It seems like there are a lot of questions surrounding Veronica Mars' ratings and chances for a fall pick up. While I don't have any idea as to what the CW is thinking, every day that goes by it looks better for a season 3. That does not mean that anyone should get complacent and stop campaigning but things should be looked at with some hope. Some sites that shall be remained nameless are beginning to irritate me with the constant doom and gloom. I'm a girl that appreciates a realistic approach but there is no need for the constant negativity.
There are a lot of questions I see come up about VM's rating and if they are good enough. Someone even asked Kristin from E! this question today in the chat and while she did give us great positive news that the CW is "96% sure" to pick up VM for the fall, she never answered the darn question! I'm here to offer some information and shed some light on this so that all of us VM fans can make up our own opinions about ratings without having to ask a journalist how good the show is doing.
First of all, what is good rating? Well CSI type ratings is obviously the top of the best. VM is never going to get to this level and I doubt 30 million people even get UPN so we have to compare UPN shows to UPN shows here. One easy yard stick is to see how VM compares to Top Model. If VM gets 60% retention from Top Model that's decent, 70% or more and things are looking good.
If you want to get more in to the numbers and really see where things are headed, compare VM ratings from week to week and from season to season. There are many different calculations of ratings such as Overnights or Fast National. Each website and publication uses different ratings so it is essential to make sure apples are compared to apples and so on. I prefer the ratings that Mediaweek put out because they express their numbers as millions of viewers. That is the easiest for me to understand and compare from week to week.
How well is VM doing in terms of millions of viewers? Keep in mind that the season 1 average was 2.5 (million viewers). Before the holiday hiatus VM was getting about an average of 3.0. A couple of times when Lost was in a repeat VM hit records at a high of 3.55 and the low was during Thanksgiving week at 2.54. When VM came back in January for Donut Run it got a horrendous 1.6, so you can see why everyone began freaking out. The next 2 episodes got 2.14 and 2.05 respectively. A bit better but as you can see still very disappointing. So, when VM finally came back from its second hiatus on 3/15/06 it got a encouraging 2.76. Not bad at all considering all the turmoil it has been though.
My overall point is that VM got one of its higher ratings of the season this past Wednesday and nobody said a darn thing about it. Sure, the ratings need to improve and we need to get back to the consistent 3.0 million viewer range, pushing the 3.5 on a regular basis but this was a HUGE improvement from those episodes shown in January and February. None of the media, journalists or hype types dared to share this information or explain the ratings. Now I hope that you all have a batter understanding of the VM ratings and can keep track for yourself at home.
