Staff Writer
If you’re a ratings watcher like I am, you’ll notice that ABC’s new show Agents of SHIELD has been consistent in the ratings but not overly huge like you’d expect with a large Marvel production. You also may have noticed that episode nine, which aired on November 27th, had the second biggest same day rating since the premier.
But what happened to episode ten, entitled “The Bridge”? For being a mid-season finale, it fared horribly in the ratings, dropping to a measly five million which is down nearly four million from the previous numbers.
Yikes.
People, such as myself, need to remember this article and realise that just because numbers don’t look right, doesn’t mean the show isn’t doing well.
Case in point: according to Disney and ABC, Agents of SHIELD is the highest rated Tuesday show of the season. Now, you may be sitting there scratching your head. I did too, and still am. NCIS remains the top show in same day numbers and many critics are lamenting that ABC was foolish in putting the two shows up against each other. They say AoS needs a new day or a new time to get its legs and build an audience. Again, according to ABC and Disney, it isn’t needed.
How? And why? First, executive producer/writing team Maurissa Tancharoen and Jed Whedon recently spoke to Collider and revealed that when they first came to ABC, they had a two year plan in place.
“They had a nice idea of what it was going to be before they said yes,” Tancharoen revealed. “What happens, especially in TV, is that you set out these tentpoles, and then, as you go, things pop up and things change, and more interesting ideas are pitched by other people,” Whedon added.
Second, “on average, ABC says, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.‘s season-to-date live+7 day rating came to a whopping 4.8 in the overall 18-49 demographic. By comparison, that bested every other Tuesday evening show, including a 4.6 rating for NBC’s The Voice, and a 4.2 from CBS’ NCIS.” To add to that, SHIELD improved over its entire time slot by about 86% making it ABC’s top rated drama between the 18-49 year old demo since 2009. Two thousand and nine. That’s a pretty impressive feat for any network.
So, Marvel fans, don’t worry. As long as you’re watching the show, the network doesn’t mind when you watch it. Besides, there’s an entire slew of stories Whedon and Tancharoen can tap into.
“We also work from a place of coming up with a story, and then asking if there’s someone already in the universe. It’s such a vast universe that sometimes we come up with an idea, and then we’ll be flipping through the pages to see if there’s someone who has that ability or fits that profile. So, it goes both ways. Creating new characters is something we have a little bit more freedom with,” said Whedon when asked about drawing from other aspects of Marvel.
Tancharoen also adds, “The exciting and challenging part about our show is that we do want to weave in with the movies, as well. Whatever comes up there might show up a little bit on our show.”
As long as the fans continue to come out in droves and as long as the demo remains at or above 4.8, I think we’re doing just fine in our day and time slot. So, don’t be like me and freak out when things look bad. More than likely, they’re not as bad as you think.
Agents of SHIELD is currently on a scheduled winter hiatus and will return with episode eleven, “The Magical Place”, on January 7th, 8/7c on ABC.
Tune in and watch the team as they fight to save Coulson from the murderous Centipede organization. Also be prepared to witness the fall out of the reveal we’ve all been waiting for: how did Coulson survive being murdered at the hands of Loki?
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