‘Bionic Woman’ shows power

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

It was ‘Bionic Woman’ vs. ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ -- and ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ wasn’t even on.

‘Bionic Woman,’ the hip new remake of that ‘70s show, starring Michelle Ryan, beat its heavy competition at 9 p.m. Wednesday in the key 18- to 49-year-old demographic that advertisers crave most. This despite going up against the much-hyped ‘Private Practice,’ starring Kate Walsh. That spinoff, however, earned its own bragging rights -- it won the time slot in terms of overall viewers. And ABC won the night overall among both total viewers and 18- to 49-year-olds, since ‘Dancing With the Stars’ continued its strong three-night run, and the series premiere of ‘Dirty Sexy Money’ did reasonably well against CBS’ ‘CSI: New York.’

The shows also bested other newcomers in the most competitive hour in the fall season -- including CW’s ‘Gossip Girl’ and Fox’s ‘Kitchen Nightmares’ -- as well as the CBS ratings stalwart, ‘Criminal Minds.’

If the ratings continue to hold, the ‘Bionic Woman’s’ demographic victory in the 9 p.m. Wednesday time slot suggests that NBC’s attempt to leverage the success of ‘Heroes’ with another sci-fi fantasy series could pay off.

It’s good news for new programming chief Ben Silverman: The self-proclaimed ‘rock star chairman’ was ushered in this year as co-chairman of entertainment and is on a mission to ‘bring sexy back’ to the peacock network. It has been languishing in its fourth-place slot when it comes to that 18- to 49-year-old slice of the demographic pie.

--Rene Lynch