Preliminary Ratings: Monday 09/21/15

It was the first night of the new 2015-16 TV season, but it was a bit of an let down as all season premieres are down, year-to-year. The Night's #1 show, THE BIG BANG THEORY, was down 17% in the A18-49 ratings. The #2 program, THE VOICE, dropped  near 900,000 viewers and 10% in the demo. GOTHAM, on FOX, came close to only drawing half its audience from last year's series premiere and was 50% off in the A18-49 demographic. CASTLE, on ABC, fell a half a point in the A18-49 demo and lost 1.5 million viewers, year-to-year.

The positives from last night? NBC's new crime drama, BLINDSPOT, retained 88% of its lead in, in total viewers and in the A18-49 demo rating. That is about it for the good side of the numbers.

Other season premiere numbers, SCORPION was off by 2.8 million viewers and a full ratings point in the A18-49 demo. NCIS: LA dropped 0.7 points in the demo and 1.5 million viewers, from last year's premiere. MINORITY REPORT only drew 3.1 million viewers, keeping just 69% of its lead in audience.

In a couple of weeks, when the Live+7 ratings are released for this premiere week, we'll see if viewers are staying with shows but increasing their time-shifted viewing, or have viewers abandoned the broadcast networks?

Preliminary L+SD Network Averages:

	Total viewers	A18-34	A18-49	A25-54
ABC	10.10 million	1.0	1.6	2.3
CBS	11.20 million	1.3	2.3	3.4
CW	1.20 million	0.3	0.4	0.5
FOX	3.80 million	0.9	1.4	1.6
NBC	11.60 million	2.2	3.4	4.3

Time	Net	Program	Viewers*	A18-34	A18-49	A25-54
8:00	ABC	Dancing With The Stars	11.60	1.1	1.8	2.6
10:00	ABC	Castle (SP)	7.10	0.7	1.2	1.6
8:00	CBS	The Big Bang Theory (SP)	17.80	2.8	4.5	6.3
8:30	CBS	Life In Pieces (SP)	11.50	1.5	2.7	3.8
9:00	CBS	Scorpion (SP)	11.00	1.2	2.2	3.1
10:00	CBS	NCIS: LA (SP)	8.00	0.6	1.2	1.9
8:00	CW	Penn & Teller: Fool Us	1.30	0.2	0.4	0.5
9:00	CW	Whose Line is it Anyway?	1.30	0.4	0.4	0.5
9:30	CW	Significant Mother	0.90	0.3	0.3	0.3
8:00	FOX	Gotham (SP)	4.50	1.1	1.6	1.9
9:00	FOX	Minority Report (SP)	3.10	0.6	1.1	1.3
8:00	NBC	The Voice (SP)	12.10	2.3	3.5	4.5
10:00	NBC	Blindspot (SP)	10.60	1.9	3.1	4.0

* - in millions