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Local Nielsen ratings snapshot (Wed., Jan. 9) -- Chicago Fire heats up while Kimmel cools down

By ED BARK
@unclebarkycom
NBC's fall season success with The Voice and Revolution has been duly noted in these spaces. Now it looks like the Peacock may have a late bloomer in Chicago Fire.

Created by Dick (Law & Order) Wolf, Fire commandingly won its 9 p.m. slot Wednesday with 261,600 D-FW viewers. And it did so opposite the closing hour of CBS' annual People's Choice Awards (185,873) and the midseason return of ABC's Nashville (172,105).

Fire also hosed the competition among advertiser-prized 18-to-49-year-olds. ABC's Modern Family likewise swept its 8 p.m. slot before NBC's Law & Order: SVU controlled the Nielsens from 830 to 9 p.m.

The 7 p.m. hour went to CBS' I Get That A Lot in total viewers and the first half of Fox's Celebrities In Danger: The High Dive in the 18-to-49-demographic. Among those going off the deep end was Terrell Owens, who lost out to Antonio Sabato, Jr. in the climactic final splashdown.

ABC's Jimmy Kimmel Live!, in its second outing at 10:35 p.m., ran second in total viewers among the three late night talkers. The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, which also topped Fox4's TMZ and Access Hollywood, led with 137,684 viewers, with Kimmel (68,842) outpointing CBS' Late Show with David Letterman (61,958).

Leno also thumped Kimmel among 18-to-49-year-olds after losing to him on Tuesday night. But TMZ was the overall leader in that key demographic before Leno took over at 11 p.m.

WFAA8 continues to possibly hamper Kimmel by subjecting viewers to a lengthy block of commercials following its 10 p.m. newscast. CBS11 saves a brief newscast "kicker" story for last before saying goodnight and going immediately to Letterman. NBC5 pretty much does the same, in getting very quickly from the end of its newscast to Leno. Not WFAA8. And damned if makes any sense to configure your commercials this way. But whatever.

Here are Wednesday's local news derby results.

The 10 p.m. firsts were split between NBC5 in total viewers and WFAA8 among 25-to-54-year-olds, the main advertiser target audience for news programming.

Fox4 again commanded the 6 a.m. slot in both measurements and added 5 and 6 p.m. wins with 25-to-54-year-olds.

NBC5 topped the 5 p.m. competition in total viewers and CBS11 did likewise at 6 p.m.
unclebarky@verizon.net