Ratings II

[Savatage]

Let me just throw something out there: SGU had really good ratings for it's first couple episodes, right? So imagine for a moment that SGU was a good show. Wouldn't the serialized format been more likely to keep the audiance coming back week after week?

 

[shavedape]

Let me just throw something out there: SGU had really good ratings for it's first couple episodes, right? So imagine for a moment that SGU was a good show. Wouldn't the serialized format been more likely to keep the audiance coming back week after week?

I think people tuned in because of the Stargate name and they fell off as they eventually figured out SGU was a serialized soap opera and not an episodic action/adventure. Maybe if they serialized it like the old "Buck Rogers" where there was endless action but with many episodic cliffhangers then it would have done better, but TPTB eschewed anything with "square jawed heroes" so serialized or not SGU was doomed from the start. This format also doesn't portend well for reruns. I'd love to see the ratings comparison between reruns of SG1/SGA verses the reruns of SGU. I think that would be very telling.

 

[Mr. A]

I think people tuned in because of the Stargate name and they fell off as they eventually figured out SGU was a serialized soap opera and not an episodic action/adventure. Maybe if they serialized it like the old "Buck Rogers" where there was endless action but with many episodic cliffhangers then it would have done better, but TPTB eschewed anything with "square jawed heroes" so serialized or not SGU was doomed from the start. This format also doesn't portend well for reruns. I'd love to see the ratings comparison between reruns of SG1/SGA verses the reruns of SGU. I think that would be very telling.

I think Briangate has been posting such info here and there and SGU did not look very good - or was it sydication? Do you have some figures from your spreadsheet, Briangate?

 

[johnsheppard]

DVR 's excuse does not hold water for SGU like it did for SGA. Atlantis as I said averaged over 2.1 Million viewers after Live+7, SGU is averaging over 1.5 Million viewers. That is a 600,000 viewers deficet. Also 2nd and 3rd runs were pulling in around a 0.7 to 0.8 rating for SGA. SGU 2nd runs have about a 0.3 rating. Makes you wonder why they pulled the 8pm slot.

SGU failed, now if MGM is smart they will resurrect the classic SG with a modern twist but still keeping true to it's roots.

Well I well understood what you explained previously here.

Now getting to Stargate. SGA and SG-1 may have lost live viewers, but they did not lose total viewers. People still showed up to the TV to watch even if it was the next day or so. They both had good numbers in syndication and reruns, you guys saw what I posted from a couple of years ago. Now here comes SGU, a more serial show, which started off excellent in ratings, then to what we call a "Fat Kid doing a belly flop in the wading pool" SGU did not lose live to DVR, people just stopped watching. As I posted and MS posted, SGU's Live+7 was hovering around 1.5 Million. Which for Total viewers is pathetic. As I keep saying SGA was hitting highs of 2.5 Million viewers for their key eps in the final season.

BTW THX for reruns numbers I didn't know.Interesting.
Could you be more specific about 8pm slot? I'm not familiar with US TV schedule.

 

[Briangate78]

Let me just throw something out there: SGU had really good ratings for it's first couple episodes, right? So imagine for a moment that SGU was a good show. Wouldn't the serialized format been more likely to keep the audiance coming back week after week?

If SGU was a good show to a lot of people, or a good amount, or more than half thought it was good, there would of been no SGUS. lol.

Well I well understood what you explained previously here.


BTW THX for reruns numbers I didn't know.Interesting.
Could you be more specific about 8pm slot? I'm not familiar with US TV schedule.

The 8pm slot is the episode that ran into the new episode of SGA. So it was actually a 3rd run, or the episode from the previous week. They tried that with SGU but did not do well, as i mentioned above.

 

[alien0]

If SGU was a good show to a lot of people, or a good amount, or more than half thought it was good, there would of been no SGUS. lol. ...
.

Hahahaha. Yeah. I guess that whole SGU°S-thing was pretty telling for sgu's tptb
I think they were getting increasingly nervous as the public was becoming more and more aware of that place.
Great times hehe =) .

 

[Savatage]

I think people tuned in because of the Stargate name and they fell off as they eventually figured out SGU was a serialized soap opera and not an episodic action/adventure. Maybe if they serialized it like the old "Buck Rogers" where there was endless action but with many episodic cliffhangers then it would have done better, but TPTB eschewed anything with "square jawed heroes" so serialized or not SGU was doomed from the start. This format also doesn't portend well for reruns. I'd love to see the ratings comparison between reruns of SG1/SGA verses the reruns of SGU. I think that would be very telling.

You're right. People did tune in because of the Stargate name but they tuned out because it was a boring SOAP and because 9:15 is way too early to be asleep on a Friday night. I still think the serailed format could have worked. I think back to when SG1 did 2 part episodes. After seeing part 1, there was no way I wasn't going to show up live to watch part 2. So what if instead of a 2 part episode, it goes 3 or 4 episodes? Wouldn't it be a good way to keep the audiance coming back?

@Briangate: Yeah if SGU was decent we wouldn't be here at this forum now. That's the strength of real Stargate fans - we take life's lemons and make lemonade. lol

 

[Overmind One]

If SGU was a good show to a lot of people, or a good amount, or more than half thought it was good, there would of been no SGUS. lol.

BINGO!

The 8pm slot is the episode that ran into the new episode of SGA. So it was actually a 3rd run, or the episode from the previous week. They tried that with SGU but did not do well, as i mentioned above.

I think it was the show itself. It WAS a soap opera, and if the writers only had acknowledged that like Ronald Moore did with Caprica, viewers would have known what to expect because it was stated. I would not like a Stargate soap opera (and didnt), but others might.

 

[Briangate78]

Hahahaha. Yeah. I guess that whole SGU°S-thing was pretty telling for sgu's tptb
I think they were getting increasingly nervous as the public was becoming more and more aware of that place.
Great times hehe =) .

LOL, yeah even when SGA and SG-1 had some upset fans at the direction of the shows, it never got as negative as SGU, not even close. The ratings for SGA were actually going back up by a decent amount when some of the Anti-SGA faction emerged a few years ago, but they were such a small group confined to one thread. Syfy.com was like 99% Pro-SGA when Season's 4 and 5 ran. Again, I liked SGU but it did not come close to appealing as the last two series.

BTW, love the Avatar, Great Friggin movie!

 

[YoshiKart64]

LOL, yeah even when SGA and SG-1 had some upset fans at the direction of the shows, it never got as negative as SGU, not even close. The ratings for SGA were actually going back up by a decent amount when some of the Anti-SGA faction emerged a few years ago, but they were such a small group confined to one thread. Syfy.com was like 99% Pro-SGA when Season's 4 and 5 ran. Again, I liked SGU but it did not come close to appealing as the last two series.

BTW, love the Avatar, Great Friggin movie!

If Atlantis had suddenly replaced SG1 though I think the story would be a little different. With SGU launching the way it did it couldn't be a different way of telling a Stargate story so much as it was seen as "new" Stargate. When combined with the horrifically slow start to Season 1 it became an instant turn off and after 'Life' people were just done with the show. It's a great shame for me as I think SGU could have found its place among a successful Stargate franchise had a few crucial things happened differently.

Speaking of successful though, I'm surprised MGM hasn't pushed for another SG1 movie. Out of everything Stargate that's probably the only one you can guarantee will make a profit.

 

[shavedape]

You're right. People did tune in because of the Stargate name but they tuned out because it was a boring SOAP and because 9:15 is way too early to be asleep on a Friday night. I still think the serailed format could have worked. I think back to when SG1 did 2 part episodes. After seeing part 1, there was no way I wasn't going to show up live to watch part 2. So what if instead of a 2 part episode, it goes 3 or 4 episodes? Wouldn't it be a good way to keep the audiance coming back?

Well, a lot of sci-fi shows do the multi-episode story each season. I don't know that doing it repeatedly within a season would be appealing. The multi-episode story needs to be really good and intriguing to work. Admittedly this is a far better option (for me) than an entire season of episodes that are dependent on the preceding episodes for the story. (This shouldn't be confused with the seasonal story arc which is played out over the entire season but in many ways is more abstract and doesn't necessarily affect stand-alone episodes).

At the end of the day though I think many people like to watch an episode of a show and have the story resolved within that episode. This is why I'm curious about the ratings for reruns of shows like SG1 and SGA verses SGU. As the ratings system evolves with the new technologies I think that the importance of "live" viewership will decrease in favor of accurate readings of viewers for reruns, etc. Working from this theory I just don't see how a serialized soap could pull the same numbers as an episodic adventure. It's just a theory and if proven wrong I'll graciously concede the point.

 

[Briangate78]

If Atlantis had suddenly replaced SG1 though I think the story would be a little different. With SGU launching the way it did it couldn't be a different way of telling a Stargate story so much as it was seen as "new" Stargate. When combined with the horrifically slow start to Season 1 it became an instant turn off and after 'Life' people were just done with the show. It's a great shame for me as I think SGU could have found its place among a successful Stargate franchise had a few crucial things happened differently.

Speaking of successful though, I'm surprised MGM hasn't pushed for another SG1 movie. Out of everything Stargate that's probably the only one you can guarantee will make a profit.

Well, I did like Season 8 a lot so would of been missed. I think they should of ran SGA for at least one season along SGU, and I think SGU would of been successful, or maybe not, who knows.

I agree, a SG-1 movie would likely be the smartest and less riskier choice by MGM since SG-1 has proven a success. But SGA also did well in DVD sales, so a movie would not be as risky either. Right now, a SGU movie is the biggest risk, since it failed to capture an audience on TV.

 

[Mr. A]

I agree that serialized shows have to work harder in some ways to be successful, however I don't agree that there can't be a "payoff" at the end of a serialized episode. A well-written serialized show will have many character arcs running through it, and each episode should have some payoff or another relating to these arcs. These smaller payoffs will provide satisfaction, as the show also builds towards the larger payoffs reserved for season finales. So each episode has some sort of "stepping stone" payoff leading up to bigger things. But each episode should also raise a new question or even a new "cliffhanger" so to speak, to keep the viewer addicted. It is difficult to write a serialized show that provides enough "payoff" in each episode but maintains the tension moving forward. Standard "soaps" fail to intrigue me because they generally don't have enough payoffs at all, they just string you along indefinitely. However, some serialized dramas I think are quite good at balancing the two - like True Blood Another show that I think does that very well right now is Vampire Diaries (haha okay some of you will laugh at that and just call it a soap, but it's very well written and has a good balance of action / character arc payoffs / and interesting characters). A show like Grey's Anatomy, on the other hand, just gets extremely frustrating after a while because you just get strung along forever - I think I made it less than six episodes before I couldn't stand that show any more.

I agree that a show that has a cliffhanger on just about every episode better be DAMN good, or else people get fed up very quickly and just don't tune in anymore! I myself hate the feeling that I am being "played". I think that's why I eventually gave up on Heroes IIRC...

 

[Savatage]

Well, I did like Season 8 a lot so would of been missed. I think they should of ran SGA for at least one season along SGU, and I think SGU would of been successful, or maybe not, who knows.

I agree, a SG-1 movie would likely be the smartest and less riskier choice by MGM since SG-1 has proven a success. But SGA also did well in DVD sales, so a movie would not be as risky either. Right now, a SGU movie is the biggest risk, since it failed to capture an audience on TV.

If they ran SGA along with SGU, I don't think we have SGUS.

 

[Mr. A]

Well, I did like Season 8 a lot so would of been missed. I think they should of ran SGA for at least one season along SGU, and I think SGU would of been successful, or maybe not, who knows.

If they ran SGA along with SGU, I don't think we have SGUS.

If they had run SGU along with SGA, I don't think we would've had SGU! At least not for very long...

 

[shavedape]

If they had run SGU along with SGA, I don't think we would've had SGU! At least not for very long...

The shows were both so different in tone and style and plotting that I don't think they would have worked together. SGU would have sucked off of SGA's popularity and would probably have reflected badly onto SGA. Guild by association and all that. SGU certainly wouldn't have done anything to better SGA, that's for sure.

 

[Hyndara]

Well, I did like Season 8 a lot so would of been missed. I think they should of ran SGA for at least one season along SGU, and I think SGU would of been successful, or maybe not, who knows.

I agree, a SG-1 movie would likely be the smartest and less riskier choice by MGM since SG-1 has proven a success. But SGA also did well in DVD sales, so a movie would not be as risky either. Right now, a SGU movie is the biggest risk, since it failed to capture an audience on TV.

True answer? No.
When I remember the right thing here Atlantis had a big female viewership (40 -50 %?). SGU with the cast we know would never reach this numbers. What was the female high? 18 %?
When I'm talking with other SG-fans about the different shows I will get very similar answers: Families were watching SG1 and SGA. SGU never was something what the whole family would watch. (and I'm not the right person to judge anyone because of the entertainment-factor of slaughtering the goa'uld/wraith of the week and how healthy it will be for a child to watch ...).
Many women I'm talking to aren't very ... mh, pleased about the SGU-cast. There wasn't no "eye-candy", no character you would like to watch and no character you could take care about. The serialized (soapy) character of a show is more appealing for women but women also would like to watch a show with more positive characters and, yes, also pretty faces (and bodys ) .

Personally I have to say, not everything is about a pretty face. I'm watching TV for entertainment, I'm watching shows because I take care about the characters. I have enough "dark and gritty" in RL I don't need it in my TV. And, besides, some ... uhm ... storyarcs in SGU are pure and simply nonsense.

 

[Gatefan1976]

True answer? No.
When I remember the right thing here Atlantis had a big female viewership (40 -50 %?). SGU with the cast we know would never reach this numbers. What was the female high? 18 %?
When I'm talking with other SG-fans about the different shows I will get very similar answers: Families were watching SG1 and SGA. SGU never was something what the whole family would watch. (and I'm not the right person to judge anyone because of the entertainment-factor of slaughtering the goa'uld/wraith of the week and how healthy it will be for a child to watch ...).
Many women I'm talking to aren't very ... mh, pleased about the SGU-cast. There wasn't no "eye-candy", no character you would like to watch and no character you could take care about. The serialized (soapy) character of a show is more appealing for women but women also would like to watch a show with more positive characters and, yes, also pretty faces (and bodys ) .

Personally I have to say, not everything is about a pretty face. I'm watching TV for entertainment, I'm watching shows because I take care about the characters. I have enough "dark and gritty" in RL I don't need it in my TV. And, besides, some ... uhm ... storyarcs in SGU are pure and simply nonsense.

I know this is an English/German Translation thing, but is this proof that all you "older ladies" wish you had children like Sheppard and Ford?

 

[Briangate78]

It's interesting you mention the characters. SGA and SG-1 have many character appreciation and ship threads and are still active years after the shows were cancelled. SGU has next to nothing on the Syfy forums. Also on GW they are not as active or as many either. So it makes you think. The ironic part of all this, is SGU was supposed to be a character focused/driven series.

 

[Gatefan1976]

It's interesting you mention the characters. SGA and SG-1 have many character appreciation and ship threads and are still active years after the shows were cancelled. SGU has next to nothing on the Syfy forums. Also on GW they are not as active or as many either. So it makes you think. The ironic part of all this, is SGU was supposed to be a character focused/driven series.

A very common, and just as commonly ignored observation sir!