Last night was the premiere of NBC’s much-hyped new series, Kings. Though the series has an impressive cast and big production values, few viewers tuned in to watch. Based on the initial ratings, will interested viewers get a chance to see the whole season?
Kings is a modern retelling of the classic David and Goliath story. It’s set in a modern world that closely resembles our own, except for the fact that what looks like the United States is ruled by a king. Kings is billed as an epic story of greed and power, war and romance, forbidden loves and secret alliances — and a young hero who rises to power in a modern-day kingdom.
It stars Ian McShane, Christopher Egan, Susanna Thompson, Michael Patrick Crane, Allison Miller, Sebastian Stan, Eamonn Walker, Dylan Baker, Wes Studi, Joel Garland, Jason Antoon, Sarita Choudhury, and Macaulay Culkin.
The two-hour premiere got off to a rocky start last night, to put it mildly. The first half hour attracted a poor 6.5 million viewers and a 1.6/5 rating/share in the 18-49 demographic. By the time the last half hour had aired, only 5.5 million were still watching with a 1.7/4.
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Those numbers placed the debut firmly in fourth place among the big networks. It performed significantly worse than Celebrity Apprentice had the week before and proved to be the network’s second worst premiere of the season, behind last week’s Chopping Block.
NBC has committed to 11 more hours of the series which are set to begin airing next Sunday night. With a complicated premise and a little-watched premiere, it’s hard to imagine a scenario in which even fewer people will tune in next week. With so few viewers, NBC will have little choice but to make a change in their schedule. What’s likely to happen?
In the past, NBC probably would have simply pulled the show from the schedule and opted to leave a bunch of unaired installments sitting on the shelf. In these tough economic times however, that’s not a very viable option. As was the case with Crusoe, they’ll likely move the remaining episodes to Saturday nights to burn them off.
No matter what they decide to do with the existing episodes, unless viewership radically improves, it’s impossible to imagine that the series would be renewed for a second season. Long live the king? It appears, not so much.
Image courtesy NBC.
Kings was a great show. It was different., not the usual reality tv and cop show you see on tv. What does it say about our society when we would rather see Sanjaya play in the jungle than to see a well written drama with an actual plot. I hope another network picks it up. Was this the same network that let Surface and E-Ring go?
I guess Kings wasnt dirty enough for NBC,Or was it because their was know nudity?NBC your a bunch of IDIOTS!!!!!!!
I loved this show, I HATE that it was cancelled. I hope that perhaps a cable network can pick it up. I really wanted to see the story play out.
Hey! Heroes is a good serie!
I’m going to stop watching NBC, CBS, and ABC altogether. These three antiquated jokes consistently cancel their more thought-provoking programming. They will let you down every single time. All three seem to think “reality t.v.” is on the cutting edge, mainly because it’s cheap to create and many viewers are not intelligent enough to realize it has nothing to do with reality. I keep a list of programs I’ve liked over the years that have been cancelled. It’s a very long list. It’s too bad NBC, CBS, and ABC are branching out into cable t.v. programming. Cancellations of more enjoyable… Read more »
I am also sad kings is gone. However, you need to relax with the “dumb american” talk. hate only breeds hate. Insted show enthusiasim and try to promote the show to everyone you know if it gets big enough they will have no choice. remeber jericho
A good show bring it back
@tressa: NBC pulled the show and it will supposedly return on Saturday nights beginning in June.
hey — i set my DVR to record kings last week — and it recorded law and order i doulbe checked it — the scheduled recordings showed Kings — but when i pressed play it showed that show WHAT AM I MISSING ???? did my dvr via dish network mess up — or am i just a silly goose ??!?!? i know the ratings are not what they’d hoped — so i was wondering if it was cancelled just for that night — so they can determine whre to place it for the rest of the summer ANYBODY KNOW THE… Read more »
This is the best show since sliders. And Sliders appeared in 94. I don’t know what is wrong with my country, the vast majority of us would rather watch American ******** idol than watch a TV show that requires brains to understand.
So what if the initial battle scene probably wouldn’t have worked in reallife, TV is about what ifs.
It’s good that NBC created something profound, not just another money making series that doesn’t require thinking and sadly most humans don’t like to think. This show stimulates the intellect but at the same time, it’s entertaining (at least for those who understand it). So I hope NBC airs all episodes for the sake of those bright people who are fed up with many shows that are as shallow as kiddie pool.
Loving this show. The cast is perfect and I’m happy to have Ian McShane in another show.. Unfortunately it’s so good that it will likely not last. Sad really.
at first i was skeptical about this show but after watching the 2 hour pilot and the next episode i have started to like it. Unfortuantly the US public probably won’t give this show a chance. They are too busy watching reality shows such as survivor, american idol, holmes in NO, hell’s kitchen. And the other sitcoms like gary unmarried, new adventures of old christine, ghost whisperer, terminator, heroes…shall i go on?
great show, too intimidating for the stupid american public that can’t pay their mortgages unless they are working more than one job so they can’t watch!!!
Who watches TV on Sunday nights except for sports fans? Premier viewership probably dropped off because people switched over to a game they were waiting on. Seems like a terrible timeslot for a good series. Perhaps ratings have been worse for subsequent episodes because the series builds on itself and doesn’t make complete sense unless you caught the first episodes between games? Catch the whole thing on HULU from the beginning while they still have the episodes up. I watch everything on HULU anyway so it fits in my schedule but ratings are based on broadcast viewing. That is rapidly… Read more »