By David Bauder, Media Writer
NEW YORK (AP) --It wasn’t so long ago that zombies, and “The Walking Dead,” were all the rage. This week’s ratings show how that’s faded.
The latest episode of the AMC series was seen by 6.82 million viewers on Sunday, the drama’s smallest audience since 2012. For the youthful 18-to-49-year-old demographic, it was the worst showing since 2010.
“The Walking Dead” this week competed directly against the Oscars, which themselves had a record low viewership. The first night ratings are also hurt by the same factors affecting television in general; viewers are increasingly finding different ways to watch. For example, in 2014 AMC found that three-quarters of viewers watched the show on live TV or on DVRs. Three years later, that number was down to 55 percent, with the rest watching streams online or through devices like Roku or Apple TV, and those people don’t appear in the Nielsen company’s weekly measurement.
“The Walking Dead” is still television’s most popular drama among young viewers for the sixth season in a row, and no other drama has ever done that for more than four, AMC said.
Still, it’s hard to deny that the numbers illustrate a marked decline in the show’s decline in popularity.
Meanwhile, the Academy Awards have their own issues to talk about. It was the first time that the Oscars, seen Sunday by 26.5 million people, had ever had an audience smaller than 30 million. The relative unpopularity of the movies being honored surely had an impact. Conservative commentators claim that political messages from Hollywood figures made a difference, too.
ABC won the week in prime time behind the Oscars, averaging 7.6 million viewers. CBS had 6.8 million, NBC had 5.1 million, Fox had 2.8 million, Univision had 1.8 million, ION Television had 1.4 million, the CW had 1.2 million and Telemundo had 1.1 million.
Fox News Channel was the week’s most popular cable network, averaging 2.24 million viewers in prime time. MSNBC had 1.82 million, HGTV had 1.42 million, ESPN had 1.39 million and USA had 1.31 million.
ABC’s “World News Tonight” topped the evening newscasts with an average of 9.1 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” was second with 8.7 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 6.7 million.
Below are primetime viewership numbers compiled by Nielsen for Feb. 26-March 4. Listings include the week’s ranking and viewership.
1. “Academy Awards,” ABC, 26.54 million.
2. “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 13.75 million.
3. “Live From the Red Carpet” (7:30-8 p.m., Sunday), ABC, 13.13 million.
4. “NCIS,” CBS, 12.46 million.
5. “Young Sheldon,” CBS, 12.42 million.
6. “The Voice” (Monday), NBC, 12.32 million.
7. “The Voice” (Tuesday), NBC, 10.84 million.
8. “Bull,” CBS, 10.7 million.
9. “Live From the Red Carpet” (7-7:30 p.m., Sunday), ABC, 10 million.
10. “This is Us,” NBC, 9.74 million.
11. “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 9.06 million.
12. “Mom,” CBS, 8.95 million.
13. “NCIS: New Orleans,” CBS, 8.27 million.
14. “Survivor,” CBS, 8.19 million.
15. “Hawaii Five-0,” CBS, 8 million.
16. “The Good Doctor,” ABC, 7.83 million.
17. “Grey’s Anatomy,” ABC, 7.52 million.
18. “Chicago Med,” NBC, 7.28 million.
19. “MacGyver,” CBS, 6.93 million.
20. “The Walking Dead,” AMC, 6.82 million.
ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co.; CBS is a division of CBS Corp.; Fox is owned by 21st Century Fox; NBC is owned by NBC Universal.
Review: Writer-Director Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance”
In its first two hours, "The Substance" is a well-made, entertaining movie. Writer-director Coralie Fargeat treats audiences to a heavy dose of biting social commentary on ageism and sexism in Hollywood, with a spoonful of sugar- and sparkle-doused body horror.
But the film's deliciously unhinged, blood-soaked and inevitably polarizing third act is what makes it unforgettable.
What begins as a dread-inducing but still relatively palatable sci-fi flick spirals deeper into absurdism and violence, eventually erupting — quite literally — into a full-blown monster movie. Let the viewer decide who the monster is.
Fargeat — who won best screenplay at this year's Cannes Film Festival — has been vocal about her reverence for "The Fly" director David Cronenberg, and fans of the godfather of body horror will see his unmistakable influence. But "The Substance" is also wholly unique and benefits from Fargeat's perspective, which, according to the French filmmaker, has involved extensive grappling with her own relationship to her body and society's scrutiny.
"The Substance" tells the story of Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor with a televised show, played by a powerfully vulnerable Demi Moore. Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday by a ruthless executive — a perfectly cast Dennis Quaid, who nails sleazy and gross.
Feeling rejected by a town that once loved her and despairing over her bygone star power, Sparkle learns from a handsome young nurse about a black-market drug that promises to create a "younger, more beautiful, more perfect" version of its user. Though she initially tosses the phone number in the trash, she soon fishes it out in a desperate panic and places an order.
The one rule to follow is that... Read More