Proving just how much viewing habits have changed even for network procedurals, ABC’s drama “Will Trent” has seen its viewership explode given time for people to take it in and discover the series at their own pace.
Ramón Rodríguez leads the cast of the series as the eponymous Special Agent. Raised in the foster care system and dyslexic, he has the highest case clearance rate in the Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) but has also engendered animosity among his peers after his solving of a police corruption case resulted in the arrest of several APD officers.
As per Nielsen, the show’s first airing pulled in just 3.61 million viewers and a 0.38 rating among adults 18-49 in Live+Same Day. When that was extended to Live+7, it rose to 6.57 million viewers and a 0.6 rating.
However with more time, rebroadcasts, and multiplatform/delayed viewing taken into account though, the series has seen the viewership for its premiere jumping to nearly six times its same-day total viewership and nearly seven times that rating.
Five weeks later, the opening episode snagged a total viewership of 18.1 million viewers and a 2.64 rating. Minus the rebroadcasts, the pilot has still managed an impressive 11.2 million multiplatform viewers and a 1.94 rating.
Around 41% of its five-week audience, and more than two-thirds of its 18-49 rating, came from streaming (the series is available on Hulu) and/or over the longer time period – showing how overnight ratings aren’t a great measure of the success of scripted dramas.
This fits with the results for “The Rookie” and “The Rookie: Feds” whose mid-season debuts in early January saw those shows more than doubled their total viewers and tripled their initial ratings once 35 days on all platforms are taking into account.
Source: THR
