Not only has NBC’s The Firm failed to snare those hypothetical fans waiting 20 years for a sequel to John Grisham’s legal thriller (If only he’d written more of them!), the show has failed to attract much of anybody: This week’s episode saw the series’ smallest numbers yet, with a miniscule 0.9 rating amongst adults 18 to 49. Even worse, it represents one of NBC’s lowest ebbs yet, knocking the network to an embarrassing eighth place in the Thursdays at 10 p.m. ET time slot—a far cry from its ER heyday, and a ranking that no doubt makes executives long for the relatively minor indignity of The Jay Leno Show. (Among the series that beat The Firm last night, besides the No. 1-ranked Jersey Shore: Univision’s Rosa De Guadalupe, A&E’s Beyond Scared Straight, and a rerun of The Big Bang Theory on TBS.) Despite dropping well below the levels deemed unacceptable when Prime Suspect was pulled, NBC said there were no plans to replace The Firm anytime soon—both because it’s an inexpensive outside acquisition and because they’ve got nothing else going on right now. NBC then pulled out a harmonica and did a gut-wrenching rendition of “Nobody Knows The Trouble I’ve Seen.” It was very moving.
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