"Wow, here it is!" In an apartment building in New York, a young white boy stares at the TV screen with excitement in his eyes, and the production of big investment is always expected, not to mention that "Sherlock" is an idea from Kung Fu Lin and his favorite suspense crime drama.

"Oh, Mom, let me watch Sherlock first, and if it's not good, we'll watch America's Got Talent." In Houston, a blonde girl is desperately guarding the remote control in her hand, and her eyes are reluctant to take her eyes off the TV, and "Sherlock" has begun.

"How can you let this Cumberbatch play Sherlock Holmes, where is it like Sherlock Holmes? Hopefully it won't mess up the whole series. "Salt Lake City, see Benedict on TV. Cumberbatch's look, a white teenager can't help but flatten his mouth, he is Sherlock. A big fan of Sherlock Holmes, Benedict. Cumberbatch is clearly a far cry from his idol.

And in Los Angeles, Chris. Anderson looked at the TV screen quite cramped, he was naturally full of confidence in the quality of "Sherlock", in the internal screening of Summit Entertainment, all the management were amazed, the same suspense crime drama, whether it is the picture or the plot, or the actors' performances, "Sherlock" has almost completely exploded "Criminal Minds", "Navy Criminal Investigation Service", "Crime Scene Investigation" and other similar dramas, coupled with CBS's full publicity and boss's strong appeal, "Sherlock" will definitely get good ratings, This is acknowledged internally by both CBS and Summit Entertainment, but no one has a definite answer to how high the ratings will be.

On Nielsen's 2008-2009 overall U.S. TV program ratings rankings. Excluding interview talk shows, sports events, reality shows and other programs, looking at the American drama part alone, the first place is the veteran ratings overlord "Crime Scene Investigation". The average number of viewers is 19.23 million, ranking second is "Navy Crime Investigation" with an average viewership of 17.87 million, ranking third is "Super Sense Detective" with an average viewership of 17.51 million, followed by "Desperate Housewives" with 15.68 million from fourth to tenth, "Two and a Half Heroes" with 14.92 million, "Criminal Minds" with 14.88 million, "CSI: Miami" with 14.27 million, "Grey's Anatomy" with 14.22 million, and "Dr. House" with 13.52 million and CSI: New York with 13.46 million, six of which are CBS series. In total, there were 26 dramas with an average viewership of more than 10 million throughout the year.

As a new drama, it stands to reason that it is difficult to compare with the old hit drama from the beginning. Looking at the popular dramas since 2000, the best performance in the first season is undoubtedly 2004's "Desperate Housewives", with an average viewership of 23.7 million, ranking second in the annual drama category. Second only to Crime Scene Investigation. It also ranked fourth in the overall TV program rankings.

followed by "Grey's Anatomy" in the same year, with an average viewership of 18.5 million, followed by "CSI" (17.8 million) in 2000, "CSI" (16.57 million) in 2002, "Evil Force" (16.53 million) in 2005, "Lost" (15.69 million in 2004), and "Two and a Half Heroes" (15.32 million) in 2003.

Both Summit Entertainment and CBS are certainly hoping that Sherlock will be on par with these series, and Sherlock itself has qualities that support extraordinary ratings. The problem is mainly that TV ratings have shown a significant decline in the past two years, taking "Crime Scene Investigation" as an example. Although "Criminal Mind Investigation" won the 2008-2009 drama ratings champion, its ratings were the worst except for the first season, "Crime Scene Investigation" in 2007-2008 had an average rating of 19.47 million, and before that, it maintained more than 20 million viewers for six consecutive years, and its best ratings appeared in 2004 when the three dramas "Desperate Housewives", "Grey's Anatomy" and "Lost" came out, with an average rating of 26.42 million.

Since then, the ratings of "CSI" have declined year by year, and there are also dramas such as "Desperate Housewives" and "CSI Investigation: Miami", although there are also occasional increases such as "Grey's Anatomy", "Dr. House", and "Navy Crime Investigation", but from the perspective of the overall market, the decline in TV ratings is definitely an indisputable fact.

There's a sense of unease across the U.S. television scene, and if viewership continues to decline, the industry could be in a very difficult position for years to come.

It is also the deep TV environment that makes it difficult to predict the ratings of "Sherlock" exactly. Anderson is not worried about the ratings of "Sherlock", but is more nervous about how much the ratings of "Sherlock" can reach, because this is directly related to the international market sales of "Sherlock" and the planning of the second season.

Excluding the top ten dramas last year, and then looking at the crime suspense category alone, the average viewership of "The Missing Detective Team" is 12.91 million, "24 Hours" is 12.63 million, "Ironclad Evidence" is 12.24 million, "Don't Lie to Me" is 10.95 million, "Bone Search" is 10.74 million, "Digital Chasing the Murderer" is 10.28 million, and "Spiritual Book Detective" is 10.19 million, and the high-rated dramas are undoubtedly the most among all genres.

And the average number of viewers exceeding 10 million is also the lowest psychological expectation of Summit Entertainment and CBS for "Sherlock", "Ghost Whisperer" and "Digital Chaser" can both exceed 10 million viewers, and there is no reason why "Sherlock" is not even as good as these two dramas.

Generally speaking, due to the inevitable loss of first-broadcast audiences, the number of first-broadcast viewers will be about two or three million higher than the average viewership, that is to say, in order to reach an average of tens of millions of viewers, the number of viewers for the premiere of "Sherlock" tonight should not be less than 12 million, and the number of viewers for the premiere of "Don't Lie to Me" last season, that is, the first season, was 13.56 million, although this is related to the fact that FOX attaches great importance to the show and deliberately puts it after "American Idol", but even so, Sherlock 's premiere shouldn't be lower than that number either.

Can it be achieved? Chris. Anderson is in a fretted mood, and he is in a similar situation with many people in Summit Entertainment and CBS, but no matter how anxious he is, the ratings will come out tomorrow.

Compared to them, the audience doesn't have so many other ideas, they only care about whether "Sherlock" is exciting and interesting, the fact is that "Sherlock" is definitely exciting and interesting enough, like most crime suspense dramas, "Sherlock" is also an episode of a case, due to the need to explain the characters and story background, the length of the first episode is as high as 82 minutes, far more than the 52 minutes of each subsequent episode, there is no high salary of tens of millions of dollars, there are no thrilling large-scale special effects scenes, The investment of $12 million in the first episode is enough to ensure quality results.

This is only the most basic, the actors' performances and the plot are the most important, and in the blink of an eye, thirty minutes have passed.

"This damn advertisement, sooner or later, it's just this time." Seeing that the crime finally happened, Sherlock Holmes. Sherlock was looking for clues at the crime scene when an ad suddenly appeared on the TV screen, and countless young viewers across the United States scolded unpleasantly.

As soon as the advertising time passed, the audience was immediately immersed in Sherlock's world of reasoning.

"Damn, here you go again, and don't let people watch TV." When the advertisement appeared again on the TV screen, more people scolded, but at the same time, taking advantage of the advertising time, people also got up and walked to the bathroom, without the slightest delay, the suspense in the reasoning process continued, such a plot is too exciting, almost breathless, now don't go to the bathroom, wait for the story to start again, there will be no time, it will be the most tense and exciting moment, the final suspense is about to be revealed, no one wants to miss a minute and a second of this critical moment.

"It's wonderful, Paul, who do you guess the murderer will be, I think there will definitely be a shocking reversal in the end." There are also viewers who can't wait to call their friends to discuss the plot.

"Things don't seem to be good!" NBC Production Manager Brandon. Jennings frowned, after watching "Sherlock", he naturally thought of "Lost", there are too many similarities between the two, the same huge investment in building, the same suspense, the same excellent actors, the same not small, "Lost" originally premiered with 18.6 million viewers, creating the highest ratings of ABC TV since 2000, and the final average viewership in a single season was 15.69 million, ranking 14th in the total ratings of TV programs that year, limited environment, "Sherlock" Even if it's inferior, it's not much worse.

This is undoubtedly a very fatal thing, although the types of programs are different, "Sherlock" and its own "America's Got Talent" have almost overlapping main viewers, young people in the United States, but at the same time period, the good results of "Sherlock" ratings can be imagined.

"It seems that the ratings champion of "America's Got Talent" in the same period can't be kept, and I don't know how many ratings "Sherlock" can have, damn CBS, why is it always so lucky?" The indescribable jealousy of the management of other TV stations, CBS was already strong enough, and now it is about to conquer another time slot.

"Hurry up, why is it so slow?" Salt Lake City, originally on Benedict. Cumberbatch's role as a very dissatisfied white teenager now just can't wait.

When the ad break finally passed, millions of viewers across the U.S. were immediately engaged in the most intense moment.

"How many will there be?" Due to the time difference between New Zealand and the United States, when Lin Yuquan got up in the morning, "Sherlock" had already ended its national premiere, and since the morning, he has been concerned about the ratings.

In the blink of an eye, it was evening in New Zealand, and after a day of shooting, I had just had dinner. Anderson's phone called.

Hoping it will be good news, Lin Yuquan's eyes froze and he connected the phone.

"Boss, we made it"

As soon as I heard Chris. Anderson didn't hide his excitement at all, and a bright smile suddenly appeared on his face, it was successful, great! (To be continued.) )