Ratings: ‘Castle’ season 8 hits high, improves season 9 renewal odds

While “Castle” may not have the numbers that it once did on ABC, we do still have one very clear feeling upon looking at the latest primetime ratings for Monday night’s lineup: Hope.

The latest episode “Heartbreaker” ended up scoring a 1.2 rating in the adults 18-49 demographic, which marks the show’s best number of the season … provided it stays. We son’t want to get overly excited since it is often that it falls once the finals are calculated, especially following a show like “Dancing with the Stars.” For those wondering, this is also at present the highest total-viewer count of the season with 6.88 million people watching.

Even if the show adjusts down, the worst we could see it falling to is a 1.1, otherwise known as the same rating it had the week before. Given that “Once Upon a Time” scored a 1.1 this week, “Agents of SHIELD” has fallen hard, “Nashville” is struggling to even get a 1.0, “The Catch” is already low, and “Quantico” isn’t really faring any better, we’re starting to feel like “Castle” is that stable, battle-tested show ABC needs to keep around the other season. Due to some struggles elsewhere, it’s gone from a season 8 disappointment to a consistent performer.

Granted, there are some other things that will have to be negotiated for a season 9 to happen, and we’ll hopefully have more on that in the future.

Other good news – It was a light night of programming, but “Dancing with the Stars” (1.8) was steady.

The bad news – “The Voice” fell to a 2.4 for its final Knockout Round show this season; meanwhile, “Blindspot” (1.4) is at a point where it is really not that much better than “Castle” anymore. “Castle” has kept around its premiere rating all season, while the tattoo drama has lost more than half its total-viewer count.