The Sci Fi Network has announced that Battlestar Galactica will move to Sundays beginning in January, with Painkiller Jane taking its spot on Friday.
Sci Fi’s highest-rated original scripted series has struggled during the first half of its third season, which began Oct. 6 and ends Dec. 15. Through Nov. 17, the show’s premiere installments averaged a 1.4 household rating and 1.8 million viewers, well below the 2.1 rating and 2.4 million viewers the show attracted during the 10-episode first half of its sophomore season from July to September 2005, and the 1.9/2.1 million during its 10-installment second half from January to March 2006.
But Howe said the program’s performance is skewed because of heavy digital video recorder action — a quarter of its viewing is time-shifted, according to Howe.
With DVR viewing factored in, the show has averaged a 1.8 household rating and 2.25 million viewers through Nov. 10 and has recorded a 2% gain to 1.4 million of Sci Fi’s target audience of adults 18 to 49, compared with the show’s full second season.
Heavy DVR usage among younger viewers aside, Battlestar has also taken some hits from a pair of broadcast shows that touch the genre.
“Friday has become much more competitive,” Howe said. “There are more original and scripted shows that have been scheduled against us like [CBS] Ghost Whisperer which is very close to us in terms of genre and Numbers which is very close to us in demo. That has affected us more that we would have liked.”
It’s too bad to hear it lost a few viewers, as the third season has probably been the strongest to date.
December 4th, 2006 at 9:58 am
Good now I can watch it. Friday’s is a night to go out. Not stay home and watch T.V. Plus the football season will be over soon.
December 4th, 2006 at 10:15 am
So even though the article starts out saying BSG has “struggled”, it turns out the show is still actually getting strong ratings because of DVR? Man, these articles can be a bit confusing sometimes!
December 4th, 2006 at 10:22 am
Sunday’s already taken up with Fox’s animation block (and Amazing Race, when it’s airing).
December 4th, 2006 at 10:33 am
It’s because DVR numbers are recorded differently than “live viewers” It’s the same reason why there probably won’t be another season of SG1. The VP of programming pretty much said “Sure, we’ll buy another season, but only if you watch it live and not on tivo” and was met with dead silence.
December 4th, 2006 at 11:12 am
This may be a dumb question but from a network perspective who cares if the show is DVR’ed or Tivo’ed? A number is a number, right? Or is it just because they don’t want people fast forwarding through the ad revenue/commercials?
December 4th, 2006 at 12:50 pm
Oh well, goodbye BSG. You were a fun series but now you’ll be canceled on the death night shortly after.
December 4th, 2006 at 2:36 pm
Reply to King Of Cities:
First: The Neilsen (ratings) numbers are reported differently than the stuff that is watched live.
And second: Yes there are many advertisers who assume that shows recorded on a DVR/Tivo/etc have their commercials skipped past, if not automatically deleted by the DVR’s software. So why pay for advertisements on a show that most of it’s viewers skips the commercials for? That money is better spent on a show with a larger percentage of “live” viewers.
December 4th, 2006 at 2:44 pm
I’ll follow BSG to whatever night SciFi wants to air it, but for me all this move does is make it far less likely that I will tune in to their Friday night lineup. I like Dr. Who, but I really only watch it because it’s on before Galactica.
December 4th, 2006 at 2:55 pm
looks like i will be staying in fridays…lol.
hey, pkj is gonna rock.
JIMMY
December 4th, 2006 at 7:06 pm
I do think that season four will likely be the final season of BSG. The same people who aren’t watching the show on Friday night won’t watch it on Sunday night either.
December 4th, 2006 at 7:52 pm
I’m watching BG, but I think it got hurt ratings-wise, by starting later than its former leadins: new episodes of the 2 Stargates. When all 3 ran together, it was 3 hours of solid space action, each one more intense than the show preceding it. Dr. Who is probably not as strong a leadin for it. It can be amazingly easy to get out of the habit of watching something. I hope the move helps it. If viewers remember it’s been moved and showing new episodes.
December 5th, 2006 at 3:02 am
hey, I think commenter #9 might be biased, lol!
December 5th, 2006 at 12:48 pm
Battlestar Galactica remains an excellent show (far superior to the original version) and in all likelyhood will continue as such – no matter how much longer it runs.
It does however suffer from the same mistake that made the original series unbearable to watch.
Cylons!
I mean come on… every damn week. These Colonials also jump all over the galaxy and never encounter anything else.
This should come as no surprise to anybody … however there is still time to insert a few other threats into the show.
December 5th, 2006 at 1:35 pm
Before I climb on my soapbox I think that BSG is an exceptional show, but unfortunately R. Nav in reply 7 is absolutely right. While we find television a medium to be entertained with, the people in charge are simply trying to fill their pockets with as much of the advertisers money as they can. I remeber reading an article a while back that stated that the technology for the television had been around for over a decade before they figured a way to make money with it. TV would simply not exist as it does without greed.