Supernatural – CW Upfronts & The Move to Wednesday Nights

There was quite a lot of feeling passing through my social media feeds this morning as the entire Supernatural fandom awaited news of their beloved Winchesters at the CW Upfronts this morning in New York (the Upfronts are where the stars of each network’s shows give some face time to advertisers, and where network honchos try to sell advertising space ahead of time to said advertisers).

There was a great deal of happy, and some people were very angry about CW’s move of Supernatural from Friday night to Wednesday night, and cursed it as being the death of the show.

In fact, it is just the opposite. It a show of confidence on the network’s part that Supernatural has garnered enough viewers to more than satisfy a Wednesday night audience.

People are remiss in thinking that Friday night is a good night for television ratings; it isn’t. Typically, it’s where once-watched shows go to die.

Supernatural GAINED viewership on Friday night. Network honchos’ realized if they moved it back to a night where they are more likely to have viewers already watching television (say, Wednesday night) and paired it with a new and like-minded show, not only would they retain their Friday night viewers, but they would attract new viewers who typically do not watch television on Friday nights.

Essentially, more people are in watching TV on Wednesday than they are on Friday.

It’s simple mathematics: better night & time + more viewers = more seasons.

FYI – this is only the second time the actors have been asked to attend the CW Upfronts. The last time was in 2005, at the end of Season 1, and their first official public appearance together.

So what does THAT say about network confidence?

Supernatural CW Upfronts Press Conference Updates:

– CW President Mark Pedowits says he’s not looking at Season 8 as the final season, says he’s very ‘gung ho’.