Well, it went up. But not by much.
It seems not even Ed Asner can save CBC’s Michael Tuesdays and Thursdays. The comedy drew an overnight, estimated 234,000 viewers across Canada Tuesday as Asner made his first appearance on the series as daddy shrink to star/creator Bob Martin’s shrink.
The total was up from the shockingly low 153,000 who tuned in the week before.
The Debaters, which follows Michael Tuesdays at 9:30, drew 161,000 viewers. Even the Rick Mercer Report, which averaged over a million viewers last season, is off a bit in early weeks, drawing 849,000 Tuesday. 22 Minutes seems to be CBC’s steadiest Tuesday show at 730,000.
What is killing Michael? Global has NCIS: Los Angeles at 9 (1,888,000) CTV Dancing with the Stars results (1,742,000), City’s New Girl draws a further 565,000. There is no pile on, however, at CTV Two, where The Protector pulled 194,000.
There seems to be a growing consensus that Michael is an HBO show stuck in a CBC world, too smart for the big room. Punished for being smart–no wonder Michael is in therapy.
There was some good news on the Can-con front Tuesday night–CTV’s always reliable Flashpoint drew an impressive 1,309,000 at 8 p.m.
Monday was another insecure day at CBC: returning comedy InSecurity opened to 237,000 while Being Erica managed 330,000. Battle of the Blades skated to a relatively huge (but still down from last season) 786,000.
Erica got run over Monday by the return of House (2,807,000), Dancing on CTV (1,726,000 over two hours) and resilient Two and a Half Men on CTV Two (1,813,000). Global had a big night over all, with 1,840,000 watching Lily Tomlin on NCIS and a further 1,913,000 hanging 10 with Hawaii FIVE-0. City’s Terra Nova stayed strong in its second week with an overnight, estimated 1,232,000 viewers.
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2 Comments
OTA, there is also The Bob Newhart Show at 9 p.m. Followed by The (ever-debating) Odd Couple.
What is killing Michael?
It ain’t the competition.
It’s the show itself.
The public has made it clear they just don’t care for something so dull.
Apparently Bill and the National Post can’t see the obvious problem.
Within the opening minute, viewers are saying
“where’s the funny?”
“oh, I see, they’re trying to be subtle. They must think they’re the next Curb and have already won over the audience. They haven’t.”
But more importantly, it comes down to this:
“why should I care about these people and this show?”
I know why the actors care, why the CBC cares, why Bill cares.
They have a vested interest.
But the public doesn’t, and they’re not buying into this show.
There are problems with the actors as well.
Matt is simply not believable, while the therapist is ambiguously gay but we’re supposed to accept him as being straight.
And they’re both extremely sexually repressed.
Much like the CBC.