We’re into the dog days of the Fall season now as many series come to the end of their run – so this will be the last Ratings Roundup for 2010. We’ve already seen one big loser earlier in the week – A&E’s quickly cancelled docu-soap The Hasselhoffs – but here’s some other highs and lows from the last few days…

WINNERS:

THE SING OFF: Wow – I didn’t see this one coming! Like a lot of people out there I thought NBC’s acappella singing competition was going to get crushed in its second season. But guess what – The Sing Off is now a hit!

Monday night’s premiere was up 28% from last season’s opener, with 8.57 million viewers and a 2.8 18-49 share. These are VERY good figures for NBC, who’ve seen costly Monday shows like Chuck, The Event and Chase all struggling to climb above 6 million viewers and a 2.0 share all season long.

And the good news continued on Wednesday with 7.64 million viewers and a 2.7 18-49 share. Why the upswing? Has the Glee effect warmed audiences to vocal groups? Is the decline of American Idol boosting other similarly themed shows? Or maybe people just liked the show first time around… whatever the reason, Christmas just came early for host Nick Lachey!

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THE SIMPSONS: It’s in its 22nd season and admittedly a little ragged around the edges, but The Simpsons can still work some ratings magic at times!

Sunday’s episode of the veteran animation series featured Katy Perry and puppetry and pulled in a strong 9.54 million viewers and a terrific 4.2 18-49 share – which will easily plant the show within the top 5 shows of the week in the ad coveted demo.

By comparison fellow Sunday night stalwarts struggled and hit season lows – Desperate Housewives pulled in more viewers (11.35 million) but a lower youth share (3.6), while Brothers and Seasons continued to slide towards cancellation with 7.59 million viewers and a 2.1 18-49 share. Where’s Katy Perry when you need her!

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STORAGE WARS: It’s been a week of mixed fortunes for A&E. There was the aforementioned Hasselhoffs cancelation. Then there’s Strange Days With Bob Saget which also seems to be struggling with 566,000 viewers and a 0.2 18-49 share.

But there was good news for the cable net too. New docu-series competition, Storage Wars, is an out of the box hit – pulling in over 2 million viewers on Wednesday night for both episodes of a double bill – and a healthy 1.0 youth share. What’s the message here – ditch the ‘celebrity’ reality and go with real people – and their problem. It certainly worked with Intervention, Hoarders, Dog The Bounty Hunter and now Storage…

PS Gene Simmons Family Jewels gets a free pass – it’s still a hit!

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LOSERS:

CBS SHOWS: A tough week for the Eye network with several shows all hitting series lows…

On Monday the utterly dreadful Mike and Molly hit a series low of 11.03 million viewers and a 3.4 18-49 share (mainly due to its Two And A Half Men lead in), while Hawaii Five-0 also hit lows with 10.51 million and a 2.8 share. Meanwhile The Defenders continues to struggle on Wednesdays at 10pm – with 10.54 million viewers and a CBS cancel-worthy 2.0 18-49 share.

But it was on Thursday that CBS saw its main ratings carnage. The criminally unfunny $#*! My Dad Says was down to 9.40 million and a 2.7 18-49 share (a series low), CSI slipped to 13.16 million and a worrying 3.0 share, leading into The Mentalist which hit 13.40 million and an alarming 2.4 18-49 share (also a series low).

We say all the time at the Ratings Roundup that CBS attracts big audiences but not nearly enough of them are in the ad friendly 18-49 range… how long will the network allow the trend to continue before it starts taking radical action?

CASTLE: We rarely talk about ABC’s Castle here on Remote Patrolled – for me it’s just one of those shows that just exists and is hard to get too excited by (rather like Bones on Fox). It’s also not really a hit, and tucked away on Monday nights at 10pm is a show that’s easy to forget about.

Fans may argue the show is a success but essentially it’s carried by its usual lead in Dancing With The Stars. But without Dancing – as was the case this week – Castle’s ratings were less than stellar. Monday’s episode pulled in 7.62 million viewers and a 1.9 18-49 share – the sort of ratings that would normally spell cancellation. But ABC has a lot of problems at the moment so I suspect Castle is way down on their priority list!

Plus at least the show isn’t Skating With The Stars. That ratings disaster sunk to new lows this Monday – 3.94 million viewers and a 0.8 18-49 share!

 

 

 

 

AND FINALLY: I know we keep mentioning them – but seriously how low can Vh1’s ratings go this year? Exhibit A – Dance Cam Slam, Wednesday night.

 

Total viewers – 171,000. Yep, you read that right… less than 200,000 people tuned in for the latest installment of the dance competition show. Is it possible we might see a Vh1 ‘premiere’ score less than 100,000 viewers soon…