Survivor has its worst fall premiere ever, sadly; H8R crashes and burns, thankfully

Despite having a very strong opening 90-minute episode last night, Survivor South Pacific had its lowest-rated fall debut ever and came in second in viewers to America’s Got Talent‘s finale, although it did what it usually does and won its timeslot among people 18 to 49.

Survivor lost 15 percent of its younger 18-49 audience compared to last fall, while America’s Got Talent lost 10 percent; Big Brother stayed consistent with last year in the demo, though it lost about 2 million viewers from its lead-in and lost viewers throughout its 90 minutes. That’s all according to TV By the Numbers.

CBS spun this positively, noting that “Survivor, in its 23rd edition, continues to post strong ratings as the premiere … won its time period in adults 18-49 and adults 25-54 against the finale of ‘America’s Got Talent,’ while the season finale of Big Brother concluded its best season since 2004.”

Viewers got one thing right last night: They didn’t tune into The CW’s awful new series H8R, the show produced by Bachelor creator Mike Fleiss and hosted by Mario Lopez that allows horrible D-list celebrities to ambush a previously anonymous online hater, as if anyone really wants to see assholes like Jake Pavelka and twits like Snooki acting even more superior. I cannot fathom the levels of self-delusion that exist in Hollywood that would be required to make this show seem like a good idea. Baffling.

Anyway, thankfully, viewers said no, as the show had just 1.34 million viewers, losing 200,000 from the first half-hour to the second, and it had a miserable .6 among viewers 18 to 49, according to TV By the Numbers. HitFix’s Dan Fienberg wrote an excellent takedown of the show if you’d like to dance on its grave.

On Vulture, Joe Adalian reports that this is “low even by [CW] standards (though, sadly, the net’s best reality debut in two years),” and that “helped push America’s Next Top Model down nearly 30 percent in adults 18 to 34 versus its fall premiere last year (when it aired at 8 p.m.).” He says we can expect Top Model‘s all-star season to return to 8 p.m. in the next few weeks, which means H8R will either be cancelled or shuffled off somewhere to die the death it deserves.