If there’s one show this season that everyone—from critics to viewers—seems to be cheering about it is ABC’s hilariously heartfelt Modern Family, created by Christopher Lloyd and Steve Levitan. Revolving around an extended family, the comedy series manages to tap into our collective experiences of familial strife and support and its pitch-perfect writing is complemented by the superb talents of its actors, who bring to life portraits of traditional nuclear families, May-December matches, and same-sex commitment with skill and flair. It’s the rare show that makes you roar with laughter and brush away tears, all in the course of 20-odd minutes. Modern Family manages to do that and bring in the viewers as well. Roughly 9 million viewers tune in each week, making it the most successful entry in ABC’s risky comedy lineup and resurrecting the family comedy from mediocrity in the process.
Bob D'Amico / ABC
It looks like Fox played its cards right by teasing the pilot episode of the musical-comedy hybrid Glee back in May after the American Idol finale. Through the fall, the audience for the Ryan Murphy show has flocked to the network for the teenage melodrama, and to iTunes to download digital versions of the show’s signature songs, such as Journey's “Don't Stop Believin',” or Kanye West’s “Gold Digger.” While some critics have complained about some tonal inconsistencies and odd plotting, nearly everyone seems to be enamored of Glee, which blends together acidic dialogue, winsome songs, and upbeat storylines… all while making an even bigger star of scene-stealer Jane Lynch, who plays the delightfully malicious Sue Sylvester. Plus, the show managed to increase Fox’s 2008-09 season average in its Wednesday timeslot by a staggering 83 percent in Adults 18-49 and 125 percent in Adults 18-34. That’s certainly something to sing about.
Matthias Clamer / FOX
While many groaned to see yet another iteration of HBO’s True Blood and the Twilight blockbusters, one can’t argue with the numbers. The CW’s teen-centric soap Vampire Diaries turned those expectations on their head, tapping into the public’s seemingly insatiable desire for bloodsuckers and producing a much needed ratings winner for the netlet. The show, which manages to draw an increasingly huge audience for the CW, also returned executive producer Kevin Williamson back to his throne as one of the preeminent chroniclers of (hyper-verbose) teenage angst. Along the way, it has also made pinups of leads Ian Somerhalder and Paul Wesley, who play vampire brothers Damon and Stefan—they’re battling for the soul of teenager Elena (Nina Dobrev). There’s clearly still blood beating in the veins of the vampire genre.
Kharen Hill / The CW
The crime procedural has steamrolled the competition, walking away with the distinction of being the season’s top-rated freshman series and launching with nearly 20 million viewers overall. Not bad for a series that’s actually a spin-off of a spin-off of Donald Bellisario’s military crime investigation drama JAG, which began life on NBC way back in 1995 before moving to CBS two years later. (Got that?) While both the Chris O’Donnell and LL Cool J-led NCIS: Los Angeles and its forebear (which stars Mark Harmon) get little in the way of regular critical adulation or awards, both series are ratings powerhouses, providing a one-two punch for CBS in a two-hour block on Tuesday evenings. In a season where massive hits are few and far between, this is one show that’s clearly the ratings victor—and yet more proof that CBS knows how to craft crime dramas like no other broadcast network.
Joseph Cultice / CBS
It might not be a ratings winner (it only lured approximately 4.8 million viewers in its last outing) but Mike Schur and Greg Daniels’ mockumentary Parks & Recreation has caught on like wildfire among critics, who praise the whip-smart dialogue, the subtle humor, and the show’s winning cast, which includes Amy Poehler, Aziz Ansari, Rashida Jones, Nick Offerman, Paul Schneider, Aubrey Plaza, and Chris Pratt. While its first few episodes during its limited spring debut felt like wayward Office episodes, Parks & Recreation has the distinction of being the most improved show this season, transforming itself into a memorably layered comedy about good intentions and the small-town political machine embodied by ever-optimistic Leslie Knope (Poehler). It is the best television show that nobody’s watching, though with a full-season order garnered from NBC, the show will have the opportunity to try to win over new viewers all season long.
Mitchell Haaseth / NBC
Kurt Sutter’s ultraviolent Shakespearean biker saga Sons of Anarchy has proven to be the ratings-slayer for cabler FX, regularly trouncing NBC in the ratings game week after week, and netting an average of 3.7 million viewers through its second season. Add in critical praise for its morally complex characters and the show’s shockingly brutal plot twists and you have a bona fide hit for FX, which it needs now that the cabler has wrapped up The Shield.
Mike Muller / FX
Viewers and critics have both surprised themselves by falling in love with CBS’ compelling legal drama The Good Wife, which stars Julianna Margulies as the wife of a disgraced politico (Chris Noth) who returns to work as a first-year legal associate. By combining thoughtful procedural courtroom cases with an intriguing and loosely serialized plot, The Good Wife has racked up an average of 12.5 million viewers and established itself as a major ratings player on Tuesday evenings. It also boasts one of the best supporting casts this season, with Josh Charles, Archie Panjabi, Christine Baranski, Matt Czuchry, and Mary Beth Peil turning in head-turning performances each week. Is it the triumphant story of a woman standing on her own two feet after her world has come crashing down around her? Or a series of kick-ass legal cases? In the hands of creators Robert and Michelle King, it’s both.
Jason Bell / CBS
Stylish and sleek, USA’s newest dramedy White Collar has already garnered a second season order and will anchor USA’s efforts on Tuesday nights come January, a first for the cable channel which has generally stuck to airing original series on Thursdays and Fridays. The success of the show hinges largely on the winning chemistry between series leads Matthew Bomer and Tim DeKay, who play, respectively, a seductive thief/con man/turned FBI consultant and the dogged federal agent who caught him twice. While the weekly cases have left a lot to be desired (astute viewers can usually figure out the mystery about five minutes in), the snappy banter, slick vintage suits, and mismatched partners provide a draw to the tune of 5.3 million viewers once DVR figures are factored in.
Nigel Perry / USA
Perhaps it’s the lack of major competition in the 10 p.m. hour or the charms of leading man Nathan Fillion, but ABC’s mystery series Castle has morphed from being perceived as a second-rate Murder He Wrote to the television equivalent of a bestseller, netting a praiseworthy 10.5 million viewers in its final November airing. No small feat for a series that many feared would be axed after its short first season last spring. In fact, Castle has shown significant increases of more than a million viewers compared to the timeslot’s previous occupant last season, Boston Legal, and was rewarded with a full-season pickup by ABC earlier this season. No mystery that Fillion and co-star Stana Katic will be solving crimes for some time to come.
Bob D'Amico / ABC
Can Seth MacFarlane do anything wrong? The Cleveland Show has already grabbed 6.6 million viewers and been picked up for a full 22-episode second season mere weeks after the launch of its first year. Spinning out of Family Guy, the animated comedy follows the misadventures of oft-put-upon Cleveland Brown (Mike Henry), who relocates to his hometown and winds up marrying his high school sweetheart Donna (Saana Lathan) and raising their blended family together. Hijinx, scatological jokes, and talking neighborhood bears (including one voiced by Arianna Huffington herself) ensue. Considering that Cleveland’s audience is just a million viewers shy of boffo Family Guy numbers, this show has become a major part of Fox’s Sunday night Animation Domination programming block in just a short time. Cleveland won’t be moving anywhere, any time soon.
FOX
Critics and viewers seem to have a love-hate relationship with Bill Lawrence and Kevin Biegel’s comedy Cougar Town, designed to be a slightly less acerbic Courteney Cox vehicle than FX’s short-lived tabloid drama Dirt. While the raucous show—which revolves around 40-something divorcee Jules (Cox) as she attempts to navigate the cougar-filled waters of millennium dating—premiered with a healthy 11.28 million viewers, recent weeks have seen the viewing figures hover around 8 million viewers (and roughly 3.0 in the key demo). Still, many have fallen for the chemistry between the show’s leads, including Cox, Busy Philipps, Christa Miller, Brian Van Holt, Dan Byrd, Ian Gomez, and Josh Hopkins, the last of whom plays Jules’ suave neighbor Grayson in a series overflowing with C-section jokes and shirtless younger men. Still, ABC must be happy with the femme-focused premise and healthy showings among female viewers.
Bob D'Amico / ABC
While V’s ratings have dropped somewhat since its premiere (which grabbed 14.3 million viewers), the sci-fi actioner has settled in with a very respectable 9.2 million viewers over its four-episode initial run. While there have been creative concerns and quite a lot of behind-the-scenes drama (original showrunner Scott Peters was replaced by Jeffrey Bell, who was recently replaced himself by Chuck’s Scott Rosenbaum), V showed significant creative improvement third and fourth episodes. Anchored by Elizabeth Mitchell, Joel Gretsch, and Morena Baccarin, the reimagining of the 1980s cult classic is forging ahead with a creative overhaul and will return on March 30 at 10 p.m. with nine new episodes. Whether ABC’s decision to schedule V in this stuttered form will prove to be a benefit or a hindrance to the show’s momentum remains to be seen.
Bob D'Amico / ABC
Was ABC a bit premature to promote drama series FlashForward as the next Lost? Hell yes. Despite debuting with a sizable 12.5 million viewers, recent airings of the serialized drama have continually plummeted to series lows, with the fall finale bringing in 7.3 million viewers. Additionally, production shutdowns and showrunner switcheroos behind the scenes haven’t imparted much confidence in the underperforming drama, which garnered a full season order from ABC before viewers started fleeing. One-dimensional characters, shrilly clichéd dialogue, and a glacially paced plot have done little to ingratiate the show to a wide audience, with many critics fleeing the show in frustration. ABC last week opted to bench the show until early March, rather than have it come back in January. It doesn’t take a vision of the future to see that ABC has quite a few issues to fix with FlashForward if it hopes to turn it into anything resembling a hit.
Bob D'Amico / ABC
Critics seem torn about NBC’s freshman comedy Community, with some placing it on their best-of-the-year lists, while others fail to understand the fuss. Created by Dan Harmon, Community stars Joel McHale as a slacker lawyer who has to attend community college in order to obtain the Bachelor’s degree he lied about having. Despite landing a full season pickup, the show has been plagued by middling ratings. While some (myself included) dig the sly humor and gentle comedic cadence, others seem to be turned off by a lack of broader comedy and a repetitive format. Which is a shame, because it’s one of the more original ideas to come out of NBC development in a long time.
Mitchell Haaseth / NBC
Despite the cast changes (Rupert Penry-Jones out, Christian Slater in), a flat-sounding premise, and the punchline-ready title, ABC’s The Forgotten has made some inroads in the 10 p.m. timeslot. While it seemed like it was destined to become forgotten itself, the show has managed to retain its audience week-to-week, holding on to a sizable chunk of its initial 9.5 million viewers by regularly landing between 7 and 8 million viewers each week. Accordingly, ABC has given the show a bit of a vote of confidence by ordering five additional episodes, though it’s worth noting that the series hasn’t found much traction with critics nor has it been able to throw off its gloomy reputation.
Frank Ockenfels / ABC
Sure, medical soap Mercy has lured between 6 and 8 million viewers in recent weeks and come in first during the Wednesdays at 8 p.m. hour in total viewers but I haven’t seen many people expressing an obsession with this poor man’s version of Grey’s Anatomy. Coming on the heels of Showtime’s Nurse Jackie and TNT’s HawthoRNe, Mercy hasn’t quite managed to make its mark on viewers’ imagination, despite soapy storylines, torrid affairs, and Michelle Trachtenberg pulling double duty here and on the CW’s Gossip Girl. A full season order has assured that Mercy will stick around until May but the show needs to start taking some stronger medicine if it hopes to become a hit.
Andrew Eccles / NBC
The two middling comedies have most definitely landed in the middle of the pack. CBS’
Accidentally on Purpose has seen some ratings increases but it’s still the weak link in an otherwise stellar Monday night lineup. The raucous comedy, which stars Jenna Elfman as a critic who gets pregnant after a one-night stand with a slacker, has been described as a
Knocked Up rip-off with a bit of
Cougar Town—and a fake San Francisco backdrop. Still someone at CBS must like the show: it got an additional five-episode order.
ABC’s
The Middle inherited the mantle of kooky family comedy from Fox’s
Malcolm in the Middle. Told from the perspective of the family’s harried Midwestern mother (Patricia Heaton), the show has received decent notices from critics but it hasn’t been able to stand outside the shadow of lead-out
Modern Family, though there has been a nice upswing in ratings of late.
While creatively HBO’s Jonathan Ames-created detective comedy picked up steam as the season went on, Bored to Death hasn’t quite become a buzzed series on the same level as the pay cabler’s Entourage, Flight of the Conchords, or Curb Your Enthusiasm. (Personally, I’ve fallen for the show’s loopy charms.) However, HBO’s decision to order a second season order early on means that leading men Jason Schwartzman, Zach Galifianakis, and Ted Danson will be returning for another season of noir-tinged and pot-infused misadventures.
Paul Schiraldi / HBO
Despite the hiring of The Shield creator Shawn Ryan as the showrunner, and overall support from critics, Fox’s procedural drama Lie to Me has struggled to find an audience on Monday evenings, landing in third place in the timeslot in the key demos and squeezing by with a 2.7 rating. It’s a sizable loss of the 12.37 million viewers who tuned in last spring to the series premiere. While Fox has picked up the show for a full season, Lie to Me will disappear off of the schedule in January to make room for 24. As for when it will return (and in what timeslot), that’s still up in the air… and that’s no lie.
Frank Ockenfels / FOX
Proving that there’s more to remaking a show than just using a familiar title and importing some aging stars of the original, Melrose Place has been a sinking ship since the CW attempted to revive the nighttime soap in September, with viewers checking out of the once glorious apartment complex with alarming rapidity. Even efforts to goose the ratings by bringing in one-time savior Heather Locklear (whose casting rescued the first Melrose Place from cancellation) haven’t resulted in any significant ratings uptick, even as the show’s miscast producers attempt to jettison a ludicrous murder plot and dump some characters, such as Ashlee Simpson-Wentz’s loopy Violet. It would take a miracle bigger than Amanda Woodward and her signature miniskirts to save the show, which has been extended to 18 episodes this season, since it’s now scraping by with just over a million viewers.
Richard Phibbs / The CW
Two medical dramas couldn’t find a lifeline.
Trauma seemed designed to tap into an audience desperate for the high stakes of ER, but it failed to find an audience, routinely coming in fourth in its timeslot and hovering under 2.0 in the key demo. NBC announced that it would only air only 13 episodes but curiously reversed its decision, ordering three additional installments. However, unless it can turn around its ratings slide,
Trauma is D.O.A.
Organ donor transplant drama
Three Rivers, created by Carol Barbee and starring Alex O’Loughlin, has been on life support since it first launched, garnering less than a 2.0 rating among adults 18-49, and CBS has now yanked the series from its schedule. While CBS hasn’t yet officially canceled the show and production will continue on the 13-episode commitment, the show seems destined to disappear down a medical waste shoot.
Poor Jay Leno has had to bear the brunt of the backlash against NBC after the Peacock decided to hand over the weekday 10 p.m. timeslot to the former Tonight Show host. But the decision to cut back on scripted dramas at 10 hour have resulted in major viewership declines for NBC, with The Jay Leno Show getting regularly trounced by cable programs. NBC is committed to airing the nightly talkshow for the full season, much to the chagrin of NBC local news broadcasts everywhere (which have seen ratings declines), though the network did preempt Jay Leno for the first time last week in order to air a two-hour Biggest Loser. A sign of things to come, perhaps? Or a rare admission from NBC that it made a myopic decision to close up shop at 10 p.m.?
Mitchell Haaseth / NBC
The bubble burst early for two soaps.
The Beautiful Life—or
TBL as the CW wanted us to call it—was pulled after just two low-rated broadcasts, after the second airing brought in only slightly more than a million total viewers. Mischa Barton and Zac Posen could not save this faux couture drama from failure. Consider the first cancellation of the 2009-10 season fashion roadkill.
Remake
Eastwick attempted to fuse together supernatural goings-on with female-centric romantic antics (think of it as
Broomstick Jungle) but wound up shedding viewers. Despite launching with an impressive 8.5 million total viewers (beating NBC’s
The Jay Leno Show),
Eastwick lost nearly 3 million viewers. ABC recently opted to not order the back nine episodes, though the network will burn off the remainder of
Eastwick’s produced installments.
Despite a fiercely loyal (if small) fanbase, Joss Whedon’s metaphysical action drama Dollhouse never quite caught on in the way that Fox hoped, even after requiring Whedon to shoot a new pilot, airing episodes out of order, saddling it with a bizarre procedural structure, and never bothering to air its superior post-apocalyptic 13th episode. Somehow, the show managed to get a second season reprieve, but Fox continued to batter the Eliza Dushku-led series, keeping it on Friday evenings, yanking it during November sweeps, and then burning off the remaining episodes after issuing an official cancellation. Creatively, Dollhouse hasn’t ever lived up to its potential, though it did introduce the world to the considerable talents of co-stars Dichen Lachman and Enver Gjokaj. Fingers crossed that we get to see more of them in the future.
Frank Ockenfels / FOX
Two family comedies have been ousted from TV suburbia. Fox’s efforts to develop an urban family sitcom have backfired with this hackneyed comedy starring Michael Strahan, Darryl “Chill” Mitchell, CCH Pounder, and Carl Weathers. While Fox has yet to announce any official cancellation,
Brothers was quickly moved off of Fridays and into a 7 p.m. slot on Sundays—and confirmed that the show would wrap after its initial 13-episode order.
The networks’ love affair with Kelsey Grammer continues, despite the lack of a suitable post-
Frasier vehicle for the star. Even ABC couldn’t save the terminally unfunny
Hank, about a former billionaire forced to return with his family to his hometown, from a swift demise. Despite an effort to tap into the global recession, viewers avoided this series from the start and ABC canceled the struggling comedy after just five low-rated airings, replacing it with repeats of
Modern Family.
