5x20 ~ The Witch in the Wardrobe ~ RATINGS

It is quite true to say that the show has stopped growing. To get a really good idea of the show performance, though, you would have to compare year over year new episode against new episode, same time slot against same time slot, since seasonality does impact viewership. So look to that this fall.

You would expect the 100th to trend up over the normal current viewership since that was an "event" show which is more likely to draw more casual viewers all at the same time. The season finale is our next "event" show and the expectation would be that it would also trend up, if it doesn't that would be genuinely troublesome. The other thing that would be genuinely troublesome is if viewership was dropping in the second half hour. And that has not been the case so far, quite the contrary.

I do agree that HH has to advance the B&B relationship in some way by the end of the season or he will risk exhausting the patience of a large segment of the audience that watches for B & B. And I do think he will pay off 100 with an advancement of their relationship, because he does realize that. But honestly, the sites that analyze these ratings scientifically as opposed to anecdotal fan analysis would have no compunction discussing impending doom. In fact they live to do just that.