LATEST RATINGS: March 5-9, 2018

[Toups]

Ratings for the week March 5-9, 2018

[Faulkner]

Big jumps in viewers, but demos largely unremarkable other than GH taking No. 1 from Y&R in 18-49. GH must skew a *lot* younger than the other three soaps. 

 

@Toups, do you know if there’s updated median age data from recent years?

[Toups]

Median Age

 

This Week/Last year

 

Y&R 63.8 (62.6)

B&B 63.3 (62)

DAYS 62.6 (61.6)

GH 59.6 (60)

[Soapsuds]

Rafe/Hope wedding/secret was a complete failure in the ratings. If this doesn't prove to TPTB at Days that no one cares for this couple....nothing will.

 

Nick finding out Christian wasn't his was also a failure.

 

Y&R no longer on top of the demos. Mal is in hot water.

[Faulkner]

Thanks! That looks about what I guessed. GH is the only show trending downward, it appears.

[Gray Bunny]

 

Wow... LOL 

[Soapsuds]

It doesn't help the median age when soaps continue to be unable to write for younger characters. The next generation is nowhere to be found in these soaps. They are either there and being wasted or recast every 5 minutes with no real story.

[ChitHappens]

How soon before Mal is fired?!  

[DramatistDreamer]

These median ages!  I know, it should come as no surprise but to see it in black and white, that is a strong dose of reality. 

Yeah though, it really does put into stark terms how deficient the stories are for characters under 45. 

The future does not look good for these shows, to say the least.

[Toups]

One day, when I have time :), I want to go back and look at the median ages from say the past 10 years.  I'll choose one week of the year, some random week.   Soaps have no future, in the sense that there's no younger generation that's watching. 

[Faulkner]

The primetime (broadcast and cable) median ages are similarly increasing across the board, right? (This chart was from 2015, and I’m assuming those ages have gone up since.) The young audience is simply abandoning the medium or never really started in the first place, and the ship has sailed.

[Soapsuds]

Losing to GH in demos is never a good sign.

[DramatistDreamer]

MY's Y&R storytelling has a lot 'going on', in the sense that there aren't lulls where there is little to nothing happening the way it was with SS but all this busyness in Y&R now only masks the fact that there still remains a problem with continuity and consistency, in how characters and stories are written.

 

A character can do and say something one day and completely undo/reverse what they've said/done in less than a week.  It's frenetic.

[YRBB]

Based on the median age, no wonder soap ratings continue to go down each year. 

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It's Bold and the Beautiful. 

[Faulkner]

Given that life expectancy in the U.S. generally only increases a couple of months per year on average, and the median age for soaps is increasing at probably more like a year or two per year, it’s only a matter of time before the soap viewing audience literally dies off. But it’s really not that much better for the rest of linear television. It’s not sustainable.