Here  are complete series rankings for the 2011-12 season in adults 18-49 and total viewers. Several highlights: NBC’s Sunday Night Football was the No.1 program of the season in both adults 18-49 and total viewers, ending American idol‘s eight-year streak topping both categories. SNF also became the first sports…

The broadcast season unofficially kicks off tonight. And just like in a kids board game, the youngest of the networks, the CW, got to start first, unspooling its new series Ringer starring Sarah Michelle Gellar. Also launching tonight are the new seasons of the CW’s 90210 and NBC’s Parenthood, marking the unofficial…

Another TV staffing season is coming to a close as, one by one, writers rooms of new and returning series are convening to work on the 2011-12 orders. Overall, “it was a healthy staffing season,” one industry insider said, while another was lamenting the system, in which prospective writers meet on 80+ pilots in the…

We already told you what several advertisers thought of NBC’s and Fox's upfront presentations. As for the last two major networks, the people with whom we spoke were much more impressed by CBS than ABC and identified four shows that seem to have a better-than-even shot at succeeding: CBS' 2 Broke Girls, How To Be A Gen…

CBS Unveils 2011-12 Schedule After branding last year’s schedule overhaul as “aggressive stability” last May, CBS scheduling guru Kelly Kahl described the changes this year as “dynamic stability.” They include launching a new series in the Thursday 9 PM slot, the J.J. Abrams/Jonah Nolan drama Person of Interest;…

What a day! CBS just joined the pickup frenzy with orders to its two hottest pilots on the drama and comedy side. The network is making calls to producers at the moment, and the first to get one was none other than J.J. Abrams, whose Person of Interest has been picked up to series. The crime drama written by Jonah…

The marathon pilot screenings at the broadcast networks are in full force. While they are rarely the deciding factor in the networks’ final series pickup decisions, they help solidify early standouts’ frontrunner positions and sometimes breathe life into pilots that might have been written off too soon. Here are some…

Cold Case alum Danny Pino has become the first actor cast in Stephen Gaghan’s pilot for NBC S.I.L.A., a complex drama in the style of  Traffic and Syriana set in the world of crime, law enforcement and politics in sprawling modern-day Los Angeles. The project, from 20th TV and Chernin Entertainment, centers on…

Kat Dennings has signed on as one of the two leads in CBS’ multicamera comedy pilot Two Broke Girls, co-written and executive produced by former Sex and the City showrunner Michael Patrick King and comedian Whitney Cummings. Dennings is the first actor cast in the project, which centers on two girls from very…

The pilot pickup season is just starting in earnest, but we already have an unusually large number of creators with multiple pilot orders. Peter Tolan, Whitney Cummings, Michael Patrick King and the duo of Andrew Reich and Ted Cohen have each received two pickups. Tolan wrote and is executive producing Fox’s comedy The…