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path: Home / Third Season Episodes / "Posse Comitatus" * Third Season Finale Ratings
Writer: Aaron Sorkin, Director: Alex Graves

Seems the ratings ploy worked. Season finale was third for the week whereas "The West Wing" was 11th for the season. So Simon died for the money --- robber killed him when he tried to prevent the theft of money from the store, and Sorkin killed him for the extra money the show would get for showing up so well in sweeps!

As Executive Producer, it is important for Aaron Sorkin to do the best he can to make money for his show. As writer, it is important that he make this money in a way that doesn't reduce the reputation and long term goals of the show. We think he made a short term and disastrously wrong choice here and are hoping we get no more "West Wing" season finales where characters are shot and/or die as if this show were a prime time soap instead of what it started out to be.

The following is from
Zap2it | TV News: Ratings
and are official Nielsen figures

Network Primetime Week of 05/13/02 - 05/26/02

RANK PROGRAM NET DAY TIME HOUSEHOLD VIEWERS
RATING/
SHARE
AUDIENCE
1 LAW AND ORDER NBC Wed 10:00PM 12.9/21.0 13,638,000 19,511,000
2 EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND CBS Mon 9:00PM 12.8/19.0 13,477,000 20,183,000
3 WEST WING NBC Wed 9:00PM 11.3/17.0 11,871,000 16,636,000
See the rest of the ratings for the week of finales

Top 20 Network Primetime Series by Households:
Season-To-Date 09/24/01 - 05/26/02

RANK PROGRAM NAME NETWORK DAY TIME HOUSEHOLD
RATINGS/SHARE
1 FRIENDS NBC Thu 8:00PM 15.0/24.0
2 CSI CBS Thu 9:00PM 14.5/22.0
2 CBS NFL NATL POST GUN CBS Sun 7:15PM 14.5/24.0
4 E.R. NBC Thu 10:00PM 14.2/23.0
5 EVERYBODY LOVES RAYMOND CBS Mon 9:00PM 12.8/19.0
6 LAW AND ORDER NBC Wed 10:00PM 12.6/21.0
7 FRIENDS 8:30PM NBC Thu 8:31PM 12.2/19.0
8 SURVIVOR: AFRICA CBS Thu 8:00PM 11.8/18.0
8 SURVIVOR: MARQUESAS CBS Thu 8:00PM 11.8/19.0
10 NFL MONDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL ABC Mon 9:07PM 11.5/19.0
11 WEST WING NBC Wed 9:00PM 11.4/18.0
See the rest of the overall ratings for the season
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