Ratings: Elsbeth Opens Strong, Improves CBS Time Slot 45% Year-Over-Year
CBS‘ Elsbeth cracked her first case on Thursday night in front of 4.5 million total viewers, delivering nearly 100% retention of lead-in So Help Me Todd‘s audience. In the demo, it scored a 0.3 rating.
The Carrie Preston-led Good Wife offshoot also improved on what CSI: Vegas did in the time slot a year ago by 45%, and outdrew its NBC (Law & Order: Organized Crime) and ABC (a Will Trent rerun) competition combined.
TVLine readers gave Elsbeth an average grade of “A-“; read our full recap.
The catch? Due to the State of the Union Address airing next week… presumably a decision to dodge the return of ABC’s Thursday slate on March 14… and then CBS’ March Madness coverage, Elsbeth Episode 2 won’t arrive until April 4. In five weeks. Which is its own kind of madness.
Opening CBS’ night, Young Sheldon (with 7 million total viewers and a 0.5 rating) was up a tick in audience week-to-week, as were Ghosts (6.1 mil/0.5) and So Help Me Todd (4.53 million/0.3).
Over on NBC, Law & Order (4.7 mil/0.4) and SVU (4.7 mil/0.5) dipped in both measures, while Organized Crime (4.3 mil/0.4) was only down in viewers.
Fox’s Next Level Chef (2 mil/0.3) was steady, while Farmer Wants a Wife (1.9 mil/0.2) rose to its second-best audience of the season
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The Live+Same Day numbers reported in our ratings column do not reflect a show’s overall performance, given the increased use of delayed playback via DVR and streaming platforms, plus out-of-home viewing. These numbers (Nielsen fast nationals, unless denoted as finals) instead aim to simply illustrate trends or superlatives. Steve Harvey is not a judge or lawyer and merely offers an alternative forum of dispute resolution.
Elsbeth is a winner. Engaging character in lighthearted procedural. Perfect pairing with So Help Me Todd. CBS is a loser. Waiting five weeks for Episode 2 of Elsbeth is insane. But happy CBS can present something enjoyable and that feels fresh. These shows prove quirky need not be off putting. And bonus points for top talent! I look forward to spring and more of my new favorites.
A five week hiatus? Should have premiered it in April, I would think. Long absences often doom the ratings.
Todd is an excellent show. Light hearted. Needed at the end of a long day. Great escape. Love it.
Agreed. I think they just need to work on the supporting characters. Kinda falls into that trap of putting all the work into the zany fun leads, leaving the supporting cast of “straight” characters to fumble with scraps of meaningful development when they aren’t just reacting to the craziness and/or expositing the plot.
I don’t think Elsbeth will be one of those shows. I know the Kings aren’t as involved as they were with The Good Wife/Fight, but every character usually ends up being more than their job description or a broad personality type.
The pairing of these shows though is perfect. Both are fun, amiable, and just quirky enough.
CBS could have run 3 episodes of Elsbeth before the long break if they had not repeated 2 episodes of Tracker on Thursdays at 10PM. After a long strike why broadcast reruns so soon?
And tracker was a hit out of the box in Ep 2 (I throw out the post SB ratings).
It was exactly what I thought it would be. The character is quirky and amusing in short bursts, but is going to be extremely grating in large doses as the star of the series. I’ll give it a few more episodes to be sure, but my expectations were not great, and the premiere didn’t change them at all.
CBS = NCAA March Madness = 3 Thursday nights of basketball. Happens every spring, has nothing to do with the strike or anything else.
No one said that it did but uh.. thanks for that unnecessary clarification.
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I enjoyed the episode but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to stick with the series. This character is A Lot for every episode to be centered around. I’ll have to see how much Elsbeth I can take.
Delightful. Charming. Subtle. Clever. They actually need to punch up the lines for the other actors because Carrie Preston is sooo Effervescent that she’s making the cops on the show look a little bit slow & tired. But the unexpected ending helps explain a lot of that. I don’t give a damn! Thank you, Carrie Preston! Thank you, Kings!
Elsbeth4ever!!!
[One space after period.]
A major pet peeve – it’s ALWAYS 2 spaces after a period. 🫠😘 Elsbeth and So Help Me Todd should be a winning combination in tandem on CBS Thursday nights. Todd has been my favorite show since its premiere episode and only gets better with time.
It hasn’t been 2 spaces after a period for decades.
I’m annoyed that the 2nd episode is in April, 4-5 weeks away. It makes me wonder if I’ll bother at that time.
I saw the trailer for Elsbeth a long time ago and it caught my attention. I like Carrie Preston and despite never having watched The Good Wife, I decided to check out the new show. I was not disappointed. I thoroughly enjoyed it and will watch again once it picks up again in April. I also recently discovered So Help Me Todd and am currently catching up from the beginning on streaming. I’m glad to have two new shows to enjoy. Thanks, CBS!
Not surprising given how hard they promoted it on CBS — with Elsbeth popping up in virtually every show at some point and in some commercials.
If we’re going to have to wait a month for episode two, why even premiere the show this week? Such a weird move by CBS. You would think the network would want to start the show so that it could run however many episodes continuously, week-to-week.
This show is predictable and somewhat boring. Certainly does not compete with shows the likes of So Help Me Todd. Less promotion and more viewing is the only thing I would find interesting about this new show.
Really liked Elsbeth TV show!!
Too cutesy and quirky for my taste. I do not think it will wear well. Comparisons to Columbo are absurd. That was top notch cop detective stuff in perfect sync with an idiosyncratic protagonist – and certainly no cute or “kookie” factor like Elsbeth. I will stick with Law and Order and Elliott Stabler.