Watch Out Chicago Med, Looks Like Tim Allen’s Shifting Gears Is Coming For Ya

by

2025 TV programming has started off by featuring both familiar favorites and fresh additions, with Tim Allen’s “Shifting Gears” being one of the latter. Alongside sitcom veteran Kat Dennings, this sitcom revolves around Allen’s character, a classic car restorer who is a widower, as his estranged daughter returns home this time accompanied by her children. Although “Shifting Gears” has only just been released, Tim Allen’s popularity from his work on “Last Man Standing” is evident in the strong ratings, and it seems that long-running show “Chicago Med” might need to be cautious.

The debut of “Shifting Gears” on Wednesday, January 8th attracted approximately 6.1 million viewers in total, earning a rating of 0.7 among the demographic aged 18-49. This performance appears to be the highest rated show for ABC at 8 p.m. ET in quite some time. Given that Tim Allen and Nancy Dennings have previously starred in popular sitcoms and films, it’s not surprising that they managed to draw a large audience.

That particular show truly stood out during that specific evening, outperforming many other scripted programs and even two shows airing before it on the same network, namely “The Conners” and “The Goldbergs.” It didn’t manage to become the night’s most-watched series, but it came very close to surpassing the ratings of NBC’s long-running show “Chicago Med,” which aired its midseason premiere on January 8, attracting approximately 6.2 million viewers during the 8 p.m. ET slot. This viewer count was slightly higher compared to the first half of Season 10.

The medical drama, referred to as “Med,” was closing the gap with the ratings of “Chicago Fire” during its fall finale, and surprisingly took the lead in the winter premiere. However, despite leading in total viewers, its demo rating of 0.5 failed to surpass that of “Shifting Gears.” It’s evident that “Med” faces stiff competition in the mid-week slot, and is likely to face challenges from fans of Tim Allen on a regular basis, as series typically experience a decrease in viewership from their premiere episode and beyond.

It’s quite remarkable that Shiftin Gears is currently dominating in the demo ratings with only its first episode. ABC seems to have a success story on their hands, and it appears that any issues behind-the-scenes before the premiere didn’t cause enough disruption to affect things.

Despite Shifting Gears having strong initial viewership figures, it was uncertain how the series would perform following negative reviews from critics about some of its episodes. However, both a decrease and an increase in viewers and ratings could be possible as the season progresses. At this point, it’s difficult to predict, but the audience will offer more insights by tuning in every week.

The medical drama series, Med, could see an increase in viewership due to the highly anticipated crossover of One Chicago on January 29th. This might boost the show’s ratings, but it’s challenging to foresee what will happen in the coming weeks and months. Notably, Med will be switching time-slots for this event, which means that Shifting Gears will face slightly altered competition in its time slot.

Generally speaking, both shows, “Shifting Gears” and “Chicago Med”, will keep competing against each other every Wednesday evening at 8 p.m., Eastern Time, on ABC and NBC respectively.

Tim Allen shared an intriguing behind-the-scenes detail about the shifting gears in BTS that I’ll certainly keep an eye out for throughout the entire season.

Read More

2025-01-15 00:08