- Sunday's headliner was easily the season four premiere of The Walking Dead (8.2), which went yet another 28% above its previous high for the season three finale. We can now legitimately entertain the possibility that this series could hang with Sunday Night Football as the #1 series counting sports. (And it should crush it in a popularity measure like Live+7.) In raw numbers, it's the biggest regularly-scheduled drama episode since House on 2/5/08 and the biggest scripted episode since Ashton Kutcher's debut on Two and a Half Men in 2011. If you make any kind of adjustment for the collective decline, it gets even more ridiculous; it's probably only behind Men and the Friends finale in recent memory. Other than that, I got nothing!
- As for the Dead effect on broadcast: It's not good that ABC's Revenge has officially returned to its weak spring 2013 level while Once Upon a Time is almost there, or that Betrayal (0.9) has gone well below last year's low point for 666 Park Ave. But it was even uglier on CBS, where The Amazing Race, The Good Wife and The Mentalist went into lowest-ever territory.
- Sunday Night Football held off the Dead after finals and had its biggest number in a month, while Fox's ALCS rode an NFL lead-in to a significant improvement on Saturday's game 1 number.
FULL TABLE:
| Info | Show | Timeslot | True | |||||||
| A18-49 | Skew | Last | LeLa | Rank | y2y | TLa | Ty2y | |||
| America's Funniest Home Videos | 1.2 | 29% | n/a | n/a | n/a | 1/1 | -20% | +85% | -14% | 1.2 |
| Once Upon a Time | 2.4 | 40% | -8% | -0.2 | +0.5 | 3/3 | -20% | -8% | -21% | 2.4 |
| Revenge | 1.6 | 34% | -16% | -0.3 | -0.2 | 3/3 | -38% | -18% | -40% | 1.5 |
| Betrayal | 0.8 | 35% | -27% | -0.3 | -0.3 | 3/3 | n/a | -30% | -47% | 0.8 |
| ABC: | -6% | -30% | ||||||||
| 60 Minutes | 1.5 | 18% | -61% | -2.3 | n/a | 2/3 | -25% | -87% | -27% | 1.5 |
| The Amazing Race | 1.9 | 30% | -21% | -0.5 | -2.3 | 3/3 | -27% | -42% | -27% | 1.9 |
| The Good Wife | 1.2 | 18% | -25% | -0.4 | -0.5 | 3/3 | -29% | -48% | -27% | 1.3 |
| The Mentalist | 1.3 | 18% | -13% | -0.2 | -0.4 | 3/3 | -38% | -19% | -37% | 1.4 |
| CBS: | -69% | -29% | ||||||||
| Football Night in America p2 | 1.7 | 48% | -19% | -0.4 | n/a | 3/6 | -26% | -19% | -26% | 1.5 |
| Football Night in America p3 | 4.5 | 49% | +10% | +0.4 | -0.4 | 2/6 | +0% | +10% | -2% | 4.1 |
| Sunday Night Football | 8.4 | 48% | +20% | +1.4 | +0.4 | 3/7 | +9% | +19% | +8% | 7.6 |
| NBC: | +16% | +5% | ||||||||
| NFL Overrun | 9.2 | 44% | -7% | -0.7 | n/a | 4/6 | +12% | +667% | +19% | 9.1 |
| The OT | 5.1 | 46% | +9% | +0.4 | -0.1 | 1/2 | +16% | +183% | +16% | 2.5 |
| ALCS | 2.4 | 36% | +26% | +0.5 | n/a | 1/2 | n/a | +1% | +10% | 2.1 |
| Fox: | +91% | +15% | ||||||||
| Big4: | +13% | -3% | ||||||||
KEY (click to expand)
A18-49 - Adults 18-49 rating. Percentage of US TV-owning adults 18-49 watching the program.
Skew - Percentage of adults 18-49 within the show's total viewership.
Last - A18-49 difference (percent and numerical) from the show's previous episode.
LeLa - A18-49 difference between the show's lead-in and its lead-in for the previous episode.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes so far this season.
y2y - Percent difference between A18-49 and the show's rating a year ago.
TLa - Percent difference between A18-49 and the network's rating in the timeslot one week ago.
Ty2y - Percent difference between A18-49 and the network's rating in the timeslot one year ago.
True - A metric that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in. PRELIMINARY CALCULATION. For finals, see SpotVault.
(R) - Repeat.
Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.
Skew - Percentage of adults 18-49 within the show's total viewership.
Last - A18-49 difference (percent and numerical) from the show's previous episode.
LeLa - A18-49 difference between the show's lead-in and its lead-in for the previous episode.
Rank - The A18-49 rating's rank among the show's episodes so far this season.
y2y - Percent difference between A18-49 and the show's rating a year ago.
TLa - Percent difference between A18-49 and the network's rating in the timeslot one week ago.
Ty2y - Percent difference between A18-49 and the network's rating in the timeslot one year ago.
True - A metric that adjusts the A18-49 rating for overall viewing levels, competition and lead-in. PRELIMINARY CALCULATION. For finals, see SpotVault.
(R) - Repeat.
Much more detail on these numbers at the New Daily Spotted Ratings page.
More Spotted Ratings in the Index.
