Ratings for Medium 6×03 “Pain Killer”
October 11, 2009 by Kona Gallagher
Not only did Medium and CBS easily win in the Friday night ratings war, but it appears as though the other networks are conceding defeat. Instead of working on the gritty cop drama, Southland, and making it into a contender for the 9 pm slot, NBC seems to be content with the solid second place afforded to them by episodes of Dateline, choosing instead to cancel Southland (which really is a fantastic series) before it even airs. Similarly, ABC, who currently has plans to pit Ugly Betty against Medium in the 9:00 hour, continues to push its premiere back, opting instead to nab third place with reruns of their Wednesday night comedies.
What this means is that Medium’s ratings dominance isn’t going to end anytime soon– and CBS is going to continue to come out on top. As much as I love a good win for Medium– especially the “told you so” it offers to NBC, these recent moves by the other networks dismay me. Winning is a lot more fun when it’s up against actual competition. Besides, as a TV lover and reviewer, it makes me sad anytime a quality scripted show, such as Southland, is scrapped for a cheaper alternative.
Besides, I have longed hoped for networks to begin taking Friday nights seriously again, and with ABC and NBC basically conceding defeat, it’s going to be difficult going forward for networks to justify putting expensive scripted shows on friday nights. FOX, at least is trying, but unfortunately for them, their shows simply aren’t pulling in the numbers they need.
So, about those numbers: Medium had overall ratings of 8.30 million viewers (1.9 18-49). The good news is that this week’s ratings were higher than last week’s, which were 7.7 million (1.8 18-49). The bad news is that Medium’s ratings actually fell from Ghost Whisperer’s. GW garnered 8.60 million total viewers (2.1 18-49), which gave it a win for the night in both total viewers and the key demographic.
So while this isn’t the greatest ratings news in the world, an improvement over last week is definitely positive. Hopefully this growth will be a continuing trend.
Image: Sonja Flemming/CBS
Wow, I have to say, after three weeks, the friday night death trap at 9 on cbs will not find Medium as a victim this year. Now I know there are 19 more weeks of new episodes and ugly betty hasnt premiered yet, but I think Medium is alot better than betty. In fact we have been dominating friday night 3 for 3 now. I think… ok I wish CBS would order three or four more eps of Medium. maybe have 26 like Criminal Minds did last year. That would make up for the nbc lacking of a full season for the show. The ratingsare going our way. we have won 9 spot all three weeks. One of the three weeks Medium won the night. DSo why not. Give us a few more stories.
Arggggh!!! Kona, my comment got stuck in the spam filter again! HELP!!
I’m happy Medium’s ratings improved this week. I hope they continue to do so, even in episodes without notable guest stars.
Southland just got picked up over here by the same channel that will air Hung.
I had lots of good television to watch this Friday, I ended up recording the pilot of True Blood because they’ve been promoting it loads. And they’re showing the same episode twice a week, at least for the opening weeks.
The episode was really good, and if the next ones is half as good I don’t think we have to worry bout the ratings!
Yeah im so exited about the ratings im really proud of Medium good ratings for a fridfay and the episode was very good and next week episode looks really really good and i can’t freaking wait for the Night Of The living dead episode!!!!!!!!!!!
Kona, did you see this press release from CBS about the premiere week ratings? The final DVR numbers have been released and Medium gained over a million viewers when the Live+7 Day viewers were added in, which brings the total number up to almost 10M viewers! Even with an average 20% increase in DVR viewership last season, by my figures, that’s still at least a million more than it was averaging on NBC last season. That’s got to be good news for the show, and for CBS, right? And I’m keeping my fingers crossed that things will continue to improve!
http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/10/12/cbs-big-premiere-week-gets-even-bigger/30218