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Are Criminal Minds Ratings Down? Is The Absence Of Thomas Gibson And Shemar Moore Impacting Ratings?

By Kim McLendon
Published on: 21:42 PST, Dec 12, 2016

Criminal Minds ratings, coupled with the absence of Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore, have sparked a debate among the journalists. Have ratings dropped or not? Did #NoHotchNoWatch cause the decline? Well, numbers don’t lie. Ratings are down drastically.

Without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore, Criminal Minds’ most recent episode pulled 7.73 million viewers, according to iTechpost, who called that an all-time high. The rating of 7.73 is not a high of any kind for this show, nor is #NoHotchNoWatch going away. What has gone away are millions of viewers who no longer watch the show.

Criminal Minds with Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore has done far better in all it’s previous 11 seasons. Criminal Minds was ranked 11th for all programs on all networks with 14.111 million viewers in Season 10 (2014-2015), according to Deadline Hollywood.

Criminal Minds Seasons 1-11 with Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore had double-digit average ratings for each season. Season 12, hasn’t reached 8 million viewers in the last five episodes, and it hasn’t reached 9 million all season, according to TV Ratings Finale.

Without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore, Criminal Minds has fallen far from its original glory. The first season premiere of Criminal Minds, with Mandy Patinkin, Matthew Gray Gubler, Shemar Moore, Thomas Gibson and Kirsten Vangsness pulled 19.5 million viewers back in 2005. Though the show never topped that high water mark, it continued to maintain enviable ratings for 11 years.

Criminal Minds producers believed in 2007, after the departure of Mandy Patinkin, that it was all over. The show would never recover. The show would never make sense without Mandy’s character Jason Gideon in the show they thought. Well, they were wrong about that. Mandy’s departure made no noticeable impact on the ratings. Thomas Gibson’s absence, however, has made a huge difference.

Criminal Minds fans continue to protest on Twitter with #NoHotchNoWatch. It’s not over, and from the degree of determination they show, it might not ever be over.

Criminal Minds without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore has seen a significant ratings drop. That can’t really be argued. What can be discussed is why did it matter so little to viewers when Mandy left, and so much when Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore left?

Criminal Minds was 12 years old when veteran actors Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore left the show. When Mandy Patinkin departed Criminal Minds, the audience had only known the cast for two seasons. Perhaps newer shows can have major casting changes with little or no repercussions. After 12 years, though, it makes a difference.

Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore also fit into the heartthrob category with a huge fan base for each star. Matthew Gray Gubler has a similar situation, with millions of young girls watching the show just to see him. Losing two major heartthrobs in the same season was too much perhaps.

Matthew Gray Gubler and Thomas Gibson [Image by Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images]

Thomas Gibson was fired from Criminal Minds after never missing a single episode in 12 years. That is a huge sticking point with #NoHotchNoWatch. It is one thing to lose a favorite character because an actor doesn’t want to do the show anymore, but quite another to feel a favorite actor was unfairly fired.

To CBS, it seems, the Criminal Minds rating situation is similar to a glass half full question. Does it really even matter to CBS if the glass is only half full, as long as it is fuller than NBC’s glass?

NBC has only one show, This Is Us, doing better than Criminal Minds. This Is Us has 9.55 million viewers. Nothing on ABC is rating significantly better than Criminal Minds.

Despite Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore being missed, and in spite of #NoHotchNoWatch boycotts, Criminal Minds is still ranking sixth out of 21 CBS scripted shows for the coveted 18 to 49 age demographic. Further, it ranks 11th for total viewers, even with an average of only 7.85 million viewers for the season so far.

Criminal Minds isn’t going to be canceled this year with or without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore. There will be a Season 13, and possibly a Season 14 as well, but eventually there might not be a Criminal Minds, and no one wants that. Fans just want Gibson and Moore back on the show.

Thomas Gibson of Criminal Minds [Image by Frederick M. Brown/Getty Images]

Criminal Minds is in a huge rating decline without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore. Even though a lot of shows are losing viewers, and still others never attracted 8 million viewers to begin with. It still seems logical to improve ratings in whatever way one can. Wouldn’t it be better to shore up this situation rather than lose viewers?

Criminal Minds fans want to continue watching the show for years to come. Viewers want to see Kirsten Vangsness, Matthew Gray Gubler, A.J. Cook, and the rest of the cast as well, but for some, the show just isn’t the same without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore.

What is happening to Criminal Minds now is exactly what producers thought would happen when Mandy Patinkin left. It’s happening. They thought losing Patinkin would kill the show. Now, the absences of Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore, at the same time no less, are destroying Criminal Minds.

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Criminal Minds ratings aren’t the same without the millions of viewers who have abruptly stopped watching this year. Whether it’s the #NoHotchNoWatch boycott or just people thinking it is sad to watch Criminal Minds without Thomas Gibson and Shemar Moore, it is the same issue.

Many Criminal Minds viewers have said they don’t watch the show anymore because they miss Thomas Gibson or Shemar Moore. Whether they openly protest or just go away, they are still not watching. Perhaps CBS should thank #NoHotchNoWatch for calling attention to a much larger problem.

Criminal Minds without Shemar Moore and Thomas Gibson is losing viewers.

[Featured Image by Matt Winkelmeyer/Getty Images]

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