‘Battle Of Network Stars’ And ‘Zoo’ Suffer Sluggish Starts

CBS’s Zoo season launch ran at the rear of the pack, behind Night Shift and Gong Show, scoring a series low in the demo (0.5 rating) and total viewers (3.1 million) at 10 PM on a busy night that also saw ABC score meh numbers launching Battle of the Network stars reboot (1.0 rating, 4.03M).

Battle climbed steeply from its Boy Band lead-in (0.5, 2.71M) and was the net’s best performing program of the night, also outstripping ABC’s Gong Show at 10 (0.9, 3.47M). But it trailed timeslot competition, including dominating Big Brother (1.6, 5.3M) and NBC’s The Wall (1.0, 4.65M).

CBS’s 9 PM Big Brother Thursday debut finished first in viewers and the demo, as well as among 25-54 and 18-34; taking the night’s top spot in all these metrics. But the opening slipped compared to last year’s Thursday Big Brother launch (1.7, 5.67M) to hit smallest yet in the demo for a Thursday kickoff.

Fox’s 8 PM Beat Shazam (0.9, 3.13M) scored the demo win its its second half hour, after which Love Connection (0.7, 2.44M) took a tumble.

NBC’s Game Night (0.9, 3.90M) tied for the demo win in the full 8 PM hour with a slight week-to-week uptick, after which The Wall climbed (1.0, 4.65M). At 10 PM, Night Shift (0.7, 4.20M) clocked in at No. 1 in its hour in overall crowd.

CBS (1.0, 4.67M) took primetime, followed by NBC (0.9, 4.25M). ABC (0.8, 3.40M) tied Fox (0.8, 2.78M) in the demo, but not in total viewers. CW logged 0.3 demo rating sand 1M viewers with repeats of Supernatural at 8 PM (0.3, 1.06M) and 9 (0.3, 965K).