In a series of upfront presentations to advertisers, media agencies, and the press, the broadcast networks recently unveiled their respective primetime fall TV schedules. I’ve just started the process of reviewing the new series pilots for my annual predictions of hits and misses. The purpose here is to provide some insights into what to look for when evaluating the success potential of a new show. In the 40 years or so I’ve been analyzing the television landscape, the benchmark of success for a new broadcast series has continually shifted, with the bar gradually getting lower and lower.
Before discussing how to evaluate new series pilots, here’s some historical perspective.
In the 3- and 4-network world of the 1980s, as cable was just starting to impact the broadcasters, if a new show didn’t generate at least a 30 household share (something that is virtually impossible today for a regular series), it was considered borderline – even if it won its time period. Although back then, if a network believed in a show it would often be given time or moved to a new time period to see if it could find an audience. One network was usually so far ahead or behind the pack that giving a show a network head of programming (or his spouse) liked more time to grow had little downside.
With a couple of notable exceptions, this was the last decade of broadcast dominance, when a low-rated fall series could actually become a word-of-mouth hit over the summer (when the networks would typically air reruns of the entire season), or win an Emmy and the following season see its ratings surge. Miami Vice (1984-89) got low ratings during its first season, but became a hit over the summer, as its MTV-style soundtrack and fashion dominated entertainment TV shows and magazines. Hill St. Blues (1981-87) might have been canceled due to low viewership if it hadn’t won multiple Emmys and received a subsequent ratings boost. Cheers (1982-93) premiered as the lowest rated show of the week, but finished its 11-year run in the top 10 (had it debuted today, we might not have seen a second episode).
During the 1990s and early 2000s, as three networks grew to four, and then six, and cable began luring away broadcast viewers, a 20 share or a strong demographic performance was good enough for a show to be renewed. Fox had become a major force, appealing to younger viewers with shows like Married..With Children (1987-97), Living Single (1993-98), The X-Files (1993-2002), and The Simpsons (1989-present). While not doing nearly as well as the Big Three networks among households and total viewers, it did among viewers 18-34, and eventually started competing among adults 18-49.
The fledgling WB and UPN networks (since combined into the CW) had different and much lower metrics of success – they were all about the under-35 crowd, with UPN also focusing on Black viewers (whom research was showing watched significantly more network television than non-Black viewers). Referred to at the time as “emerging networks,” both had successes with shows like WB’s 7th Heaven (1996-2006), Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2001), and Dawson’s Creek (1998-2003), and UPN’s Malcolm & Eddie (1996-2000), Moesha (1996-2001), and Girlfriends (2000-06).. They were able to thrive with ratings that might have led to quick cancellation on the Big Four networks.
On the traditional broadcast networks, average ratings were no longer what they were during their heyday, but blockbuster hits were still possible. Shows like Roseanne (1988-97), Friends (1994-2004), ER (1994-2009), and NYPD Blue (1993-2005) were not only hits right out of the gate, but also buoyed other shows on their network airing on the same night – lead-ins were still important and created so-called “time-period hits” (such as anything on NBC Thursday at 8:30 or 9:30pm) or ABC on Tuesday..
During this time, it was still possible (although not as common as in previous years) for a low-rated show to build into a hit. Seinfeld (1989-98) was a modest mid-season entry for three seasons before finding a home on Thursday, while Everybody Loves Raymond (1996-2005) was a weak performer on Friday night before being moved and finding success on Monday. Neither would have lasted more than a single season today.
Throughout the late 1990s and 2000s, as cable started airing more original scripted series, ratings and shares became less significant as an indicator of success. Rankings became more telling. Finishing first or second in a given time period, ranking reasonably high among certain age groups, doing well relative to its network’s other programming, and holding onto a decent portion of its lead-in audience, all factored into whether a new show would make it to a second season or beyond. Whether a network owned the show also started to carry more weight when it came to deciding which shows to renew, since the networks made their real money when a show it owned accumulated enough episodes to be sold in the syndication after-market.
Ad-supported cable shows like The Shield (2002-08), The Closer (2005-12), and Sons of Anarchy (2008-14) and premium cable series like The Sopranos (1999-2007), Sex and the City (1998-2004), and The L Word (2004-09), drew many viewers away from the broadcast networks, and changed forever what was acceptable to show on series television – and what was considered a success on broadcast TV. Only a few broadcast shows, such as The Big Bang Theory (2007-19), were still given time to find an audience – it finished its first season in 68th place but ended up being the longest running multi-camera comedy ever, with 12 seasons. But most shows that didn’t start out with decent ratings were quickly axed.
In the 2010s, more people started owning DVRs and multi-media devices, and streaming platforms started to grow, as definitions of success became even more nebulous – receiving a solid audience bump in delayed time-shifted viewing and having a strong social media following, became factors contributing to whether a new show was perceived as successful.
Glee (2009-15) became the first internet-driven success, premiering to modest ratings in May following the American Idol finale, but becoming a hit the following season after clips from the show, including its great musical sequences, went viral over the summer. In 2013, Netflix’s House of Cards became the first major streaming hit, as “binge viewing” entered the media lexicon – and foreshadowed further declines in ad-supported TV viewing (for both broadcast and cable).\
How to evaluate the success potential of a new series, however, has not changed all that much over the years. But how long a new show is given to reach that potential has. Today, the network races are closer than ever, with tenths of a rating point often separating first and fourth place. When broadcast networks care more about rankings than growing their audience, potential is sacrificed in favor of anything that might immediately do even slightly better.
Traditionally, where a new series is placed on the schedule has been just as important, maybe more so, than the quality of the show. It is still a consideration, but much less so than in years past. At one time, a new show scheduled opposite E.R., CSI, or Grey’s Anatomy, was virtually guaranteed to fail. A new show following Seinfeld, Roseanne, or NCIS, on the other hand, was a good bet to draw a sizable audience.
The broadcast world today is much different and more splintered. There are no NBC Thursday night “Must See TV” lineups anymore, when they could throw anything in the 8:30 or 9:30 slot and get a solid rating. There are no 30+ share programs or time periods anymore. A strong lead-in, while still valuable, is not nearly as significant as it used to be. A good show can succeed anywhere and a bad show can flop anywhere. The concept of “least objectionable programming,” a phrase with which people under 40 are probably unfamiliar, no longer applies.
Being able to evaluate a new show’s success potential based solely on the pilot episode is more important than ever. Here are some guidelines:
Comedies should be funny because of the characters, not the plot. When I used to give new season presentations to clients and our media agency staff (when I was head of TV research at Bozell, TN Media, and MAGNA Global), I compared the differences between the two funniest pilots I ever saw – The Famous Teddy Z (1989) and Golden Girls (1985) – and why one was a long-running hit, with 180 episodes spanning seven seasons, while the other only aired 20 episodes before being canceled.
For those who don’t know the show, The Famous Teddy Z starred Jon Cryer as a lowly mailroom clerk at a talent agency. Through a bizarre sequence of events, he becomes the top talent agent at the company. The pilot was hilarious. The problem was that by the second episode it was a different show. The events that made the pilot so funny no longer existed, and the show couldn’t be maintained on a weekly basis.
I remember watching The Golden Girls at the NBC Upfront in the days when the networks showed a some full pilots during their upfront presentations. People were literally falling out of their seats laughing. But I don’t remember anything specific that happened. I think it was mostly just four women sitting around a table talking. It was funny because the characters gelled and were funny together, not because of anything that happened in the pilot. There were many other hit comedies since then that fit into the same category – from Roseanne, Murphy Brown, and Seinfeld in the late 1980s/90s, to Home Improvement, Frasier, Living Single, Friends, and Everybody Loves Raymond in the 1990s, to The Office, 30 Rock, The Big Bang Theory, Modern Family, and Parks and Recreation in the 2000s, to Abbott Elementary and Ghosts in the 2020s.
Viewers of these shows look forward to watching slight variations of the same situations week after week – because they like the characters, not the plots.
Questions worth asking when evaluating a comedy pilot – did some specific event happen in the pilot to make it funny? Is it a romantic comedy where the two main characters meet and fall in love during the pilot? Is it a “fish out of water” comedy where the main character returns to his or her small home town after years of having a career in the big city? Does some poor schlub somehow strike it rich or get some major promotion at work? Does someone not ready for a family inherit his or her sibling’s kids? You get the idea. By the second episode, these plot-driven comedy pilots often become substantially different shows. What made the first episode so funny, no longer exists. So, even if these pilots are hilarious, you need to look more deeply to determine whether you think it can be maintained on a weekly basis. Perhaps the most important question of all is do the supporting actors stand out and do they have chemistry with both the main star and one another?
What will a drama’s third episode look like? Does the pilot make a good one-time movie, or will it work as a weekly series? Some of the things you look at to predict comedy success apply to dramas as well. Are there specific guest stars or events in the pilot that drive the story but won’t be there by the second episode? Medical, police, or legal dramas can seem compelling based solely on the cases presented in the pilot episode. We need to consider the potential strengths and charisma of the lead and supporting characters, and ongoing themes of the series beyond the pilot’s script.
Sometimes it is considerably more complicated. For example, I pegged ABC’s The Good Doctor as one of the best medical drama pilots I had ever seen. The characters were strong, and the direction the show was headed seemed clear. It was able to maintain the quality of the pilot from week-to-week and became one of the highest rated shows on television. The same season, I said ABC’s For the People was one of the best legal drama pilots I had ever seen. The characters were strong, and the direction the show was headed seemed clear. It couldn’t find enough viewers and was canceled after its second season.
So why did I think The Good Doctor would appeal to a broader audience, and have a better chance to succeed? It’s not always easy to describe what makes me think one show will work, while an equally good show might not. You often need to look beyond the things that make you like the pilot. In this case, it came down to two things. People like to root for a person or a side. With The Good Doctor, the main character is someone people could empathize with or at least root for as he faces the many obstacles that an autistic savant surgical resident might face.
Most legal dramas focus on either the prosecutors or the defense lawyers, giving viewers a clear side to root for. For the People presented both the prosecution and defense lawyers as essentially equal sides, with some winning their cases one week and losing them the next. It just seemed to me that would not have as broad an appeal. One additional factor in my projections was that a legal drama like For the People typically appeals to an older audience. Many of these viewers prefer shows that focus primarily on the characters’ work lives (as most procedural dramas do). When a show centers just as much on the characters’ personal (i.e., sex) lives, older viewers tend to shy away.
Another important indicator is that ABC had other programming in the same genre as The Good Doctor, making it easier to promote the new show (given the ridiculous policy of not cross-promoting broadcast series on other broadcast networks). For the People did not have similar programming on ABC – it also debuted in March, which often makes a show harder to market, particularly if a network gives its promotion short-shrift.
Procedural dramas are a lot like sitcoms. They’re essentially situation dramas. Does the cast gel and will viewers want to tune in to slight variations of the same situation week after week? These can be telling when you compare successful procedurals and their spin-offs. The differences between the excellent Criminal Minds and the failed Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior and Beyond Borders, or the original CSI and the short-lived CSI Cyber are dramatic (and demonstrate the importance of good casting – CSI: Miami and CSI: NY were both successful). All of the NCIS’s, on the other hand, managed both the casting chemistry and the mixing of drama and humor quite well (and all were hits). FBI, FBI: Most Wanted, and FBI: International are all succeeding. 911 and 911: Lone Star are both hits. Law & Order: Organized Crime successfully joined that franchise. In today’s splintered viewing environment, with linear TV on the decline, extending successful franchises is as close to a sure bet as you can get.
It typically takes three or four episodes before a drama settles into its regular audience level. New CBS dramas tend to get higher viewer sampling – its audience base is the most network-loyal, and they typically check out any new CBS procedural. So it sometimes takes a new CBS drama longer to hit its regular performance level.
Shows make stars, stars don’t make shows. The failed TV series with major stars attached are too numerous to list here. Who remembers Hugh Jackman in Viva Laughlin, Halle Berry in Extant, Octavia Spencer in Red Band Society, Katherine Heigl in Doubt, Kyra Sedgwick in Ten Days in the Valley, or Edie Falco in Tommy? Just a few examples.
In most cases it’s the show that makes the star, not the other way around. Hit shows, ranging from comedies such as, Cheers, Friends, Seinfeld, Married…With Children, Everybody Loves Raymond, Modern Family, The Big Bang Theory, and Abbott Elementary to broadcast dramas such as, E.R., The X-Files, CSI, Grey’s Anatomy, Empire, and This is Us, to cable dramas such as The Shield, The Closer, Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Sons of Anarchy, The Walking Dead, and Game of Thrones, were cast largely with actors who were not well known to the general public at the time.
Some stars, such as Tom Selleck (Blue Bloods) and James Spader (The Blacklist) can bring long-time fans to a new show (and usually appeal to an older audience), but they are the exception. Kathy Bates might fit into this category with CBS’s new legal drama, Matlock.
Broadcast TV series based on theatrical movies generally don’t work. There are a few major reasons for this. Movies are typically designed as a single two-hour contained event, not an ongoing series (unless it’s a Marvel, DC, or other action/sci-fi franchise). Successful movies bring high expectations, which the television version seldom meets. There are also lesser “stars” associated with the TV show than were in the movie.
Between 1971 and 2023, the broadcast networks aired 68 television series based on or adapted from theatrical movies. Only 12 lasted three seasons or more – M*A*S*H (1972-83), Alice (1976-85), House Calls (1979-82), Private Benjamin (1981-83), In the Heat of the Night (1988-94), Buffy the Vampire Slayer (1997-2003), Clueless (1996-99), Friday Night Lights (2006-11), Parenthood (2010-15), Nikita (2010-13), Hannibal (2013-16), and Lethal Weapon (2016-19). That’s an 18% success rate, significantly less than the 32% rate of the average network series.
During the 2016 and 2017 seasons, there were an unprecedented eight new series based on movies. Only one, Lethal Weapon, was even moderately successful (it was canceled due to on-set turmoil rather than low ratings). The others, Uncle Buck, The Exorcist, Rush Hour, Taken, Frequency, Time After Time, and Training Day did not last long. Since then, there has been only two, CBS’s Clarice, in the 2020/21 season and True Lies in 2022/23. Both were canceled after a single season.
Reboots typically don’t work – unless they do. There have been many reboots of successful and not so successful TV shows over the years (roughly one-third of them have succeeded – similar to the success rate of all primetime series). Both the positives and negatives are fairly obvious. On the plus side, reboots are pre-sold concepts that don’t require the same amount of promotional weight as a completely new series to generate awareness. They also tend to receive a fair amount of pre-season buzz. Most will get decent viewer sampling, so if they’re good, they have an above average chance to succeed. On the down side, they tend to carry high expectations, which are often hard to meet. Also, younger viewers are often unfamiliar with the series, and older viewers, who liked the original, are often disappointed with the new version.
Popular shows that come back with the original casts can do quite well (see Dallas, The X-Files, Will & Grace, The Conners, and Night Court). Murphy Brown, on the other hand, didn’t perform well and was canceled after a single season. Reboots with new casts (e.g., Bionic Woman, Ironside, Dragnet, Charlie’s Angels, Melrose Place, 90210, The Odd Couple) often can’t match the original (particularly if the original had iconic casts) and often don’t last long. There have been notable exceptions. Hawaii Five-0, Magnum P.I., and The Equalizer were all hits, while Charmed, Walker and Kung Fu (the latter two reboots in name only) did well by CW standards.
So how do you know if a reboot with a new cast will work? You don’t. You need to evaluate them just as you would any other series in that genre, at the same time realizing that it will probably get an above average viewer sampling.
Pilots often look better on your laptop than on your TV. Over the years I’ve watched pilots at the broadcast networks, in a conference room at work with media buyer and research colleagues, on VCRs and then DVDs at home, and these days online on my laptop. I watch them at my leisure with no commercials, no multitasking, and no distractions. Sometimes I stop in the middle and finish watching it later.
When the show premieres on television, of course, it will air following some other show, opposite some other showss, and most viewers will simultaneously be doing some other activity. Just because you like the pilot, doesn’t mean you (or other people) will watch it in a real-world setting. Despite the high degree of DVR and time-shifted viewing that currently exists, scheduling and the competitive landscape are still important to a new show’s success.
Don’t buy the buzz. For some time now, I’ve been releasing an annual issue The Sternberg Report titled, Does Pre-Season Buzz Really Matter? It examines new broadcast and ad-supported cable series over the past 25 years, and concludes there is virtually no correlation between how much pre-season buzz a new show generates and how successful it becomes once it premieres. Social media conversations often provides a good indication of whether a show is poised to grow or decline after it’s already on the air but has little impact before the show debuts.
If you are interested in getting the Pre-Season Buzz issue or any other issue of The Sternberg Report, contact me at [email protected].
Most big hits are accidental. My track record of predicting new series hits and misses is pretty good. Roughly 9 out of 10 shows I think will flop do (it’s much easier to pick a miss than a hit). I’m also not bad at projecting which shows will win their time periods. But the big-time hits almost always come out of nowhere (not counting spin-offs, reboots, or franchise extensions). Anyone who tells you they predicted E.R., NCIS, The Simpsons, Empire, Smallville, or The Big Bang Theory would be blockbuster, long-running hits, is simply lying. You just never know what is going to connect with a broad spectrum of viewers. The next This is Us is perpetually right around the corner. But we won’t see it until after it debuts. It’s one of those things that makes this business often exciting, sometimes frustrating, and always interesting.