The launch of the new 90210 series was met with large audiences last week. However, the show’s second episode which aired on Tuesday dropped 30% of its viewers.
The American viewing audience for the glossy Beverly Hills, 90210remake took a sharp decline with the show’s second episode. According to U.S. Nielsen ratings, Tuesday’s broadcast on The CW saw ratings fall to 3.3 million viewers - an alarming decline of 30 per cent from the show’s 4.7-million viewers one week before.
The ratings drop-off was even more severe in Canada. According to BBM Nielsen numbers, the second broadcast of 90210 registered 664,000 viewers on Global, compared with 1.3 million for the debut. Unlike the first week, Global did not simulcast with The CW and aired it one hour later.
There are several potential reasons for this drop:
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The first episode was hyped up and brought in casual viewers along with the die-hards
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If this is the case, then we might see the ratings hold steady over the next few weeks
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The show’s formula does not connect with its viewers (i.e. characters, story lines, etc)
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If this is the case, then we might see the ratings continue to slide
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The new show does not connect with the die-hard tribe of the original series
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This may mean that the show will lose its previous fans but have an opportunity to create a new tribe
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I am certainly not a fan of the show, but it will be interesting to see how this one plays out over the coming weeks.
September 11th, 2008 at 12:17 pm
All the points make sense, but I think this third one is most important for me - a first generation 90210 viewer.
If a large percentage of the first episode’s viewers we’re the ‘old’ fans AND most of which are female (I wish we had viewership data by gender available), I’d suspect that a major reason for the drop-off for the second episode was because the male characters of Brandon and Dylan were absent. Sure, females like Kelly and Brenda, but I’d assume they really wanted to see the guys of 90201 ‘re-born’ and interacting with the females of the old 90210.
For me, when I watched it, i really didn’t care for any of the new characters…I just wasn’t interested in them. I was just waiting for scenes with the old crew. I guess it was more curiosity for me than anything else - maybe it was the chance to re-live my youth? And, since Brandon and Dylan weren’t in it, I didn’t bother watching the second episode. I’m sure there were other male viewers with a similar view to mine.
They definitely came up short in adequately providing value to the ‘old’ tribe.
Moving forward, I don’t think they’ll be able to satisfy the young tribe and the old tribe at the same time with the formula they have. I’m looking for more of a ‘Melrose’ age group. I think they could have had more success with the old tribe if they made the show a ‘90210 later years’ show and left the teenager/highschool stuff out.