HDTV Ratings: Flash-in-the-pan FlashForward Takes TV2 Backwards

TV2 will be relieved FlashForward at last has done its dash, after its time slot opposition, Underbelly: The Golden Mile, helped TV3 to win the night on Wednesday.

As it did with Lost, TV2 is to be commended for sticking with the sci-fi flop to keep the faith with its cult following — unlike TV One’s shameful disregard for fans of Damages (which resumes its interrupted season-two run late-night on June 27).

But it has cost the network dearly, with the HD show’s swan song losing nearly two-thirds of the 18-39 year-old viewership of powerhouse lead-in, the abysmal Courteney Cox sitcom, Cougar Town.

Most of the viewership has migrated to TV3 for the latest Underbelly series, which next month releases, with extras, on DVD (but not Blu-ray).

The week’s other HD series finale, TV One’s The Pacific, ended strongly – if not on a season high – but the WWII drama has performed better than a recent Sunday newspaper article suggested.

It’s kept TV One at least vaguely competitive with TV2 and TV3 on one of the most fiercely fought nights of the week, and will look more like the blockbuster the network might have hoped for compared to its successor, the defiantly raw and radical Iraq War drama, Generation Kill, which starts Monday (but not, inexplicably, in HD).