March of 'Empire' continues, on TV and Twitter
A week before its two-hour season finale, Fox's Empire continues to gain new viewers — and has eclipsed AMC's The Walking Dead on Twitter.
Wednesday's penultimate episode averaged 14.9 million same-day viewers, up from 14.3 million last week. That marks nine weeks of consistent ratings growth since its Jan. 7 premiere, an unprecedented record at least since 1991, when Nielsen began measuring individual viewers. (With delayed viewing counted, last week's episode will draw a cumulative total of more than 20 million.)
Empire's viewership among adults ages 18 to 49 was unchanged from last week. It's the top-rated network drama, and the most popular new series among that crowd, providing a much-needed boost to the struggling fourth-place network.
"I think we're all sort of in a state of disbelief," says co-creator Danny Strong. "I've stopped worrying about (ratings) leveling off or going down. It's more just fun: What's going to happen this week?"
The episode sparked more than 750,000 tweets, and for the season to date, Empire, with an average of 451,270 tweets per episode, has now eclipsed AMC's The Walking Dead, with 444,029, Fox says, citing Nielsen data. Both are well ahead of ABC's Scandal, with 354,085.
African Americans make up 60% of Empire's audience, but plenty of others are watching, too.
"The median age of broadcast TV is 55; there are not that many things that resonate with younger people," says researcher Billie Gold of New York ad firm Carat USA. Positive word of mouth has sparked more catch-up viewership on demand, fueling ratings growth. "They want to see what all the hoopla's about; you have to see what you're missing."
In their heyday, reality hits Survivor and American Idol saw weekly gains, but never this consistently or so early in their runs. The last big word-of-mouth growth story: AMC's Breaking Bad, which grew sevenfold from its paltry 2008 start to its 2013 finale, which claimed 10.3 million viewers, helped greatly by binge-viewing on Netflix.
Will Empire's ratings continue their climb for next week's finale? Almost certainly, given the climactic showdowns promised for Lucious Lyon and company.
Contributing: Andrea Mandell