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Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Tues., April 29) -- bombs away with Celebrity Wife Swap

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom on Twitter
Lead-ins still matter. Case in point: the final hour of prime-time in Tuesday’s D-FW Nielsen ratings.

While CBS11 high-fived its network’s Person of Interest, WFAA8 management may well have given some one-finger salutes to ABC’s Celebrity Wife Swap.

Person of Interest easily won at 9 p.m. in total viewers with 276,951. CBS11’s 10 p.m. local newscast then held enough of that audience -- 205,938 viewers -- to comfortably beat its rivals.

Wife Swap ran fourth in its time slot with just 63,911 viewers. WFAA8’s 10 p.m. newscast inflated to 106,520 viewers, but remained last in the news derby behind CBS11, NBC5 and Fox4.

CBS11 again came up a pauper with 25-to-54-year-olds, dropping from first to fourth among the main advertiser targets for news programming. Fox4 won that battle, with NBC5 second and WFAA8 third.

It was WFAA8’s first loss in the 25-to-54 demographic after first-place finishes at 10 p.m. for the first three weekdays of the ongoing May “sweeps” ratings period. A dose of Wife Swap can do that to you. But on Monday night, WFAA8 enjoyed a nice-sized 9 p.m. lead-in from ABC’s Castle while CBS11’s late night news suffered in the wake of a dismal ratings performance by its network’s Person of Interest repeat.

So ends unclebarky.com’s latest treatise on the value of solid support from your network, particularly when 10 p.m. ratings supremacy is at stake. Whatever brand loyalty exists usually fights a losing battle when the preceding program is the equivalent of halitosis in a kissing booth.

In contrast, CBS’ new episode of NCIS again drew Tuesday’s biggest crowd with 433,179 viewers in the 7 p.m. hour. The network’s NCIS: Los Angeles then won its 8 p.m. slot with 376,369 viewers. Among 18-to-49-year-olds, the key target audience for entertainment programming, NBC’s The Voice won the 7 p.m. hour before ABC’s The Goldbergs ran first from 8 to 8:30 p.m.

The second half-hour of NCIS: Los Angeles and Fox4’s 9 p.m. local newscast were tops with 18-to-49-year-olds from 8:30 to 10 p.m.

Here are Tuesday’s other four-way local news derby results.

NBC5 had the most total viewers at 6 a.m., but Fox4 edged the Peacock among 25-to-54-year-olds.

Fox4 swept the 5 p.m. competitions and NBC5 did likewise at 6 p.m.

Email comments or questions to: unclebarky@verizon.net