ABC’s Agents of SHIELD, a small screen spin-off of the Avengers movies, looked like a breakout hit two years ago when it debuted in Fall of 2013 with an eye-popping 4.7 rating based on the overnights for the 18-49 demographic. Those numbers quickly cooled off, though, when curious onlookers discovered the show would not be delivering a mini-Avengers film each week, and by the end of its first season AoS was down to marginal ratings at best. It still got the second season nod, but when it returned in Fall 2014 the show could only muster a 2.1 rating based on the overnights for its debut (less than half of its first season score). And the numbers continued to slip to the point that it only averaged a 1.6 rating for the year and its season finale sank to a series low 1.3 rating. But Agents of SHIELD is still coming back for a third season (largely because Disney dictated to ABC that it would) and looks to reinvigorate viewer interest with its Inhumans storyline and also bringing in the Secret Warriors characters from Marvel comics. The show’s Season 3 bow is on Tuesday September 29th, and the Fall ratings across the broadcast networks have not been looking great thus far. So now we ask you to give your predictions on whether AoS will get back on track ratings-wise or continue to sink and possibly face cancellation after its third season.
POLL CLOSED: The debut ratings were a 1.7 rating based on the overnights for the 18-49 demographic with 4.9 million total viewers. That was an improvement on its Season 2 finale and average rating from last year.
Just from my relatives and friends comments I think more accurate viewer ratings would be found by following internet usage. More people are watching TV shows a day later or streaming the various online services; hulu, netflix, etc. These services are missing a revenue source if they are not already gathering viewer trends or stats to form more accurate ratings. I myself DVR most of my favorites because they time-conflict with live watching.