'The Conners' Has a Decent Debut
by EG
It looks like Roseanne's family might be able to get by just fine without her. The debut of the spinoff The Conners, which features the entire cast of Roseanna except for Roseanne Barr herself, debuted on Tuesday night, and its ratings were in line with the finale of Barr's series. Read on for details.
Via Deadline.
Nearly six months after Roseanne ended its initial revival run and the volatile Roseanne Barr crashed the now cancelled show, The Conners premiered last night in hopes of turning tragedy into triumph, or at least solid success.
After months of playing its sitcom cards close to the chest, the John Goodman, Sara Gilbert and Laurie Metcalf led series revealed how Barr’s character died: opioid overdose. With everyone except Barr on-board, the cast and episode also set the stage for how the 10-episode spinoff intends to continue without the franchise’s former leading lady.
With a 7.7/13 in metered market ratings, the early indication is it’s certainly not going to be the same or easy but ABC has some breathing room, at least for now.
While no one really expected The Conners to hit the massive debut that the return of Roseanne had on March 27 after nearly 20 years off the air, the spinoff was barely ahead of the revival’s May 22 finale, at least in the early metrics. That “Knee Deep” finale episode came mere days before Barr’s racist online attack on former Barack Obama advisor Valerie Jarrett, and even by then the already renewed series had seen a double digit decline from the Season 10 opener. Which is to say, the finale was a reasonable benchmark for The Conners to reach.
Down 35% from the Roseanne opener, the debut of The Conners was just 4% better than the mothership series finale in metered market numbers. In fact, despite a massive marketing push, The Conners wasn’t even the highest rated show of Tuesday night.
Get the rest of the story at Deadline.
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