Ratings Report: 'Roswell, New Mexico' ends with low viewership, 'Reservation Dogs' strives

Jeanine Mason - Rosewell, new mexico

Broadcast: Amidst fluctuating viewership levels, The CW’s hour long sci-fi drama, Roswell, New Mexico closed out its fourth and final season on Monday, September 5. The series finale, “How’s It Going to Be,” succeeded in matching the 0.06 rating with Adults 18-49 earned by the previous week’s episode but failed to do the same for overall viewership, which dropped from roughly 459,000 viewers on August 29 to around 366,000 viewers on September 5. In fact, the last chapter of the alien romance series underperformed all but one of the episodes that preceded it this season. Altogether, the show’s thirteen-episode-long season four, which began airing on June 6, saw an average rating of 0.06 for the Adults 18-49 demographic and drew around 437,000 total viewers per episode.

When The CW axed Roswell, New Mexico back in May, it marked the second time a TV show developed from Melinda Metz’s young adult book series, Roswell High, faced cancellation. Its predecessor series, Roswell, aired between 1999 and 2002, first on The WB and later on UPN. Although the reboot gave fans one more season than the original, the show has witnessed a steady decline in ratings each year since its debut back in the Winter of 2019. While season one raked in about 1.06 million viewers per episode and maintained a 0.27 rating with Adults 18-49 on average, those numbers proved considerably lower by the end of season three, which managed an average viewer count of 549,000 per episode and a 0.08 average rating with Adults 18-49. The show’s decreasing ratings over time correlated to some degree with the summer release schedule of its last two seasons and the Monday 8:00 PM EST/PST time slot it shared with powerhouse reality programming. The series finale itself is perhaps the best example of the fierce competition Roswell, New Mexico faced from its network counterparts: on September 5,  ABC’s The Bachelorette and NBC’s American Ninja Warrior drew 3.3 million and 2.3 million viewers respectively. When measured against the appeal of its unscripted competitors, Roswell, New Mexico proved unable to hold its own. Diminishing viewership, however, wasn’t the sole factor in the show’s premature termination. The CW recently underwent some corporate reshuffling after Nexstar purchased a majority share in the network. Many speculate this transformation in management influenced the decision to cancel not just Roswell, New Mexico, but a number of other shows offered by The CW. These changes are part of a larger attempt to start filling the network’s docket with content that appeals to older, more mature viewers.

Roswell, New Mexico starred Jeanine Mason, Nathan Parsons, Michael Vlamis, Lily Cowles, Tyler Blackburn, Heather Hemmens, Michael Trevino, and Amber Midthunder. Its creator, Carina Adley MacKenzie, is also known for The CW’s The Originals and The Flash. 

Patina Miller & Mekai Curtis - Power Book III: Raising Kanan/Starz

Cable: Ahead of its season two premiere on August 14, STARZ greenlit Power Book III: Raising Kanan for a third season, citing the show’s strong performance in season one as an indication of its potential future appeal. Despite the hopefulness of its early renewal, however, the sophomore run of the third series in the Power Universe is already struggling to harness the success enjoyed by season one. This season’s first episode, “The More Things Change,” garnered 345,000 total viewers and earned a 0.11 rating with Adults 18-49. While those numbers exceed the current season’s per-episode average thus far (0.07 rating with Adults 18-49 and 264,000 total viewers), they fall well under the ratings and viewership levels achieved by both last season’s premiere and its finale. All subsequent season two episodes have continued on this negative trend, with episode four on September 4 receiving a 0.05 rating with Adults 18-49 and drawing just 211,000 total viewers. While viewership could possibly be salvaged by the promise of season three, season two’s slow decline suggests that just because a show is popular doesn’t mean that its spin-off (let alone five of them) will inspire the same enthusiasm.

Set in the early 1990s, Power Book III: Raising Kanan chronicles the origin story of protagonist Kanan Stark, played by MeKai Curtis, who must navigate New York’s criminal underworld after getting involved in his family’s drug empire. The role of Kanan was originated by Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson in the original series, Power. Jackson acts as executive producer for all the Power Universe shows along with Courtney A. Kemp (The Good Wife, Get Christie Love) and Mark Canton (300, Immortals). Co-starring alongside Curtis is Tony Award winner Patina Miller (The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 1 & 2, Madam Secretary), who plays major drug lord and Kanan’s mother Raquel Thomas. The cast of season two also includes Omar Epps (Resurrection, House), London Brown (Ballers, ASIA A), Malcolm Mays (Them, Snowfall), Joey Bada$$ (Grown-ish, Mr. Robot), Hailey Kilgore (Amazing Stories, Respect), Shanley Caswell (The Conjuring, NCIS: New Orleans), and Antonio Ortiz (High Fidelity, The Sinner). The series’ current showrunner Sascha Penn (Power, Creed II) is set to return for season three. Power Book III: Raising Kanan airs on Sunday nights at 9:00 PM EST on STARZ.

Lance Factor & Devery Jacobs - Reservation Dogs/Hulu/FX

Streaming: FX on Hulu’s half-hour Indigenous teen comedy-drama Reservation Dogs is proving more popular than ever with critics and audiences halfway through its second season. While season one earned a 98% with critics on Rotten Tomatoes across 57 ratings, season two has sustained a 100% on the Tomatometer with 22 critics so far, cementing the show’s ‘Certified Fresh’ status on the ratings site. The series remains beloved by general audience members as well. Season one achieved an 89% audience score compiled from 366 user ratings and season two currently boasts an 88% audience score generated by 57 user ratings. The series follows a group of Indigenous American teens living on a reservation in Oklahoma as they deal with the ins-and-outs of community and growing up. Its main cast includes Devery Jacobs (American Gods, Rutherford Falls), D’Pharoah Woon-A-Tai (Creeped Out, Murdoch Mysteries), Lane Factor (The Fabelmans, Ghosts), and Paulina Alexis (Ghostbusters: Afterlife, Beans).

Series co-creators Taika Waititi and Sterlin Harjo have received similar acclaim for their respective works beyond Reservation Dogs. Waititi’s past work as a writer-director includes Hunt for the Wilderpeople, What We Do in the Shadows, and Oscar’s Best Picture nominee Jojo Rabbit, which won Waititi the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. More recently, he directed two major installments in the MCU franchise: Thor: Ragnarok and Thor: Love and Thunder, the latter of which he also received a writing credit for. In television, Waititi has gained notoriety as a multi-hyphenate writer-director-producer for Wellington Paranormal, What We Do in the Shadows, and Our Flag Means Death. Series co-creator Sterlin Harjo has a similarly impressive resume. Harjo, whose work mainly focuses on the experiences of the Indigenous peoples of Oklahoma, has written and directed three independent feature films: 2007’s Four Sheets to the Wind, 2009’s Barking Water, and 2015’s Mekko. Additionally, Harjo directed the feature documentary, This May Be the Last Time. His work on Reservation Dogs marks Harjo’s first foray into television comedy

Undoubtedly, a significant part of Reservation Dogs’ growing appeal, beyond the talent of its cast and writer-producers, comes from the production’s first-of-its-kind status. Not only does the show deal with issues and perspectives specific to the American Indigenous community— a culture seldom represented authentically on screen— but it does so while boasting a cast and crew made up almost entirely of the same background it portrays. This achievement, coupled with the show’s distinct infusions of Waititi’s quirky comedic stylings, only adds to the series’ unique and ballooning favorability. The second season of Reservation Dogs began airing on Hulu on August 3 and is scheduled to end on September 28. Watch it on FX on Hulu.

Park Eun-bin - Extraordinary Attorney Woo/Netflix

International: Since its June 29 debut on Netflix, the South Korean legal drama Extraordinary Attorney Woo has spent nine weeks at the top of the streaming giant’s viewing charts for non-English language programming. Out of those nine weeks, the series has spent eight in the #1 slot, raking in nearly 49 million hours-viewed last week alone. The show, only in its first season, has also earned a 100% average Tomatometer score with critics on Rotten Tomatoes and a 90% audience score. Extraordinary Attorney Woo follows the brilliant and gifted young attorney Woo Young-woo, played by Park Eun-bin (Stove League, The King’s Affection), as she enters the professional world after graduating from a prestigious law school while navigating everyday life with Asperger's Syndrome. The show’s first season is comprised of 16 episodes that range between 64 to 83 minutes a piece. The appeal of the series at least partially comes from the fresh take it gives on an established genre, the legal drama. With its neuro-divergent lead, Extraordinary Attorney Woo transcends its generic mold by offering its audience a protagonist whose biggest asset is often what causes others to underestimate her. The resilience shown by the titular attorney Woo despite adversity, along with her brilliance and earnestness, are what ultimately endear her to viewers and other characters alike. 

Extraordinary Attorney Woo was directed by Yu In-sik and written by Moon Ji-woon. Yu’s previous projects include working as a director on multiple TV shows such as Dr. Romantic, Vagabond, and Giant.  Moon’s past credits include the feature film Innocent Witness as a writer and the documentary Rabbit hole as a director and producer. Extraordinary Attorney Woo is available to stream on Netflix.