Three weeks up against the big guns and CanWest’s Traders is holding its own, with the female audience that maintained eye contact with er’s George Clooney for Traders’ first nights showing up in bigger numbers mid-Feb.

According to AC Nielsen ratings for the Toronto/Hamilton market, the Feb. 15 Traders rated a 5 with females in the 18-49 and 25-54 targets, up from 2 in each demo for the Feb. 8 program.

CanWest is boffo about the numbers overall, but Global’s Doug Hoover, national vice-president programming and promotions, says several more weeks of ratings data is needed to accurately measure the loyalty the program is building with the sexes. No plans are afoot to skew the promotion campaign towards the female audience, says Hoover. ‘Christmas wasn’t promoted as much as this show. We may incorporate some of the critical reviews, but essentially we’ve got everybody covered.’

The male audience is staying relatively consistent with Feb. 15 rating a 3 in both the 18-49 and 25-54 demos, and a 3 and 4 respectively for Feb. 8.

Overall, for Feb. 15, 3% of the audience 2+ in the Toronto/Hamilton area watched Traders, 3% of viewers 18+, 4% of the 18-49 target and 4% of the 25-54 bracket. Numbers are up over Feb. 8, which ran a 2 for viewers 2+, and a 3 in the 18+, 18-49 and 25-54 bracket.

‘It’s performing every bit to our expectations and it’s only going to get better,’ says Hoover.

Speaking of expectations, ctv`s Arthur Weinthal was not wrong to predict golden ratings for the Gulliver’s Travels simulcast ctv picked up Feb. 4.

The computer-mutilated Ted Danson and the little people brought in a whopping 2,620,000 viewers 18+ nationally, and tied with Home Improvement for 9th overall in the key Toronto/Hamilton area with an 8.0 rating for the week of Feb.5-11.