Wish Agents of SHIELD was better

[drew]

i really want to like Agents of SHIELD - i mean its a comic book tv show after all- i have given this show an awful lot of chances and it just isn't very good:

clunky dialogue (lots of it), CGI is just okay (i know that stuff can get expensive), formulaic plots (maybe i have procedural fatigue) all add up to a pretty ho hum hour of tv; especially when i compare to this season of arrow which is, for me, firing on all cylinders.

Are any of you enjoying it more than me?

I want to like it - so if i am missing something let me know...

[fudd71]

I too would love to enjoy this show more then I do.

I do not however feel there is anything about the show that is particularly poorly done. If anything it is probably the best made show of this type (action-adventure) ever to appear on television. Unfortunately I'm not sure at my current age (almost 40) that I want to watch an action-adventure show anymore. When compared to these types of shows from my childhood (A-team, Dukes of Hazard, Magnum PI) this is a huge improvement. When compared to the action-adventure shows from the early days of television (Superman, Lone Ranger, Gunsmoke) this show is so much better it is almost laughable how large an improvement this is.

The simple truth in my personal case is I don't want to watch an action show anymore. It has taken me a while to come to this conclusion but it is the truth. As a general rule this also seems to be a fact for the American television-watching public, that is why there haven't been a lot of action adventure shows in recent time and none that were particularly successful. The public has been so trained to think of hour-long shows as dramas that they don't know how to react to hour-long scripted shows that aren't traditional dramas or police procedurals.

I hope the show does real well and that there is a whole generation of kids out there that love this show the way I did the Dukes of Hazard and the A-team when I was a kid. Maybe it will even bring some fans to comics! Personally however I won't be watching.

[drew]

it does skew a little younger probably, makes a lot of sense

but Arrow is on the CW, should also be skewing younger and probably shouldn't be as good as it is, but i love that show, the addition of black canary worked (so far) and i am excited for flash later this season even if he is a glee cast-off

last nights episode of shield was pretty good though

[fudd71]

For those interested in broadcast television rating here is quick look at how the broadcasts of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. have gone since its debut:

these are the final live +same day 18-49 ratings, the closest thing publicly available to the "real" ratings (the commercial+3 ratings are one of the most highly guarded secrets in both Hollywood and on Madison Ave) that networks actually get paid by advertisers bases off of.

September 24th (premiere) 4.7 rating
October 1st 3.5 rating
October 8th 2.9 rating
October 15th 2.7 rating
October 22nd 2.6 rating
November 5th (last night) 2.5 rating

As one can see in some ways television rating tend to follow a similar arc to comics at least for the first few episodes, unlike comics they tend to become very stable after that. A substantial drop after the premiere is somewhat normal, more then a full rating point and over 25% is however a little larger then normal. The drop after the second episode is also somewhat normal but again over 17% is larger then normal. Leveling off in the 3.0-2.5 rating is definitely respectable however if you really like the show it would be much better if the rating stopped falling and stabilized or even had a week where the rating was at least flat.

As a point of comparison last night's highest rated scripted hour on broadcast was NCIS with a 2.9 (in the same time slot as Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D) the only other show to be higher rated last night was The Voice with a 3.4 rating for NBC. On a weekly basis the last week with a new episode (week ending 11/27) of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D, it finished 6th among scripted dramas (behind NCIS-3.0, Blacklist-3.0,Scandal-2.9, Grey's Anatomy-2.8 & Criminal Minds-2.7) and 10th among scripted shows (allow behind the following comedies Big Bang Theory-5.2, Modern Family-3.9, How I Met Your Mother-3.0 & The Millers-2.7). Last weeks Arrow on the other hand garnered a 0.8 rating about normal for that show. The CW is however almost by definition playing in a whole different league then the other broadcast networks.

[fudd71]

For those interested Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. ratings ticked down yet again last night. Last nights 18-49 rating was a 2.2 with a 5 share. If this trend doesn't change soon this show will not see a second season. If the shows ratings level out at a 1.8 or lower no way it gets picked up for a second season. Anything in the 1.9-2.2 range is still questionable with how expensive the show is to produce.

At this point, if anything ABC wants to see a stable number, Last night marked the shows 7th first run episode each drawing a lower rating then the previous and averaging a loss of 11.5% of the viewership from one episode to the next. At the current rate of loss this show could have a 1.5 rating and under 5 million total viewers by its tenth episode. If this happens the show may not even return in January. With the cost of production and probable lack of viable alternatives the whole first season will most likely air, but not necessarily based on merit.

[drew]

but more important to Disney is this:

last week's episode marked the the sixth consecutive time Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has ranked as Tuesday's number-one show in the key men's 18 to 49 year-old demographic. In fact, season-to-date, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is also currently ranked the number two overall broadcast entertainment series in men 18-49, behind only CBS' long-standing favorite, The Big Bang Theory.

source

so i guess the people who are tuning out are just women and the geriatric set, who were gonna watch NCIS anyway

[fudd71]

but more important to Disney is this:

last week's episode marked the the sixth consecutive time Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has ranked as Tuesday's number-one show in the key men's 18 to 49 year-old demographic. In fact, season-to-date, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is also currently ranked the number two overall broadcast entertainment series in men 18-49, behind only CBS' long-standing favorite, The Big Bang Theory.

source

so i guess the people who are tuning out are just women and the geriatric set, who were gonna watch NCIS anyway

There are some interesting points in this article, and again I think the show is fine and expect it to be renewed at it's current levels, however there are some danger signs.

Again if anyone is interested and I realize this is way off topic for a comic book fourm, I will point out some of television PR people's most often used tricks to hide a shows weaknesses. These PR tricks are not unique to this show or this article and happens both with shows that are doing great and shows where the cancellation notice is mere moments from being made public. Everyone in television wants the appearance of more success then they have, even if they are very successful. In one of the best recent examples of this David E. Kelly, Kathy Bates and NBC's PR team publicly criticized television reporters and rating analysis in the Spring of 2012 for saying Harry's Law would be cancelled in an interview published in the Hollywood Reporter. They pointed to many of the same type of stats that were sited in this article. That show was of course cancelled by NBC two days later. Again I think Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is currently fine, but there are weaknesses.

What's more, ABC says, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. also boasts incredible staying power as this season's second-biggest adult 18-49 broadcast gainer in TV playback -- once again trailing only The Big Bang Theory -- while adding 2.1 ratings points, or 62%, from its "live plus same day" and "live plus seven day" viewership.

The live +7 number is completely meaningless. Networks PR people love to talk about it because by definition it has to be better then Live + SD (same day). Neilsen makes four sets of rating publicly available. Live+SD, Live+3 (days), Live+7 and Live+30. The Live+30 is new with this fall season and even more meaningless then the +3 & +7 numbers. Television networks ad rates and in some cases payments from advertisers (depending on the way contracts are written) are based on another number. That number is the Commercial +3 rating and is not made public. The C+3 number measures the number of people who watch the ad time during a television show within 36 hours of broadcast. It does not measure how many people actually watch the program. People that watch on DVRs and fast-forward through commercials, watch streaming on the network website, watch streaming on sites like Hulu and purchase from sites like iTunes don't count in this number (they do in the +SD (the streaming people don't affect this number because it is hard to watch streaming the night the show airs before 3AM EST),+3,+7 & +30). What we have learned over the years when C+3 numbers are occasionally made public they are most similar to the Live+SD. Networks love to talk about the +7 number because it will always be the highest, however they make decisions based on the +SD (more accurately the C+3) number because that is the one that pays the bills.We have only gotten the first of the +30 numbers but moving forward I'm sure network PR types will love to talk about that number too.

Finally, to put everything into perspective relative to Disney's previous television standings, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. so far has singlehandedly improved its time period for ABC by 105%, and in the process secured its spot as the network's top-rated series for that hour dating all the way back to 2009.

This statement has two problems.
1) it is sort of just a flat out lie. The Tuesday 8-9 time-slot for ABC during the fall quarter of 2012 was filled with the Dancing with Stars results show. That show averaged a 2.4 with a 6 share. Yes Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D debut episode was at 105% increase to that average but by the week this article was written about the increase was only 4% and this most recent week the show was down over 8% to that average. The average for all aired episodes of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is 3.0 (a 25% increase over last season) and still falling.
2)Comparing shows to how they do against previous shows is pointless. One thing those previous shows were cancelled for a reason. Being better then last years loser show doesn't mean much. The most accurate way to predict a shows fate is to compare it to the current network average for similar shows. For hour long dramas Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D currently ranks 3rd of 9 (10 hour long dramas were on the fall Lucky 7 has already been cancelled). The top 30% of ABC hour long dramas (behind only Grey's Anatomy and Scandal) if very strong but has nothing to do with what was on last year.

But just for good measure, Disney and Marvel also recently decided it'd be a good idea to orchestrate a significant big screen movie tie-in with this weekend's Thor: The Dark World for the Nov. 19 episode of Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. If that doesn't serve to run up the score even further, I don't know what will.

This statement can be taken two ways. Sure they could be using the show's success to market the film. On the other hand they could just as easily be trying to use the buzz of a blockbuster film to prop-up a show not performing as well as expected.

Kinda makes you wonder why Disney's ABC made the decision last month to pick up Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. for its full first season, right? After all, why lock in a show that's performing successively worse with each passing week?

This is again a somewhat meaningless thing. What this means is they don't have anything they think can draw better rating ready to go for a mid-season replacement and the numbers aren't bad enough to require the show being yanked off the air immediately. In two somewhat similar examples: Fox picked up a full season of the comedy Dads recently, I would bet a substantial amount that it will not be back for season 2 even with the full season pick up. ABC also recently announced the cancellation of the comedy Back In the Game, however they have decided to continue to air the remaining new episodes they have. The reason I believe they are still airing the new episodes, it is there best option. The only other option for ABC since we would guess they don't have a replacement ready to air would be re-runs of either the Middle or Modern Family (ABCs highest rated sitcoms). First run episodes of Back In Game will most likely garner the same or higher ratings than those reruns would. So they are choosing to air the already paid for episodes of a cancelled show. The real question I have here is why they announced the cancellation already?

First, consider the fact that last week's episode marked the the sixth consecutive time Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has ranked as Tuesday's number-one show in the key men's 18 to 49 year-old demographic. In fact, season-to-date, Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. is also currently ranked the number two overall broadcast entertainment series in men 18-49, behind only CBS' long-standing favorite, The Big Bang Theory.

Targeting specific demos like men, women, kids, the elderly, teenagers, specific ethnicities is all the domain of of cable stations, day-time and late night. There is simply too much money involved in primetime network television for anything other then the full 18-49 number to mean anything.

Lastly I wanted to quote/paraphrase Bill Gorman, one of the best television rating analysis and writers in the field today: Don't fall for the PR Jedi mind trick as they way theirs hands and say "these aren't the ratings your looking for". The Live+SD are the most accurate way to judge a show's success and predict its future, anyone that points you someplace else has an agenda other than the truth.

[drew]

i certainly do not have the in depth understanding of the current Neilson & Arbitron rating systems that you do

back in the day, all ratings were determined by 1500 or so people with boxes on their tvs and those that kept diaries of their viewing habits (i was selected for this once and sucked at it)

its easy to see the flaws in both systems then, not sure how much better they are now, great stuff gets canceled all the time simply because of numbers and According to Jim runs for 10 seasons,

i think there is obviously much more value in JUST 18-49 males than you think, the recent NFL record TV contracts were driven by this number alone, right?

[fudd71]

back in the day, all ratings were determined by 1500 or so people with boxes on their tvs and those that kept diaries of their viewing habits (i was selected for this once and sucked at it)

its easy to see the flaws in both systems then, not sure how much better they are now, great stuff gets canceled all the time simply because of numbers and According to Jim runs for 10 seasons,

How good the rating system is, is up for plenty of debate. It is however the system we have, and the one that determines add rates.

Arbitron and radio ratings are a whole different mess. The diaries are gone, and have been replaced by personal recorders that people carry and the system figures out what you heard based on the recordings. It is not something I know nearly as much about.

"Good shows" do get cancelled all the time, no doubt about it. Personally I find this particularly frustrating and true. 10-15 of my favorite 20 shows of the last 10 years or so never made it to a second season and many never finished their first season.

i think there is obviously much more value in JUST 18-49 males than you think, the recent NFL record TV contracts were driven by this number alone, right?

This season so far 19 of the 20 highest rated programs on broadcast television have been NFL games. Live NFL football is quite simply the most popular program available to any broadcaster. What makes the NFL (all live sports really) extra attractive to broadcasters is people watch it live commercials included. Many viewers of scripted shows tape them and watch them at a later date, in some cases a much later date (time sensitive adds get nothing from this, and most people watching recordings don't actually watch the adds), others watch them streaming seeing the adds of the website they stream them from not the ones sold by the broadcaster, and still others wait for the season to end and buy or rent the shows on DVD/BluRay. NFL broadcasts have none or little risk of these behaviors. The huge broadcast contracts signed by the NFL were because more people of all demos watch them and watch them live then watch anything else.

[drew]

i didn't factor in the difference in viewing habits, although i DVR and watch football in time shift, most people do not, so its apples and oranges with shield...

i personally still don't think shield is very good (watch out of habit now) and i wouldnt be surprised if it doesnt make it to season 2...but its early and seinfeld wasnt great in its first season...so...wait and see?

[fudd71]

i personally still don't think shield is very good (watch out of habit now) and i wouldnt be surprised if it doesnt make it to season 2...but its early and seinfeld wasnt great in its first season...so...wait and see?

I to don't think the show is great and am only watching (recording, I haven't seen the last 3) out of habit.

I too think there is around a 98% (that would have been 100% several weeks ago) chance of there being a season 2. Even at a 2.2 rating it still ranks as ABC's fourth highest rated show. The only thing that has changed since the beginning when it was considered one of the biggest TV hits in years is the unprecedented fall. It has gone from being the far and away massive hit of the year to a very decent show. That being said this fall has to come to a stop soon, the sooner the better.

[fudd71]

The final rating for yesterday's agents of S.H.I.E.L.D are in and the show grabbed a 2.4 18-49 rating with a 7 share, up 2 tenths from last week. It looks like the show might possibly have finally found its level somewhere in the 2.3-2.4 range. At this level it will be just fine and fit into ABC's schedule with its ratings a little behind Grey's Anatomy and Scandal and ahead of Castle.

[drew]

it will be just fine and fit into ABC's schedule with its ratings a little behind Grey's Anatomy and Scandal and ahead of Castle.

grey's anatomy is still on TV?

[fudd71]

grey's anatomy is still on TV?

I have personally never watched an episode, but it is has rating of 2.6, 2.7 and 2.6 for the last 3 weeks. So if the cast and crew want to keep making it, ABC will be happy to keep showing them.

[JohnMayo]

Again if anyone is interested and I realize this is way off topic for a comic book fourm, I will point out some of television PR people's most often used tricks to hide a shows weaknesses.

I don't think talking about how a comic book related television show is doing is off topic for this forum. Even if it were, I'm finding the conversation interesting...