Will be canceled faster than Manimal.
Posted on 10/17/2018 8:20:24 AM PDT by EdnaMode
ABC’s Roseanne-without-Roseanne spin-off The Conners couldn’t come anywhere close to the blockbuster premiere rating of its predecessor, yet still had a strong number that led Tuesday night in the ratings.
The debut airing delivered 10.5 million viewers and a 2.3 rating among adults 18-49.
That’s down 55 percent from the premiere of Roseanne last spring, but was very much on par with Roseanne‘s finale and even managed to edge out NBC’s This Is Us for the night.
When Roseanne returned on ABC earlier this year, the first episode delivered a staggering 18.2 million viewers and a 5.1 rating among adults 18-49 in the overnight Nielsens. The series fell from that height, of course, and its finale ended up at 10.3 million viewers and a 2.4 rating.
ABC did not expect Roseanne premiere-level numbers, of course. Internal industry marketing research suggested viewer interest in the spin-off was tracking about half that of viewer interest in Roseanne before its return.
The episode, titled “Keep on Trucking,” confirmed previous reports that Roseanne Conner died of an opioid overdose. Roseanne Barr didn’t much appreciate that plot twist, saying in a statement that the “opioid overdose lent an unnecessary grim and morbid dimension to an otherwise happy family show.”
ABC has had some rough sledding this season. The network understandably axed its top comedy Roseanne due to Barr’s tweets but also less understandably canceled Last Man Standing — which Fox picked up and is now using it to easily beat every other show on Friday nights. In the ratings so far this fall, ABC has slipped into fourth place behind Fox (and that’s even if you take sports coverage out of the equation).
Still, The Conners should help matters. If this was any other new comedy premiere, the network would be overjoyed by this number. There’s a big question mark moving forward, however, in terms of how many of these viewers are merely curious about how Roseanne Barr’s character was killed off and how the family reacts vs. how many are actually interested in sticking with the show in coming weeks. Our critic Kristen Baldwin watched The Conners first two episodes and there’s a pretty big mood swing coming next week, check out her review.
Ratings are likely to drop a lot over the next few weeks. A lot of people (including a lot of anti-Roseanne leftists) may have watched the first episode out of curiosity.
Viewership will drop precipitously after this.
Curiosity drove the numbers up.
I suspect that many of the viewers were there just to see how they offed Roseanne. It will now die a slow and painful death, unlike Roseanne.
Next week it will tank...........................
Roseanne got a raw deal. Should have been left to the marketplace to determine whether she stayed on the air or not.
It all depends ..but if it is not at least half as good ..those numbers will drop like a rock.
“The episode, titled “Keep on Trucking,” confirmed previous reports that Roseanne Conner died of an opioid overdose.”
That’s how they did it.
maybe when it tanks enough, Fox can pick it up too, and resurrect Roseanne from the dead! That would be show worth watching..
I Love Last Man Standing & I love the fact the Fox picked up Tim Allen’s show.
Sure would be funny to see Roseanne in an episode of LMS.
I tuned in for one minute, just as the two Daughters were talking about how their Mom OD’d.
Those Writers sure are creative. You would think they would have gone the Anthony Bourdain route where she hung herself.
Nice of them to kill off Rosanne’s character like that, It’s like a Mafia Hit Man shooting a Gangster in the face so the Family can’t have an Open Casket at the Service.
First TV show in a long while I heard advertised on the radio, and often.
Will be canceled faster than Manimal.
Agree.
Ratings will drop from here on out.
Agreed. But the idiot liberals who run our TV networks, had to prove they were properly outraged at Roseanne’s stupid tweet.
Maybe those idiot TV execs will learn a lesson about knee jerk reactions to events. Maybe. Or perhaps they will never learn.
Leftist scum.
People making the show and creating the story arc are ungrateful parasites.
It would be called a dream. again
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