So much for the idea that Fox's decision to move one of its few popular scripted progams, The O.C., to Thursday evenings was going to hurt CBS's Survivor.
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With the baseball playoffs finally over, the Fox teen soap finally made its long-delayed Thursday evening debut (Fox originally planned to air the program in the Thursday 9PM ET/PT time period last fall -- before blinking at the last minute and deciding to move the Summer 2003 hit to Wednesdays) and all Survivor: Vanuatu did is delivery its most watched episode of the season.
With original episodes of The O.C., NBC's Joey, and ABC's Extreme Makeover all nipping at its heels during the first Thursday evening of the November 2004 sweeps period, Survivor: Vanuatu dominated the 8PM ET/PT hour, winning its time period in households (12.0/18 rating/share), viewers (20.24 million), and the Adults 25-54 (9.2/21), Adults 18-49 (7.6/20) and Adults 18-34 (5.4/16) demographics. Survivor also won both half-hours in households, viewers, Adults 18-34, Adults 18-49 and Adults 25-54.
The broadcast represented Survivor: Vanuatu's best performance of the season in households, viewers and the Adults 25-54 demographic and its best delivery in the Adults 18-49 demographic since its September 16 season premiere. The Survivor episode also placed very well in the overall weekly ratings, ranking 4th for the week ending November 7 in total viewers, 3rd in Adults 18-54, and 6th in Adults 18-49.
While The O.C. did relatively well in the highly competitive hour -- it drew 8.6 million viewers and delivered Fox's best performance among viewers and Adults 18-49 in nearly seven years -- it still finished third behind NBC's second place Joey in most key demographics (although it did finish surprisingly first among Men 18-34 and second behind Survivor in Adults 18-34.) Continuing a ratings run that has demonstrated that while successful for a first-year program, Joey appears unlikely to ever become a Friends-like mega-hit, Joey finished a solid second in its half-hour with 12.6 million viewers and a 5.2/14 rating/share in Adults 18-49.