These numbers are current through Monday, April 24.
WHAT MATTERS:
- Like Veep last Sunday, Silicon Valley took a big hit in the absence of the Game of Thrones halo, down 58% year-to-year in its season four premiere. Still, 0.44 left it as the highest-rated original in this new HBO lineup, building on The Leftovers (which was down to 0.34 but is still having a big growth season overall). Veep held last week's 0.27.
These numbers are current through Monday, April 17.
WHAT MATTERS:
- HBO will have to wait longer than usual for its Game of Thrones return, which would usually come about this time of year. But the network got some good news on a much smaller scale as the return of acclaimed drama The Leftovers (0.39) was up by six hundredths from its last premiere back in October 2015.
These numbers are current through Thursday, December 10.
WHAT MATTERS:
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The week's most interesting point probably belonged once again to Into the Badlands (1.06), which got its first look at life without The Walking Dead. Though it was down 57% from the previous airing after the TWD finale, 1.06 is still a really good same-day number by today's standards. If it can stay anywhere close to this in the last two episodes, it's gotta be back.
The Leftovers
Sundays, 9/8c, HBO
These numbers are current through Thursday, October 8.
WHAT MATTERS:
- American Horror Story opened the Hotel edition with a 2.99, ever so slightly below the last two season premieres (3.11 last year and 3.05 in 2013). In a cable world where the median decline is still somewhere in the -20s, that's great news.
WHAT MATTERS:
- The series finale of True Blood (2.1) was only up 14% from last week and didn't even set a new season high. Though it may have been an underwhelming final season, it still goes out as easily the top drama of the summer. More importantly for HBO going forward, this bounce helped vault rookie The Leftovers (0.9) to a new high. In other finale news, TNT's The Last Ship (1.0) was exactly even week-to-week, wrapping up a first season that had nearly the exact same rating every week.
- On Saturday, the return of Doctor Who (0.85) and the introduction of a new Doctor exploded for BBC America, way up from the 0.6 that began the last season in March 2013. But new lead-out Intruders (0.23) retained very little of that audience. Fox's second and final Saturday Glee repeat (0.2) once again failed to hit a 0.1, though it was very close (since the 9:30 half-hour averaged 0.1).
- MTV ruled Sunday with the Video Music Awards (4.2), though they were down a full point from last year (and merely tied Monday's Emmys). Despite that, ABC's finale of Rising Star (1.0) was up two tenths to the show's best rating in over a month. I wouldn't think this would be enough for renewal, but I guess we'll see. And CBS saw a big bounce for Big Brother (2.5), which not only set a new season high but tied last season's high as well. (One of the many times it hit 2.5 last season was on this night 52 weeks ago.)
- With all the national NFL preseason games in the books, we can pretty confidently say it was not a good preseason for the league. Four of the five games were steeply behind the corresponding games last year, including all three this weekend.
The Leftovers
Sundays, 10/9c, HBO
WHAT MATTERS:
- Reckless held its egregious 0.6 in week two, while Unforgettable plunged to a new low 0.7. This prompted CBS to flip the two dramas starting next Sunday, a move that will probably not make much difference for either show (but may bring Reckless low enough to get outright pulled).
- Against no formidable music-themed competition (NBC's Miley Cyrus special bombed), Rising Star (1.2) was steady in week three. For whatever it's worth, this was even with week three of Duets from two years ago, so the show at least seems to be avoiding real disaster territory.
- Cable:
- HBO's The Leftovers (0.7) was down less than a tenth in week two while its True Blood lead-in (1.7) inched up;
- Lifetime brought back Witches of East End (0.5), tying its low point from season one and below the 0.7 series premiere from last year;
- And AMC wrapped up a solid The Walking Dead marathon over the 4th of July weekend with a special season preview edition of Talking Dead (1.0). Illustrating the unreal gap between The Walking Dead and everything else, even this middle-of-summer Talking Dead easily more than doubled the network's recent original drama results.
WHAT MATTERS:
- Sundays in the summer remain a tough nut for the broadcasters to crack. ABC was first to give it a crack, but it had a relatively soft start from new singing competition Rising Star (1.5 on 6/22). This may have been a bit stronger than ABC's last major music competition premiere foray, Duets (1.7 on 5/24/12), given it's over two years later and the show skewed a little younger than Duets. However, the general point is the same: this is not ABC's game-changer, and it's even farther from being that after a 20% week two drop (prelim 1.2 on 6/29). It soundly lost to NBC's special America's Got Talent (2.1) on 6/22 and had to deal with the always potent BET Awards (3.1) last night.
- It got even uglier last night as CBS entered the fray. Though Big Brother (1.8) continued its solid start, nearly even with the 2013 Sunday premiere (1.9), CBS continued to surround it with weak and highly incompatible pieces. New drama Reckless (0.6) retained a paltry third of the BB demo (yet 70% in total viewership). Since the return of Unforgettable (0.9) actually picked up some steam at 10/9c, CBS may be tempted to try flipping the dramas around here (or they may just kill Reckless altogether).
- The biggest cable story on 6/22 was the solid premiere of TNT's drama The Last Ship (1.2 with 5.33 million viewers), the closest thing to a new breakthrough on cable this summer to date. It joined a softening Falling Skies (1.0 on 6/22), which tied its series low and was down big from last summer's 1.5 start. HBO brought back True Blood (2.2 on 6/22) for its final run in relatively healthy fashion, down just a bit from last year's 2.4 start, and starting last night it led into new HBO drama The Leftovers. Much more cable to come!
- 6/29 UPDATE: The Last Ship (1.1) had a solid week two hold; not so much for True Blood (1.6), which plummeted to easily its lowest number since season one (excluding a 4th of July episode in season four). The Leftovers (0.8) opened at half of True Blood's delivery.
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