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‘The Walking Dead’ Ratings Drop, Still Doubles 2nd Place ‘O’Reilly Factor’

By Nick Younker
Published on: 11:58 PST, Mar 1, 2017

The Walking Dead on AMC saw a significant drop in the ratings when it went up against the Oscars last Sunday, but it still performed remarkably well considering the competition it was up against. Following a ratings boost on the Season 7B premiere of The Walking Dead, the show was improving its numbers compared to others in their mid-season episodes and has shown that it still has lightning running through its veins.

In a report by Zap2It, there is good evidence that The Walking Dead will still be the ratings king of the 2016/2017 TV season, despite its lagging ratings in Season 7A that has been subjected to critical responses from fans across social media. On Sunday nights, the only show that even comes close to the ratings of The Walking Dead is the sister show, The Talking Dead.

But there is another statistic to look at for basic cable ratings and that is the weekly performance. Fans of The Walking Dead can rest easy knowing that it is still king above all other shows, but there is a news channel out there that fills the other slots in the ratings race every week, and that is Fox News.

On the chart for the week of February 20, The Walking Dead clocked 10.4 million viewers. That more than doubles the second place cable show for the week, which was The O’Reilly Factor and it landed 4.1 million viewers on Monday night. Of course, The O’Reilly Factor airs every day of the week so it also filled the No. 3 and 4 slots before The Talking Dead came in and etched out a number 5 slot at 3.9 million viewers.

We should also mention that, again, The Walking Dead and The Talking Dead this week had to go up against the Oscars and they only have that one night to perform in the ratings game. So that made it all the more difficult to get the numbers and slots filled, especially for The Talking Dead.

It might also be worth mentioning that 16 out of the top 25 ratings slots were filled by programming from Fox News, which airs mostly original news programming throughout the week. But none of their shows came even close to the mountain that The Walking Dead looks down on them from as the cable ratings king.

Fans of The Walking Dead that tuned into the show last Sunday also got a special treat with an episode that was devoted to life at the Saviors Sanctuary and the transition of Eugene into the Saviors clan.

Although this article will not spoil the details of that episode for you since it is so fresh, what we can tell you that Season 7B of The Walking Dead is shaping up to be one of the biggest battles that Rick and the core group have ever fought. With all of the slow dragging episodes of 2016 making for a bitter return to The Walking Dead in Season 7 by having an explosive premiere episode, then draining the life out of all the momentum they had going.

All of that is now changing in Season 7B of The Walking Dead with Rick making dangerous alliances with new groups and forming a coalition to lead into war with Negan and the Saviors. The hunt for weapons is now on and the search for a solution is the main path forward this season on The Walking Dead.

In the next episode of The Walking Dead, fans will get to see Rick and Michonne scavenging for weapons and food now that their mission has been more clearly defined and they are all on the same page.

Be sure to tune into Episode 12 of The Walking Dead next Sunday on AMC.

[Featured Image by AMC]

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