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GOOD WEEK/BAD WEEK: October 4, 2014

GOOD WEEK: "THE VOICE"
We've gotten used to The Voice being one of TV's top shows in the past couple years. But when it premiered this season, it showed some serious sign of decline even with new judges Gwen Stefani and Pharrell Williams. The season premiere's 3.9 demo was down 23% from last fall's premiere. Then the Tuesday episode climbed to a 4.1 demo (down 12%). This week, Monday's episode had a 4.0 demo (down 14%) while Tuesday again climbed to a 4.1 (down just 8%). The trend is getting better for The Voice as it is holding up quite well. It may be past its peak, but it's not too far past it and audiences are responding well critically to the new judges.
BAD WEEK: NEW COMEDY BLOCKS
Launching a one hour comedy block with two new shows seems to be an exceedingly hard task for the networks. In fact, I can't think of a successful one in years but I can think of tons of quickly gone bomb blocks (Animal Practice/Guys with Kids, Go On/The New Normal). At best, I can think of instances where one show survived (The Goldbergs over Trophy Wife, Brooklyn Nine-Nine over Dads, Up All Night over Free Agents). This year's two combos look pretty pathetic and we might go 0 for 4 with the new shows. On Tuesday, ABC's Selfie and Manhattan Love Story had pretty anemic premieres then it went even worse for NBC on Thursday with Bad Judge and A to Z. Perhaps the problem is that none of those four shows are very good.

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