The record-breaking viewership of its first two episodes weren’t enough it seems as HBO’s TV series adaptation of the famed PlayStation game “The Last of Us” has become a smash hit.
A combination of Nielsen’s measurement of linear viewers across airings of Episode 3 on HBO on Sunday, plus first-party data regarding streams on HBO Max through the night have revealed 6.4 million viewers tuned into the third installment this past Sunday.
That’s a 12% jump from the second episode’s 5.7 million which was a 22% jump from the first episode’s 4.7 million.
The show’s debut was HBO’s second-most viewed series premiere in over a decade, behind only “House of the Dragon” last year. However, viewership of ‘Dragon’ was already dropping by its third episode where ‘Last’ is on the increase.
These numbers cover only viewership over each episode’s first night of availability alone. As of Tuesday, Warner Bros. Discovery says the first two episodes are now averaging 21.3 million viewers an episode. The series still has six more episodes to air with the fourth one hitting this Sunday and the finale set to air opposite the Oscars in mid-March.
Warner Bros. Discovery has also announced that for the first time ever, HBO has four different series in the past year tracking at 15 million viewers or more per episode – “The Last of Us” at 21.3M, “The White Lotus” S2 at 15.5M, “House of the Dragon” S1 at 29M, and “Euphoria” S2 at 19.5M.
Source: TV Line
