Last year they debuted 8 new shows for a total of 6 hours, and this coming fall they will debut 7 shows for a total of 6 and a half hours (With more on reserve for mid-season.)

Comedy Wednesday was a success, or at least Modern Family was, The Middle is doing middling ratings (pun intended) and Cougar Town has seen its ratings dip post-renewal.  In all, only Hank was a total strike out, and that one quickly disappeared.  Considering how awful ABC has been at launching successful comedies, the fact that they had any success with its bold Wednesday night block is a huge win for them.  Literally, ABC was scraping the bottom of the barrel, underscored not just by the fact that they even bothered saving Scrubs from NBC, but then renewed it despite its average of under 5 million viewers.  That didn’t happen again, Scrubs is now dead.

Dramas are where ABC has some problems.  They banked pretty much everything on FlashForward being the heir-apparent to Lost, and as anyone who endured FlashForward knows, that didn’t happen.  As the guy who actually watched The Forgotten, I actually thought it was a better show than FlashForward, and I’ll miss that one quite a bit more.  Alas, The Forgotten lived up to its title and the Jerry Bruckheimer drama will be replaced by The Whole Truth, a Jerry Bruckheimer drama.
ABC needs some success with its new dramas, striking out last season combined with its aging and dying veteran shows, it could be in serious trouble if it comes out of this season empty-handed.  Its Sunday line-up saw its ratings dip across the board and many expected that schedule to get a shake-up.  That will happen once Brothers and Sisters wraps early, but given that ABC is trying to launch so many new shows, it needed some familiarity in its schedule as well.  Desperate Housewives is still strong enough for a couple more years, Extreme Makeover: Home Edition was considered most likely to shift to Fridays, and still could, as it has definitely weakened over the past year.  Brothers and Sisters saw its ratings tank last year and may well be heading into its swan song.  Producers are still moving full steam ahead on a flash-forward that will see the show pick up one year in the future following the tragic events in the season finale.

Despite struggling on Fridays for years, ABC hasn’t entirely thrown in the towel just yet.  Body of Proof, the new Dana Delaney drama will launch on the night.  Because a female-centric detective drama worked so well there last time with Women’s Murder Club.  It will be paired with Secret Millionaire, the canceled reality show that ABC picked out of Fox’s scrap heap.

Sundays

7:00 – America’s Funniest Home Videos
8:00 – Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
9:00 – Desperate Housewives
10:00 – Brothers & Sisters

Mondays

8:00 – Dancing with the Stars
10:00 – Castle

Tuesdays

8:00 – No Ordinary Family
9:00 – Dancing with the Stars Results Show
10:00 – Detroit 1-8-7

Wednesdays

8:00 – The Middle
8:30 – Better Together
9:00 – Modern Family
9:30 – Cougar Town
10:00 – The Whole Truth

Thursdays

8:00 – My Generation
9:00 – Grey’s Anatomy
10:00 – Private Practice

Fridays

8:00 – Secret Millionaire
9:00 – Body of Proof
10:00 – 20/20

Saturdays

8:00 – Saturday Night College Football
(followed by a mix of specials/reruns)

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http://twitter.com/TVMoJoe/status/11323362325
http://twitter.com/EWAusielloFiles/status/11323327850
http://twitter.com/franklinavenue/status/11323221786

Update: Michael Ausiello of Entertainment Weekly is confirming that pick-up is for a full 22 episodes!
http://ausiellofiles.ew.com/2010/03/30/abc-renews-castle/

That’s good enough for me to take this to the bank!  The news does not come as a surprise, Castle has been on the rise especially of late, but for fans like me it’s reassuring to see it official.

As for its recent surge in ratings, just last week it set a series high 12.2 million and 3.3 demo.  That was topped this week (although final Nielsen numbers could alter it just a bit) by another series high 14.4 million and 3.7 demo.

Who else is excited for Castle?

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SECOND BOOK FROM RICHARD CASTLE – STAR OF ABC’S “CASTLE” -
PLANNED FOR RELEASE SEPTEMBER 2010

HEAT WAVE by Richard Castle, star of the hit ABC series “Castle” (Mondays, 10:00-11:00 p.m., ET), has been a successful cross-platform collaboration between ABC and Hyperion. Published at the end of September 2009, HEAT WAVE has spent 14 weeks on the New York Times Hardcover bestsellers list, currently holding the #32 position for Sunday, January 17, 2010. Hyperion has gone back to press eight times and now has over 170,000 copies in print. With this great success, a second book from Richard Castle will be published at the end of September 2010.

HEAT WAVE is Hyperion’s #2 bestselling ebook for 2009, surpassed only by “The Last Lecture.” It is also Hyperion’s #5 Kindle bestseller for the year. The free chapters of HEAT WAVE offered on ABC.com have been downloaded almost 100,000 times since the first chapter posted in August 2009. HEAT WAVE will be released as a mass market paperback edition in August 2010.

UNTITLED CASTLE BOOK 2 by Richard Castle –
In the sequel to HEAT WAVE, Castle’s new thrilling mystery continues the story of NYPD Homicide Detective Nikki Heat. Tough, sexy, professional, Nikki Heat carries a passion for justice as she leads one of New York City’s top homicide squads. In what’s sure to be another smash sensation by this blockbuster author, readers will once again follow Nikki Heat and hotshot reporter Jameson Rook as they trade barbs and innuendos, all while on the trail of a murderer!

For more information on “Castle,” visit ABC.com

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Well, SERENITY didn’t do tell well in Theaters but luckily the show has lived on and became a cult-classic becoming a top DVD seller and more recently to be the first ‘complete Series’ available on Blu-ray. But now…things really heat up! On next weeks episode of CASTLE, Richard Castle (Nathan Fillion) will be dressing up for Halloween. Can anyone guess who he will be?

Anything I put here would not be as cool as the picture above

Oh hell yeah! Not only do random episodes have small nods to Firefly fans but this is the ultimate!

Profit.  CASTLE is starting to make some serious money for Disney.  That is what happens when you have a book based on the series hit number 1 in sales.  That’s right.  The cheesy tie in book written by the fake Richard Castle called HEAT WAVE about the Nikki Heat character based on the make believe Kate Becket character on the show has gone and sold a bazillion copies, staying on the NY Times Best Seller list for the past 4 weeks, and is currently the top selling book at Barnes & Noble, and the 8th best selling book at the time I checked on Amazon.

The DVD Sales have been above average for the ratings as well.

Not bad for a book written by an unknown writer.  Give the house of mouse some credit though.  They went all out in promoting the book written by a character on a TV show.  They totally made the incredibly weak GOD HATES US ALL book that Showtime pimped out to promote Season 3 of CALIFORNICATION look like child’s play.  They are totally treating the book as if Richard Castle was real.  It has worked.  All they had to do was give the real writer a couple guest spots as himself for a couple episodes as well.  Ego does wonders, eh?  (it also doesn’t hurt that the real writer is a good one).

Given the recent huge success of the book, it was a no brainer that ABC would give CASTLE a full season.  There is no better promotion for the series than a best seller.  Has it worked in viewers?  Some will argue it hasn’t, but the numbers state that the show has risen from a 2.2 to a 2.4 in the 18-49 category while the book has been on the NY Times Best Seller List.  A 2.4 for the time slot is a win for ABC.  If the show can grow to a 2.5+ they will have a solid show.  If it ever hits a 3.0+ then it’s a hit.

Disney currently has plans for a follow up book by Richard Castle as well.  So the future of this series may well live on past a second season despite what a certain index might show.