All the shows that left Nickelodeon since iCarly

I mentioned in the previous post that from the period of late 2012 to, well, the present, Nickelodeon's pretty much hemorrhaged live-action programming. I promised a more detailed look at that, so, well, might as well get it over with. A lot of this is off the top of my head - I can go back and try to verify it on IMDb but, sadly, there isn't a lot to look up in terms of the sheer number of shows that ended unless you already know first-hand what to look for. So I'll try to make this comprehensive, and I'll go back and make changes accordingly, but bear with me and feel free to make corrections yourself in the comments. Anyway, I'm going to be organizing it by both year and success (whether or not the show lasted at least three seasons or not, which is more or less the Nick/Disney agreed upon marker of "success"). I'm not going to include the Saturday morning run of shows, or the animated block (I can keep track of that stuff if I really wanted to, but it's a bit complicated for my tastes) but the type of programming that tends to appeal to the type of demo Disney Channel is directly vying for (as opposed to what might be watching Disney Junior or XD instead) with maybe a few borderline cases but eh whatever. Beyond that everything is included, even foreign imports (virtually all of them were co-produced by Nick at home anyway). Again, I'm not tracking episode counts or total seasons, just strictly end-dates. 

Shows That Had Successful Runs:

2012: iCarly
2013: VicTORious, Big Time Rush
2014: Korra: The Last Airbender
2015: Every Witch Way, See Dad Run, Instant Mom

...wait that's seriously it? Oh wow. And two of those are Nick@Nite originals. Let's see the shows that have failed (again, less than three seasons, and in a lot of cases just one)

2012: Bucket and Skinner's Epic Adventure, How to Rock
2013: Marvin, Marvin; Wendell and Vinnie; House of Anubis; Supa Ninjas (a borderline case but it just didn't last enough by episode count)
2014: Sam & Cat (that's the only one I can think of for that year, but I still feel like I'm missing one)
2015: The Haunted Hathaways

Yeah, needless to say even when adding in Nick@Nite shows the number of failed shows outnumber the number of "successful" shows. Nick should consider itself lucky that 2014 and 2015 have only seen two official subpar cancelations total.

But not so far: WITS Academy and especially Talia in the Kitchen and 100 Things to Do Before High School and even Bella and the Bulldogs have questionable futures and possibly either have already aired their last episodes or will in 2016. It's possible Thundermans will air its last episode in 2016 too. That's no less than six shows whose fates are in the wind. Almost inevitably Make it Pop! will join them as well (daily strips are getting murdered since EWW made its exit). To put it another way, that's Nickelodeon's entire weekday/weekend afternoon live-action lineup sans Schneider's Bakery's productions. And then there's Max & Shred - I don't know what the status of this show is, but since this show has been utterly buried and completely hidden in the schedule over the summer and hasn't returned since, I think it's safe to assume it's canceled. I'm not completely sure so I'll just list it separately.

So, to summarize, since 2012 on Nickelodeon:
7 shows have ended successful runs
3 managed to end with four seasons specifically (though EWW is somewhat of an abberation by design)
8 shows have been prematurely canceled
15 shows have ended period regardless of success or circumstance
1 show that may or may not have been canceled, but most likely has been canceled
5 shows that are "on the bubble" and in imminent danger of being canceled
1 show that will most likely join them but is waiting to premiere its second season (Make it Pop!)

15 shows is a lot in three years, especially for a network like Nickelodeon. Especially given the number of premature cancelations they've had (just over half of their total expired shows!).

Just for fun, let's run the exact same statistics for Disney Channel. Again, this will be since 2012, for shows that have had "successful" runs (same exact criteria, at least three seasons or ran the entirety of its intended and planned run, which is an important distinction for one show on the list):

2012: Wizards of Waverly Place (we're not going to count Alex vs. Alex for this purpose)
2013: oddly enough, none!
2014: Good Luck Charlie, Fish Hooks, ANT Farm
2015: Phineas and Ferb (for this purpose we'll count it as a Disney Channel show), Dog With a Blog, Jessie
(January) 2016: Austin & Ally, Gravity Falls (I'm counting it as a Disney Channel show too since it premiered on that network)

Now let's run premature cancelations (again, less than three seasons)

2012: None! (WoWP was the only show in 2012 to come to an end)
2013: ...again, oddly enough, none! (no Disney Channel show aired series finales at all in 2013)
2014: ...and yet again, none! (all the Disney Channel shows that ended in 2014 ended with at least three seasons)
2015: I Didn't Do It (the only Disney Channel show that belongs on this list period since So Random! in 2011, which just misses out on this list).

So that's 9 successful shows that have come to an end in three years, and one that wasn't so successful. There are a number of shows with flailing ratings - actually pretty much all of them that aren't Girl Meets World or K.C. Undercover. Yes that even includes Bunk'd, which the network pretty much assumed was going to be a major, automatic four-season success. Really, the situation on Disney Channel and across both networks is such a mess I don't feel like I can put any shows on Disney Channel on "the bubble" as it's hard to tell right now if the network's going to sink them all for new programming or just swim anyway - other than Best Friends Whenever, which I've heard enough ratings and BTS woes to feel like I'll have to do so (as much as I actually like it). Which brings us to, since 2012:

9 shows that have had successful runs and have come to an end
5 shows (WoWP, GLC, Phineas and Ferb, Jessie and A&A) ended with a minimum of 100 episodes
Just 1 show that has come to a premature cancelation
10 shows total that have ended
Just one that's on the bubble, but more potential depending on exec's attitudes.

Disney Channel's 10 compared to Nickelodeon's 15. 15. I believe that stat speaks for itself. And of that 10 only one failed to make it three seasons (excepting Gravity Falls as it still ran its intended run), while over half of Nickelodeon's shows ended as failures. Just over half of Disney Channel's shows that have come to an end during that period managed to make out at least 100 episodes! Not all of Nickelodeon's shows that made it to four seasons even made that! (namely, again, EWW, though I don't remember if Korra or even BTR managed to quite make it to 100). Oh, and I keep forgetting that VicTORious had "four seasons" although by production code Season 4 is still Season 3, and it didn't quite even make it to 65 episodes which is the typical episode count with three seasons - so it's gone three seasons as far as I'm concerned, for whatever this compilation of statistics is worth.

I could run through some bad math to punch out some percentages for further on-paper pissing match comparisons, but the disreprency between all the numbers is big enough to make the conclusions obvious just as they are. If either having the fewest shows get canceled or the most shows get three (or four) seasons or more is sign of victory, then Disney Channel has utterly dominated Nickelodeon during the past three years and especially in 2013, which again going by this criteria was both Disney Channel's zenith and Nickelodeon's nadir (and again, this doesn't count Nick's Saturday/Sunday morning line-up, or most of their animated shows like Spongebob or Sanjay and Craig which I'm basically categorizing into a separate subnetwork more competing with Disney Junior or Disney XD depending on the show - and even so, the statistics are still favoring the Disney networks, though the stats aren't quite as lopsided in their favor. I suppose it's more akin to when Robb Stark was just running all over the Lannisters in his early battles, as opposed to late in Season 5 when the Whitewalkers were completely killing absolutely everything in their way and Jon Snow and Tormund barely escaped with their lives). 

Now, again just for fun, let's see the opposite effect - how many new TV shows each network has added in during the same period (keeping in mind that period is large enough that many of these shows have since ended and show up on the previous list) Also, again, it might be an incomplete list - to find out what shows premiered you kind of have to already know what you're looking for, but I'll try to make it as comprehensive and accurate as I can.

For new shows Nickelodeon added since 2012:

2012: Bucket and Skinner's Epic Adventure; How to Rock; Marvin, Marvin; The Legend of Korra
2013: Sam & Cat; Wendell & Vinnie, The Thundermans; The Haunted Hathaways; See Dad Run; Instant Mom
2014: Every Witch Way; Henry Danger; Max & Shred; Nicky, Ricky Dicky & Dawn
2015: Bella and the Bulldogs; 100 Things to Do Before High School (I'm counting it as a 2015 series given the ridiculously half-year gap between the pilot and the actual show); Game Shakers; Talia in the Kitchen; Make it Pop
2016: *shrug* (no not an actual show title I just have no idea what's premiering if anything)

That's 19 shows, which is quite a lot (not surprising given that 15 shows made their exit during the same time period, and a good chunk of titles of both lists are mutual). Speaking of which, a more useful statistic is that of those 19, no less than 10 of those shows that aired during that same time period also ended within that time. Again, that's expected because as far as tween shows are concerned that's pretty much a lifetime. An even more useful statistic is that 6 of those shows were premature cancellations. That's about a 62% success rate. I'm sure someone can tell me how that compares to whatever statistically useful standard would apply to a tween network like this, or if I get about to researching it myself. Meanwhile, only two shows premiered from 2014 are confirmed to be returning in 2016, only one show premiered from 2013 will still be airing episodes in 2016, and absolutely no show that premiered in 2012 survives to this day (and in fact only one, Korra, even managed to last beyond a single season). 

So how does Disney Channel compare?

2012: Gravity Falls, Dog With a Blog
2013: Liv and Maddie, Wander Over Yonder (again counting it as a Disney Channel show since it premiered on that network)
2014: I Didn't Do It, Girl Meets World
2015: K.C. Undercover; Best Friends Whenever; Bunk'd
2016: (scheduled/confirmed to what I've been updated on) Blizaardvark (yes that's a real show title), Stuck in the Middle

Of further note both Jessie and Austin & Ally barely miss out on this list, premiering very late in 2011 (especially Austin & Ally's November 2011 premiere date)

That's 11 shows counting the two I know for a fact are scheduled for a 2016 premiere (though I think there might be one or two still) but considering shows that have yet to actually premiere as of this writing to be outliers, that gives us 9 shows that premiered on Disney Channel during that time period. Of those 9 shows, only 3 came to an end within that period and only 1 was a premature cancelation (IDDI, natch). Needless to say that's waaaay better than Nick's success rate at a whopping 89%, though it tips a little bit in favor of Nick when you factor in the fact that Gravity Falls and Wander Over Yonder got banished to XD during that time as well. It very roughly restores itself though if you simply count Gravity Falls and Wander Over Yonder to be completely XD shows. Breaking down the stats by year, only one premiere from 2014 is still with us (GMW), while both of 2013's premieres are still with us, and nothing from 2012 or older remains (with Gravity Falls just airing its series finale, Jessie airing its finale back during Monstober and A&A scheduled for next week or so - close enough). 

So yeah, while Nickelodeon has a higher number of show premieres during that period, there's a pretty clear reason for it. Right now Disney Channel is whomping Nickelodeon's butt going by this set of arbitrary criteria during this arbitrary time period, but the ratings game just isn't the same right now as it was in 2013. There's enough Neilsen ratings instability to suggest all sorts of things could be happening in the new year to come, and much potential for sudden upsets or even mutual downfall.