Last weekend’s premiere of HBO’s series adaptation of “The Last of Us” launched as the premium cable drama’s second-most watched series premiere in more than a decade, behind only the “Game of Thrones” spin-off “House of the Dragon”.
Last night’s second episode however has broken a new record for the channel. According to ratings giant Nielsen combined with first-party data from Warner Bros. Discovery, the show’s second episode pulled in 5.7 million viewers across linear airings on HBO and streams on HBO Max.
That’s a 22% increase on last week’s record-breaking 4.7 million in overnights – a number that jumped to 10 million after two days of availability.
That 22% jump from the initial premiere viewership to second episode debut audience is also, according to HBO, the “largest week 2 audience growth for an HBO Original drama series in the history of the network.”
In addition, the network has revealed that after one full week of availability, the first episode is now tracking at 18 million viewers – nearly four times its premiere night audience.
HBO indicated last week that Sunday night viewership for an HBO series represents around 20%-40% of the show’s total gross audience per episode.
The news comes as the series success has impacted game sales. The recent remake of the first game, which the first season is based on, saw a 238% spike in sales week-on-week in the UK according to GameIndustry.biz.
In addition the nearly decade old PS4 remastered version of the game also re-entered the charts with a 322% sales spike with the two versions of the title coming in at No. 20 and No. 32 respectively.
Source: TV Line
