Ugly Betty Ends Season on Ratings Uptick

The season finale of Ugly Betty (episode 2.18 – Jump), won its time slot for the second straight week, and got the highest ratings since episode 2.14 (24 Candles- which was the first episode back once the strike had ended).

All of broadcast television had been suffering, ratings-wise, since the strike – even reality shows. (I guess viewers just found other things to do). Reality shows Survivor, Dancing With The Stars, and of course, American Idol were still king, but even they suffered the same proportional downturn this spring.

Now, I had been wanting to create an Ugly Betty ratings chart all season but never got around to it. Lo and behold, Your Entertainment Now did just that, and the chart gives you a pretty good picture of how the season went:

Betty ended up with 6.2/11 in Houseolds, 8.75M in viewers, and 2.8/9 in Adults. Is this good? It depend on how you look at it. THe numbers are quite down from last year’ season finale, but that was also true for powerhouse Grey’s Anatomy. But, I think the chart shows that, after the growing pains of “the refocusing”, things were going in the right direction for Ugly Betty’s ratings. Episode 2.15 was the low point (you have to throw out the Thanksgiving episode 2.09). After that, the viewers have slowly been coming back.

I thought there would be a bigger “Lohan Bump”, but maybe early reviews that told how brief Lindsay Lohan’s appearance was kept casual fans away.

Regardless, I think Betty is going to be on much more solid ground next year. Will it get to averaging over 10 million viewers a week again? Only time will tell.