Ratings Report: ‘FBI’ dominates the network lineup, ‘The L Word: Generation Q’ kicks off its new season with low viewership
Broadcast: CBS’s hit procedural drama, FBI, continues to dominate the Tuesday night network lineup in its fifth season while its spin-off shows FBI: International and FBI: Most Wanted also perform well in later time slots. The season’s eighth episode aired on Nov. 22, earning a 0.53 rating with adults 18-49 (A18-49) and raking in 7.54 million total viewers. Those numbers inch slightly above the ratings for the previous week’s episode which garnered a 0.50 A18-49 rating and counted 7.54 viewers in total. Overall, the current season has maintained strong but somewhat fluctuating viewership with a 0.56 A18-49 average rating and an average viewership tally of 7.14 million viewers per episode. While FBI claimed the top spot on the viewership charts for Tuesday Nov. 22, its sister series FBI: International and FBI: Most Wanted, which air consecutively after their forerunner, landed spots two and three, respectively. FBI’s hold on the Tuesday night network viewership charts means that the series consistently outperforms heavy-hitting reality programming like ABC’s Bachelor in Paradise and NBC’s The Voice in addition to CW’s The Winchesters and Fox’s The Resident.
FBI follows the challenges and triumphs faced by a team of agents working in the criminal division of the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s New York City office. The series stars Missy Peregrym as Maggie Bell and Zeeko Zaki as Omar Adon “O.A.” Zidan, a pair of Special Agents from different backgrounds who are fiercely committed to their work. Alana De La Garza (Criminal Minds: Beyond Border, Forever) joined the cast back in season 2 and plays Special Agent in Charge Isobel Castille, the unit’s supervisor and boss. FBI was created and is executive produced by Craig Turk (Private Practice, The Good Wife) and procedural drama veteran Dick Wolf (Law & Order, Chicago Fire). The cast also includes Jeremy Sisto (Wrong Turn, Clueless), John Boyd (Argo, 24), Taylor Anthony Miller (Magic City, Chicago Fire), Vedette Lim (The Undoing, True Blood), and Katherine Renee Kane (Extra Ordinary, Live a Little). FBI airs on CBS on Tuesday nights at 8:00 PM EST/PST.
Cable: Showtime’s reboot of its LGBTQ+ drama, The L Word— The L Word: General Q— kicked off its third season on Nov. 22 and faced considerably low viewership, earning a 0.01 A18-49 rating and measuring only 67,000 viewers overall. Those readings clock in far under the standard set by season two, which earned a 0.1 A18-49 average rating and managed an average of 80,000 viewers per episode. The third season did snag an 83% audience approval score on Rotten Tomatoes with 12 users responding, a noticeable uptick from last season’s 73% audience rating. The series follows returning characters from the original show while introducing new cast members and tailoring its focus to modern sensibilities by introducing younger cast members.
The L Word: Generation Q was created by The L Word’s creators and executive producers, Michele Abbott, Ilene Chaikan and Kathy Greenberg. The cast includes Jennifer Beals (Flashdance, The Book of Eli), Katherine Moennig (The Lincoln Lawyer, Gone), Leisha Hailey (Supernatural, Bosch), Arienne Mandi (In the Vault, Love, Classified), Sepideh Moafi (Black Bird, The Killing of Two Lovers), Leo Sheng (The Matrix Resurrection, Adam), Jaqueline Toboni (Grimm, Easy), Rosanny Zayas (Otherhood, Modern Persuasions), Jordan Hull, and Jamie Clayton (Hustle). The L Word: Generation Q airs Tuesdays on Showtime at 8:00 PM EST/PST.
Streaming: Welcome to Chippendales has snagged a Certified Fresh designation on popular ratings website Rotten Tomatoes despite its 76% critic rating and 74% audience score. The limited series stars Kumail Nanjiani (The Big Sick, Life as We Know It) as Somen “Steve” Banerjee, the owner and founder of the infamous West coast strip club, Chippendales. Set in the 1980s and 1990s, the story covers Somen’s fall from grace as well as the rise and fall of his now legendary business. With a little embellishment of the original story, Welcome to Chippendales seems to ultimately charm audiences and critics alike with its stylistic edge and salacious central focus.
Welcome to Chippendales was created by Robert Siegel, the writer behind Pam & Tommy and The Wrestler inspired by the book Deadly Dance: The Chippendales Murders by K. Scot Macdonald and Patrick MontesDeOca. Nanjiani leads the cast which also includes Murray Bartlett (The White Lotus, Looking), Annaleigh Ashford (Masters of Sex, American Crime Story), Juliette Lewis (Natural Born Killers, Cape Fear), Quentin Plair (The Good Lord Bird, Roswell, New Mexico), Robin de Jesús (tick, tick… BOOM, The Boys in the Band) and Andrew Rennells (Girls, A Simple Favor). Welcome to Chippendales premiered on Nov. 22 and airs Tuesdays on Hulu.
International: The South Korean fantasy drama Reborn Rich debuted on Netflix at the end of November and earned the fourth slot on the most watched non-English shows list within the first week of its release. During the week of Nov. 21-27, the series accrued 10.35 million hours of global viewership on the streaming platform. Reborn Rich stars Song Joong-ki (Vincenzo, Descendents of the Sun) as Jin Do Joon, the son of a wealthy businessman whose body is taken over by the consciousness of a man who was killed by his employer, Jin’s family. The series, which premiered on Nov. 18, is currently airing in South Korea on JTBC every Friday and Sunday at 22:30 KST. Just as the show’s first week viewership count on Netflix hints at the makings of a hit in the USA and other regions, its domestic rating likewise continues to grow week by week.
Director Jung Dae-yoon (She Was Pretty, W) helms the series penned by Kim Tae-hee (A Beautiful Mind, Designated Survivor: 60 Days) based on the web novel The Youngest of a Conglomerate by Som Gyeong. The cast features Shin Hyun-bin (He’s on Duty, Beasts Clawing at Straws), Park Ji-hyun (The Divine Fury, Gonjiam: Haunted Asylum), Jo Han-chul (The Wailing, Healer) and Lee Sung-min (The Man Standing Next, The Spy Gone North). Reborn Rich is available to stream on Netflix.
