'The Walking Dead' Gets Small Ratings Boost as Andrew Lincoln Exits
by EG
Given that it wasn't competing against a World Series game and it featured the last appearance of the show's central cast member, the latest episode of The Walking Dead turned in a disappointing improvement in ratings over last week's episode. The show's recent ratings are on a par with its lowest-rated episodes in its first season, and this week's big events did little to change that. Read on for details.
Andrew Lincoln's departure from The Walking Dead brought ratings gains to the show — just not very big ones.
The last episode for Lincoln and his character, Rick Grimes, on the AMC series improved modestly on the previous week. After hitting series lows earlier in the season, however, any gain is welcome.
The Nov. 4 episode, "What Comes After," delivered a 2.1 rating among adults 18-49 and 5.4 million viewers, up 6 percent in both measures over the prior week's 2.0 and 5.1 million. About half the show's total audience fell in the 18-49 demo. The episode also grew by 7 percent among adults 25-54 to 3.1 million or a 2.6 rating.
On all counts, they were the best ratings since the Oct. 7 season premiere but still at the low end of The Walking Dead's nine-season history.
After-show Talking Dead had much larger week-to-week gains as Lincoln, co-star Melissa McBride and Walking Dead creative chief Scott Gimple gathered to discuss Rick's departure and the plan to have Lincoln star in three feature-length TWD-related films for AMC.
Get the rest of the story at The Hollywood Reporter.
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