Tv Ratings, American Idol | featured news

Did Mariah Carey almost get voted off “American Idol”? According to report from The Hollywood Reporter, “Idol” execs were considering replacing the singing sensation with veteran judge Jennifer Lopez mid-season in an attempt to boost ratings.

In the heyday of "American Idol," the notion that it could fall ratings victim to a zombie slugfest or standard crime drama would have been laughable... When it comes to advertising dollars, the series "will have the top price for the 2012-13 season," said analyst Jon Swallen of Kantar Media. Last season, "American Idol" grossed a leading $836 million in ad revenue.

Ending its three-night live round, American Idol (3.5/10) pared it down to the final 10 contestants of Season 12 on Thursday. Spilling two minutes over, the scheduled 90-minute live show had a lot of Ryan Seacrest shuttling back and forth to the holding room to bring the lucky ones back on stage. It also had a mixed bag of ratings results.

On the second night of its three-night live round American Idol (3.7/10) saw a surprising flameout by contestant Charlie Askew over criticism from the judges. Besides the profound dismay from judge Nicki Minaj over Askew’s performance, the two-hour show also saw Idol continue its weekly Wednesday ratings slide.

Fox's "American Idol" continues to lose ratings ground on Wednesday, with ABC's "Modern Family" appearing to have edged it out as the night's top show among young adults for the first time. In another first, NBC's rookie drama "Chicago Fire" edged past CBS vet "CSI" to win the 10 o'clock hour in demos.

Katie Couric finished first among new daytime talk shows during its premiere week, early stats suggest. “Katie’s” week, which started big before taking a spill, ended strong Friday with a Jennifer Lopez interview. (Couric got J-Lo to comment on the new “American Idol” judging panel by incorrectly assuring her that Fox had confirmed the names — which Fox did not do until Sunday).

Thursday was a big day at Fox. In the morning, the network got word from Nielsen that — after Wednesday night’s Top 5 performance show — “American Idol” had regained its throne as the No. 1-rated entertainment series among younger viewers, who are the currency of broadcast TV ad sales. To accomplish that, “Idol” had to edge past NBC’s singing competition, “The Voice.”

Having the top show on television presents a rare opportunity for any network, but especially NBC, which has been so far behind for so long... This week “The Voice” emerged as the unlikely winner of its own reality competition. With a 6 rating, it displaced Fox’s long-running “American Idol” as America’s top-rated television series.

How many singing competition shows can America watch each week? That’s the question being asked now that NBC’s “The Voice” has started its second season with a bang, while Fox’s long-running “American Idol” has seen its ratings decline. “It’s still very early on for ‘The Voice,' but they got a great start coming out of the Super Bowl with 37.6 million viewers,” media analyst Brad Adgate of Horizon Media told Fox411.com. “The most watched ‘American Idol’ was the finale between Clay Aiken and Ruben Studdard in 2003, with a little over 38 million viewers.”

At first glance, the numbers look bad: "American Idol's" season premiere was down nearly 5 million viewers from last year's, the biggest season-to-season drop in franchise history. At second glance, the numbers don't look bad at all: "AI" was Wednesday's dominant show, averaging 21.6 million, per estimates, and scoring a still-huge, if diminished, 7.4 demo rating among 18-to-49-year-olds.