotten huge total numbers of viewers. On NBC, The Mysteries of Laura held up surprisingly well in week two despite an older skew. And Gotham on FOX was its strongest show in the demo by over a full point. This might look great for the new shows but the networks did bring out their biggest guns this week. The next week sees premieres of second tier shows like Stalker on CBS, ABC's Tuesday comedies, NBC's Thursday comedies, and Gracepoint on FOX. The newbie numbers may not look as universally good next week.

BAD WEEK: FOX
Oh FOX, what a horrible week you had. This situation seems more dire than even NBC was in when it was in the depths of despair following the Jay Leno weeknight show debacle. FOX's demos through Thursday night were the following:

Gotham - 3.2
Sleepy Hollow - 2.0
Bones - 1.6
New Girl - 1.3
Hell's Kitchen - 1.3
Red Band Society - 1.1
The Mindy Project - 1.0
Utopia - 0.8

So, only Gotham was impressive. Sleepy Hollow had a decent showing on paper but its big decline is a cause for concern. The Sunday lineup might be OK when it has a football lead-in, and Gotham might stay solid but other than that, it's pretty dire. And they can thank themselves for putting all their eggs in the X Factor/American Idol basket.

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