RATINGS: ‘Hawaii Five-O’ Tops Night, ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ Finale Down

With a lot of the country still feeling winter chills, it makes sense that a bit of the warmth from the 50th state would give Hawaii Five-O (1.0/4) some heat last night.

Back from a two-week break and with Sopranos alum Vincent Pastore joining McGarrett and the gang, the island set cop drama was even with its last original of January 19 among adults 18-49. However, Five-O was the highest rated show of the night and, with 8.5 million watching, the second best viewed series of Friday.

No surprise, the most watched show of the last Friday before Super Bowl LII was Blue Bloods (0.9/3) with 9.22 million sets of eyeballs. Also even with its last original, the Tom Selleck led NYPD family drama helped push CBS to its 16th Friday viewership win this season. With MacGyver (0.9/4) back down a tenth, the House of Moonves had an audience of 8.31 million to second place Fox’s 3.32 million. However, CBS was denied its 15th clear key demo Friday victory as the net tied with the Murdoch-owned network in adults 18-49 with a 0.9/3.

That demo result came from the two-hour Season 17 finale of Hell’s Kitchen (0.9/3, in case you forgot already).

As the ever busy, busier and Amazon Super Bowl ad starring Gordon Ramsay awarded Michelle Tribble the big prize of becoming executive chef of the Caesar’s Palace Hell’s Kitchen restaurant, the ever simmering cooking competition took a bit of a drubbing from last year. Even with its January 26 show, the All-Stars Season 17 ender was down 18% in the 18-49s from last year’s Season 16 finale of February 2, 2017, a very competitive Thursday. Still, Hell’s was matched with Blue Bloods and MacGyver for the second highest rated show of last night.

Over on the CW, Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (0.2/1) and Jane The Virgin (0.3/1) were even and up a tenth over their January 26 shows.

ABC and the Super Bowl broadcasting NBC saw a lot of the same last night, at least in terms of the demo numbers. Child Support (0.7/3) and Marvel’s Agents Of S.H.I.E.L.D. (0.6/3) were the exact same as last week as was NBC’s Blindspot (0.6/2). Breaking that trend, Taken (0.4/1) was down a tenth from last week to hit an all-time demo low. As for the battle of the news mags, Dateline and 20/20 were tied with a 0.7/3 each, a rise of a tenth for the ABC offering.

So with that, get your beverages and food ready for tomorrow when the New England Patriots and Philadelphia Eagles put all out there on the thankfully covered field in Minneapolis.