‘Roseanne’ Ratings Remain Strong In Week 2

ABC’s Roseanne revival settled in last night with a slice-of-life episode focused on parenting after last week’s headline-grabbing premiere tackled President Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton and the election. The ratings took the inevitable dip but remained impressive — 15.4 million viewers and a 3.9 rating among adults 18-49 in Live+same day at 8 PM last night. Vs. the 8-8:30 PM part of the double premiere episode last week (17.7 million, 4.9/21), Roseanne retained 87% of the audience and 80% of the adults 18-49 rating. It was once again the top program of the night by a mile in both adults 18-49 and total viewers.

For comparison, NBC’s Will & Grace revival’s Week 2 retention was 70% in total viewers and 67% in adults 18-49.

Last night’s Roseanne posted the highest Adult 18-49 rating for any non-premiere comedy telecast in more than two years, since the 12/17/15 episode of CBS’ The Big Bang Theory.

ABC paired Roseanne with the other blue-collar family comedy on broadcast TV, The Middle, now in its final season. Boosted by Roseanne as a lead-in, The Middle (2.2, 8.3 million) returned up 57% in the demo and up 43% in total viewers from its most recent original two weeks ago, hitting season highs with its best numbers since January 2015.

black-ish (1.5, 5.4 million) was down sharply (-42% in the demo) from last week (2.6, 8.7 million) when the comedy directly followed the highly-rated hourlong Roseanne debut. Still, black-ish logged its second-best numbers of the season. The week-to-week declines carried over to new comedy Splitting Up Together (1.4, 4.8 million), which was down -33% from its debut last week. New legal drama For the People (0.8, 2.8 million) seems to have benefited from the extra sampling on Roseanne premiere night last Tuesday when its demo rating shot up 50% week-to-week. For the People‘s 18-49 rating only slipped a tenth last night.

Elsewhere, NBC’s lineup recovered a bit after taking a hit with double-digit drops last Tuesday. The Voice (1.8, 9.3 million), Rise (0.9, 4.5 million) and Chicago Med (1.1, 6.2 million) all rose a tenth. UPDATE: Rise was adjusted down to 0.8 in the finals, even with last week’s low.

At CBS, NCIS (1.3, 12.1 million) and NCIS: New Orleans (0.9, 8.5 million), which bid farewell to a cast member, were steady, while Bull (1.2, 11 million) ticked up a tenth in the demo.

Fox’s LA to Vegas (0.7, 2 million) inched up a tenth, while The Mick season finale (0.7, 1.9 million) was even.

The CW’s just renewed Black Lightning (0.5, 1.5 million) held steady.

ABC won the night in 18-49 (1.8 rating) with the top 2 shows of the night, Roseanne and The Middle. The network topped the 8 PM and 9 PM hours, with NBC winning at 10 PM with Chicago Med. CBS was the night’s most watched network with an average of 10.5 million viewers.