took a hit going up against the premiere of American Idol this week, dropping from a 1.1 in the demo to an 0.9 and falling below 3 million viewers for the first time in more than a month (granted most of that time, the show was on hiatus).Just about everything got smoked on Wednesday, though; even Idol returned weaker than usual, but still strong enough to sap everyone else on the schedule. The same thing happened again on Thursday, but the momentum NBC had going into the week following the return of Community wasn’t enough to hold up.Veteran comedies Community and Parks and Recreation took just a 1.1 and 1.2 in the ratings, for just over 3 million viewers, which is scary for a “big three” network but not entirely unheard-of. But freshman sitcoms The Michael J. Fox Show and Sean Saves the World, both of which came into the season with very high expectations from critics and the network, scored an 0.6 and an 0.8, respectively, with Fox dropping 40% in a week.That’s scary for both shows–and Fox in particular, which scored below not only Arrow (as did Sean) but also below cable shows like Cougar Town, Robot Chicken and re-runs of The Big Bang Theory in syndication on TBS that aren’t “event TV” for fans the way Arrow is.
