As series pitches go, CBS’s Tracker is as high-concept and straight-ahead as it gets. 

Each week, Justin Hartley, who already proved his hunk bonafides on NBC's This Is Us, stars as “rewardist” Colter Shaw, a loner with a past, who drives his GMC pickup and vintage trailer into a new town, full of modestly paid, largely unknown actors who play Shaw’s supporters, foils and bedmates, as he tries to “track” down his latest missing person target. 

For the series adapted from the novel The Never Game by Jeffery Deaver, there's no scheme or anything being “turned on its head” here. The execution, as overseen by showrunners Hilary Weisman Graham and creator Ben H. Winters, works like one of those Vince Lombardi sweeps. 

Here it comes. Everybody knows the play. But nobody can stop it.  

Also read: ‘Tracker’ Gets Second Season on CBS

On Sunday, 10 weeks after Tracker's boffo post-Super Bowl debut, the 20th Television series averaged 7.7 million same-day viewers, a high-water mark for its regular 9 p.m. Sunday time slot. 

Already renewed for 2024-25, this wasn't even close to being Tracker's biggest audience. That came for its premiere, when it averaged 18.44 million viewers leading out of CBS’s record Super Bowl broadcast. The series also averaged 8.19 million viewers when it led out of 60 Minutes at 8 p.m. on April 14. 

Averaging 8.606 million viewers, not only is Tracker the leader among Big Four Network shows in total audience, it also owns the 18-49 demo crown, averaging a 0.88 rating. 

The freshman series leads a list with only two other scripted shows on it, one of them an animated series in its 35th season, another a Chuck Lorre comedy about to sign off the air and cede to a spinoff. 

What's surprising to us, living in media-entertainment world in which Warner Bros. Discovery festooned its second quarter earnings in pink last year following the boffo theatrical debut of Barbie, is how little fanfare Tracker has received so far outside of CBS' own air time.  

“We knew we had something special when we saw the very first cut of the series and the overwhelming audience response confirms it," said CBS Entertainment president Amy Reisenbach, in a statement announcing Tracker's renewal. 

And sure, Tracker was referenced a couple of times, thumbnail photo included, in the "TV Media" section of Paramount Global's Q1 earnings release Monday. 

But the fact that CBS has a new, original scripted series hit, drawing an outsized audience in an era in which all the viewership metrics are steeply declining, seems buried amid the vast turmoil occurring at Paramount this week.

Indeed, the big Nielsen numbers we see for CBS are only the audience metrics for Tracker we know about. 

How much audience is Tracker drawing to Paramount Plus, where episodes stream the day after they premiere on CBS? Paramount Plus subscribers were up by 3.7 million in the first quarter. Was that all Super Bowl LVIII?

And what's the uptake on Disney Plus, where the show streams internationally? 

Trying to locate a media-entertainment future all on its own in a strange, competitive M&A market, there's probably a reward waiting for Paramount for tracking all this ratings data down and sharing it with us. 

Tracker has Justin Hartley, last seen as Kevin on This Is Us, as lone-wolf survivalist Colter Shaw, who roams the country as a reward seeker while dealing with his own dysfunctional family. The CBS drama was on after the Super Bowl on February 11 and slid into its regular time period a week later. 

Hartley and executive producer Ken Olin both worked on This Is Us. Summing up Hartley’s goals after playing Kevin, Olin quipped at a CBS press event, “Justin wanted to carry a gun and get in fights.”

The show is based on the Jeffrey Deaver novel The Never Game and initially had that title. The name change was so that the show would not be confused with video games. “I didn’t want people to watch and see the guy rescue someone,” Olin said, “and wonder when the game would start.”

A difficult childhood has influenced Shaw and his odd career pursuits. “He grew up with a very fractured family,” Hartley said. “There are secrets.”

TV’s Colter Shaw is a bit more animated than his novel counterpart. “Justin is so good with humor,” Olin said. “The character in the book was much more of a silent kind of character.”

The Completely Made-Up Adventures of Dick Turpin premieres on Apple TV Plus March 1. Noel Fielding portrays Turpin, a legendary British highway robber from the 18th century. 

Executive producer Kenton Allen said Turpin was made into something of a romantic hero in British novels, but that was not the true dude. “Dick Turpin was a pretty awful individual,” he said, “basically a cutthroat murderer and horse thief.”

In the show, Turpin leads a band of outlaws and battles with corrupt lawman Jonathan Wilde, who bears the ominous title Thief Taker. Hugh Bonneville, who played the Earl of Grantham in Downton Abbey, portrays Wilde. “He’s very skillful, very subtle, with great timing,” Fielding said. 

Turpin is well known in the United Kingdom, Allen said, thanks to those novels and the Adam and the Ants song “Stand and Deliver.” “He’s definitely in the popular culture here,” he said from London. “Globally, we’re about to find out.”

Allen and Fielding cited Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Princess Bride and Blackadder as influences. “The Holy Grail has quite a good atmosphere,” Fielding said. “It’s got that spooky British thing about it. We tried to get a little of that.”

The Completely Made-Up Adventures is set almost 300 years ago, but Allen believes it is timely today. “The world is a challenging place at the moment, with lots of very, very grim things,” he said. “Going on adventures with Dick Turpin and his gang is a great escape.” 

The Never Game, a Justin Hartley drama scheduled to air in the 2023-2024 season on CBS, has been retitled Tracker. The show features Hartley, who was Kevin Pearson on This Is Us, as lone-wolf survivalist Colter Shaw, who roams the country as a “reward seeker,” in CBS’s words, using his expert tracking skills to help private citizens and law enforcement solve mysteries while contending with his own fractured family. 

Robin Weigert, Abby McEnany, Eric Graise and Fiona Rene also star. The series is based on the novel The Never Game by Jeffery Deaver.

Deaver has several books with Colter Shaw as the main character, including Hunting Time (2022), The Final Twist (2021) and The Goodbye Man (2020).

CBS did not provide a reason for the name change. 

Amy Reisenbach, president of CBS Entertainment, previously said of the show, “since our viewers love shows with action, intrigue, mystery and complex characters, they will love [Tracker] — it delivers on all fronts."

Tracker is produced by 20th Television. Hartley executive produces with Ken Olin, Ben H. Winters and Hilary Weisman Graham. Olin directed the pilot from a script written by Winters. ■

John Malone’s Liberty Interactive engineered a deal Wednesday to sell the floral and gifting business of its e-commerce unit Provide Commerce to FTD that will give Liberty a 35% stake in the combined company, but will put its plans to split into two tracking stocks on hold.

According to the deal, Liberty will receive 10.2 million shares of FTD common stock (about 35% of shares outstanding) and $121 million in cash. In return Liberty will contribute its floral and gifting e-commerce brands ProFlowers, Shari’s Berries and Personal Creations. The deal is expected to be completed by the end of 2014.

But the combination will delay Liberty Interactive plans to split into two separate tracking stocks –  QVC Group to house its interests in home shopping channels QVC and HSN, Inc., and Liberty Digital Commerce for its e-commerce businesses like Provide Commerce and Bodybuilding.com. That deal was expected to be completed sometime this year but in a statement, Liberty Interactive said while it expects to continue with plans for the QVC tracker, the FTD transaction is putting plans for Liberty Digital Commerce on hold.

“In light of the pending Provide Commerce transaction, and other factors, Liberty is reevaluating the optimal structure and best alignment of the Liberty Digital Commerce Group assets,” the company said in a statement.” As a result, the timing of the transition to the QVC Group has been delayed.”

The combined FTD/Provide Commerce will have more than $600 million in annual revenue and the addition of the Provide Commerce brands will enable FTD to provide greater support to its member florists by expanding their resources and helping them create new programs and services.

FTD provides floral, gift and related products and services to consumers, retail florists, and other retail locations primarily in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., and the Republic of Ireland. The business uses the highly-recognized FTD and Interflora brands, both supported by the iconic Mercury Man logo that is displayed in nearly 40,000 floral shops in 150 countries. FTD’s portfolio of brands also includes Flying Flowers, Flowers Direct, and Drake Algar in the U.K.

“This transaction provides the opportunity to create significant value for our stockholders and offers immediate benefits for consumers and our premier network of member florists, said FTD CEO Robert Apatoff in a statement. “The combination of these businesses will expand the breadth of our brands, provide opportunities to further diversify our revenue streams and open up additional avenues for growth and innovation.”

Moelis & Company is serving as financial advisor to FTD and Jones Day is acting as legal counsel. Baker Botts L.L.P. and Cooley LLP are acting as legal counsel for Liberty and Provide Commerce, respectively

FTD shares soared 14% ($4.31 per share) to $33.85 in early trading Wednesday. Liberty Interactive shares were down 1% (30 cents) to $28.23 per share.

“We are excited to become the largest shareholder in the complementary businesses of Provide Commerce and FTD,” said Liberty CEO Greg Maffei in a statement. “FTD has an extensive florist network while Provide Commerce has a proven ability to source their flowers directly from top growers. The combined company will be able to offer comprehensive and unique gifting services in the U.S. and around the world.”