I’ve looked at the prospects of renewal/cancellation for current shows (and since then a whole lot of shows have been renewed (iZombie & Agent Carter, woo!!) or cancelled) and gone over the pilots for the potential new shows next season, now it’s time to move on to the main event: playing backseat executive and scheduling the networks’ TV shows for the upcoming TV season.
As I’d mentioned in my look at the pilots, despite most likely winding up as a 3rd place network for the 2014-15 Television season in the 18-49 demo (NBC will likely be 1st, CBS 2nd, ABC, and FOX dead last), ABC is actually in a strong position right now. It’s laid a solid foundation for it to build on next season with a healthy mix of shows of various ages. It has its veteran players still pulling in the ratings (Modern Family, Grey’s Anatomy), medium-aged shows approaching/just past syndication numbers (Scandal, Once Upon a Time, The Goldbergs) and it probably launched the most hits this season that remained consistent throughout its run (Black-ish, Fresh off the Boat, How to Get Away with Murder). ABC needs to capitalize on this and 2nd place doesn’t seem unimaginable next season, after all, 2nd-place CBS is at a crossroads with many old and old-skewing shows in addition to having difficulty launching anything more than a modest hit (as I will discuss in my upcoming CBS ‘fantasy schedule’ post).
Sunday
Current Schedule: America’s Funniest Home Videos/Once Upon a Time/Secrets & Lies/Revenge
Believe it or not, America’s Funniest Home Videos still pulls in perfectly decent ratings, and OUaT was rejuvenated in the fall from its Frozen storyline. Though AFHV host Tom Bergeron will be stepping down after this season, that doesn’t seem like it’ll be a catalyst for a precipitous ratings drop.
So what to do with the last 2 hours of Sunday? The cancellation of Revenge opens up an hour to premiere a new show. It may be tempting to keep Secrets & Lies in place, as opposed to last year’s Spring newbie Resurrection, S&L grew throughout its run, hitting series highs in its season finale. Not officially renewed, but a definite shoo-in,Now officially renewed, but where to schedule it? Fall or Spring? Sunday or a different day? Will the fans come back to see most of the cast replaced as Juliette Lewis comes back to investigate a new case? There’s no obvious good choice here, while
There are 3 ABC dramas that have been ordered to series that are a little more male-skewing, two having a historical bent: Kings and Prophets, Wicked Crime, and the show formerly known as Boom. TSFKA Boom is the most intriguing of ABC’s pilots, focusing on the oil boom in North Dakota and a couple who moves there for the economic opportunities. Save this for mid-season and, if it’s any good, give it a big marketing push (well, relatively big for a mid-season show) so it doesn’t get lost in the morass of all the new fall shows. Slot anthology show Wicked Crime (its previous name L.A. Crime was better, they definitely need to retool the name so it sounds less telenovela) and end the night with Kings and Prophets.
Monday
Current Schedule: Dancing with the Stars/Castle
Castle is getting old aka pricier and while Nathan Fillion has signed on for another season, Stana Katic is still in the midst of contract negotiations. With decent ratings (if older-skewing), Castle seems like a safe bet to come back for another season.Castle has been officially renewed (ABC is renewing/cancelling a raft of shows since I started this post yesterday). Dancing with the Stars still pulls in ratings and has been in the Monday night time slot since 2007. Monday’s is solid enough to let it be.
Tuesday
Current Schedule:Dancing with the Stars/Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D./Forever
Tuesday has been a bit of a sore spot for ABC, with the last hour in particular being a graveyard of cancelled shows. The opening hour also barely got to know Selfie/Manhattan Love Story before both got yanked off the schedule. However Spring saw the arrival of Fresh off the Boat which got heavy sampling from premiering two episodes in Wednesday’s comedy block (one after Modern Family). After moving to its regular Tuesday time slot it dropped off as expected but didn’t slide too far, managing to stabilize at perfectly decent levels. To no surprise it’s been renewed. The question is for how many episodes and if not a full season, fall or spring? This doesn’t particularly seem like a show to benefit greatly plot-wise from shorter orders so go ahead and give it a full 22-episode order and have it continue launching the night. Have Dr. Ken follow it up.
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. has been performing ably enough, a time slot move may be warranted later, but to start off the season keep it at Tuesday 9/8c. Reports are that the AoS spin-off (the not John Ridley-written one) is on hold/dead in the water, otherwise I would’ve slotted it after AoS as CBS does with its NCIS spinoffs. With that spin-off out of the picture, out of the dramas ABC has ordered to series (so far), there are 3 similarly-themed shows that could mix and match well on Sunday leaving the Joan Allen-starring The Family for Tuesday. It could be Quantico but I’m more intrigued in The Family, leave Quantico for mid-season.
Wednesday
Current Schedule: The Middle/The Goldbergs/Modern Family/Black-ish/Nashville
There are talks of ABC switching up its Wednesday night comedy line-up. FFS ABC, you FINALLY have a lineup that works and you want to muck with it? What utter sheer stupidity. You’ve found a show that builds on The Middle, you found a show that doesn’t drop 75% of its Modern Family lead-in, you have other holes to plug. Sure The Middle is an older show that never really broke out in the way Modern Family did. It still is a 
very potent self-starter with no lead-in of its own. Sure Modern Family has come down from its ratings heyday. It’s still the highest rated show on Wednesday (when Empire isn’t airing). Don’t. be. stupid.
On the other hand, Nashville. It has been chugging along at barely-above-cancellation numbers for much of its life, granted it’s been pretty darn consistent in its ratings, the widest gulf between its highest and lowest-rated episodes is a 0.5 and that was only on one occasion. Outside of 3 episodes, the ratings for Nashville have maintained in the 1.3-1.5 range for 17 of its season 3 episodes, that’s impressive. What’s more, it consistently brings in around another ratings point in DVR ratings. There’s a reliable audience here.
But. A 1.3 rating is not spectacular. The power of syndication compels another season of Nashville (4 full seasons is the basic minimum for a show to enter the syndication market, if a show has 3 full seasons (≈66 episodes) under its belt, its a shoo-in for a 4th season), especially since ABC is also the studio behind Nashville and it has musical merchandise as another revenue stream. However, as I said before, ABC needs to build and capitalize on its momentum, the Wednesday 10/9 o’clock spot needs a show that stands a better chance at pulling in ratings above a 1.3, especially in light of ABC’s stronger preceding hours. Put a new show in the last hour and move Nashville to Fridays, however give Nashville a late fall start, if the new Wednesday show bombs, boom, move Nashville back.
Crazy idea, Wednesday is a solid comedy night for ABC, there’s really no laggards in the bunch. Why not go full comedy, 6 comedies on Wednesday. Sure, the last time a network did that (NBC Thursdays in the 2010-2011 season) it didn’t work out. While there was a lot of quality comedies then (Community, 30 Rock, Parks & Rec), none of them were ratings dynamos in the way ABC Wednesdays are. ABC has a strong line-up of family comedies that flows nicely into each other, not even CBS has been able to sustain 2 hours of consistently-rated comedies: it scrapped its Monday attempt at 2 hours of comedy last year and right now its Thursdays include a Big Bang Theory repeat. This is asking for an extension into the 9(/10) o’clock hour. You could slot Fresh off the Boat & Dr. Ken here, but you really need a solid show to anchor the 9(10) o’clock hour if you’re gonna pull that off.
The Muppets. There will be large sampling for at least the first couple episodes. ABC renewed medieval musical comedy Galavant which would pair nicely with the occasionally musical Muppets.
Hell, launch this out of the craziness of the rush of fall premieres and save it for November sweeps. Kick off Nashville as usual to end the night then move it to Fridays and launch The Muppets/Galavant.
Thursday
Current Schedule: Grey’s Anatomy/Scandal/American Crime (Spring)
ABC finally found a way to solve its Thursday first-hour problem, after years of failing to launch a show in the 8/7c hour that stuck around longer than a season (if even), simply shifting the schedule back plugged the hole along with presenting a marketing opportunity under the TGIT banner.
There are potential headwinds however. A twist in Grey’s Anatomy has many fans upset, swearing off the show. While too much stock shouldn’t be put in people complaining online, the original cast of GA is dwindling and there really hasn’t been any breakout new cast members since then (so far as I can tell). I don’t anticipate an immediate, steep drop for the season 12 premiere, but Grey’s may fall to the curse of the Thursday 8/7c timeslot yet.
Scandal has been solid as rock for ABC. After a decent 1st season, it’s become a runaway hit, strong enough to be the lead-in program to help launch other shows. After season 4 premiered to a fantastic 3.8, it’s maintained a rating right around 3.0 (read: very good).
Take a look at the ratings for Scandal’s past 10 episodes since coming back in Winter: 3.6, 3.2, 3.1, 3.3, 3.0, 2.7, 2.4, 2.3, 2.1, 2.4, 2.3. It hasn’t hit a rating that low since the beginning of its 2nd season. And those dips aren’t accompanied by a corresponding increase in DVR viewing either. Springtime usually brings a dip in viewership as viewers enjoy the warmer weather and more daytime hours, but such a downward trajectory is worrying, coupled with dumb plot lines and the feeling that the spark of the show is near-extinguished (based on what I gleaned from online rumblings) is worrying. Can Scandal still anchor the 8 o’clock (/9 o’clock) hour? Intriguing things to look forward to in the upcoming season.
Despite all of what I just wrote, Thursday is still (thusfar) a solid-enough night, it might crash and burn next season, but that will be next season’s problem. Keep up TGIT. Grey’s. Scandal. HTGAWM in the fall. Order another Shonda Rhimes show (The Catch) and put that in Spring after HTGAWM wraps up. This may be much ado about nothing, maybe.
Friday
Current Schedule: Shark Tank/Beyond the Tank/20/20
Start the season off with the exact same combination as above, Shark Tank, BtT, 20/20, then sometime mid-October-to-early-November move Nashville to start off the night and move Shark Tank back an hour.
2015-16 ABC television schedule
new shows in italics
Sunday: America’s Funniest Home Videos/Once Upon a Time/Wicked Crime/Kings and Prophets
Monday: Dancing with the Stars/Castle
Tuesday: Fresh off the Boat/Dr. Ken/Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D./The Family
Wednesday: The Middle/The Goldbergs/Modern Family/Black-ish/The Muppets/Galavant
Thursday: Grey’s Anatomy/Scandal/How to Get Away with Murder (Fall), The Catch (Spring)
Friday: Nashville/Shark Tank/20/20
Last Year’s Upfront Preview:
Part 3: ABC
Part 2: Pilot Preview
Part 1: Cancel/Renew
AVthatsme 