'American Horror Story' Bounces Back

After beginning the new season as the highest-rated scripted series on cable TV, American Horror Story had backtracked a bit, losing a big portion of its viewership over the course of the series' first four episodes. As it turns out, though, all those viewers may just have been taking their time to watch, as the series' delayed-viewing ratings last week rose substantially from those of the third episode's live broadcast.

When the "Live+3" results came in, the third episode of AHS found that it had nearly doubled its viewership in the 18-49 age demographic after three days of delayed viewing. That made AHS not just the highest-rated scripted series on cable, but the second-highest-rated program, period, on cable for the week. The series' third episode easily bested both Monday Night Football and Thursday Night Football on ESPN and the NFL Network, and it came in second for the week only to CNN's coverage of the first presidential debate.

The delayed-viewing numbers for AHS's fourth episode, which originally aired on October 5, aren't in yet. Given that the episode's live airing was the lowest-rated of the season so far, its delayed viewership will go a long way toward indicating whether fans are simply waiting until later in the week to watch, or whether they're truly deciding that they're not all that excited about season six after all.