Stargate Universe just finished its first week of international premieres, and based on the preliminary ratings gathered so far, it was a tremendous success.
In the United States on Friday, October 2, Syfy’s premiere “grabbed 2.35 million total viewers” in its first showing and at the same time out-did a network show, while on the same night on Space in Canada, “a record breaking 2+ average minute audience of 565,000” made it “SPACE’s highest rated single episode ever.”
The following Tuesday night, Sky One aired the two-hour premiere, which “averaged a respectable 865k (4%) between 8pm and 10pm, making it the most-watched show on the multichannel stations.” And the premiere week ended on Friday, October 9, when Australia’s Sci Fi Channel aired the pilot, which “was seen by 149,000 people, giving the channel its biggest audience of the year so far.”
Congratulations to everyone who worked so hard to bring us this newest installment in the Stargate franchise. Here’s hoping that this success brings news of a second season!
[image from MGM]
Edited to add this more detailed info from an MGM press release:
SGU debuted in the U.S. on Syfy to the best franchise premiere performance in four years, drawing more than 2.3 million viewers. The series grabbed 2.35 million total viewers with 1.32 million Adults 25-54, and 1.12 million Adults 18-49 during its two-hour debut.
In Canada, SGU premiered on SPACE with a record breaking audience of 565,000 making it SPACE’s highest rated single episode ever. SGU was the #1 non-sports specialty program of the day for Adults 25-54 and A18-49. SPACE is the Canadian English language cable television specialty channel owned and operated by CTVglobemedia.
Launching on Sky1 in the UK, SGU delivered 1,042,000 viewers for episode one and 961,000 for episode two, earning the series the biggest “Stargate” audience in almost five years.
In Australia, SGU was the best performing show on the Sci-Fi pay television platform, posting a 6.4% share. This performance represented an increase of 411% in the time slot (Fridays 8:30 to 10:30 p.m.) versus the previous programming of the last four weeks. SGU is well on its way of being one of the highest rated shows for the week on pay television in Australia.
DAMM!!! I thought that SGU pulled in some numbers untill I saw what one of the CSI’S DID EITHER MIAMI OR NEW YORK PULLED IN 14 MILLION VIEWER’S….what can we do to get those number’s for the SyFy Channel???
CSI: Miami is a network show and has a larger possible audience by default. Cable channels like Syfy have a smaller audience to begin with.
Within the cable network standards, SGU is doing pretty well.
Bigger numbers? A network slot would do it, but even then, there’s no guarantee since sci-fi is not exactly mainstream drama or such.
Thank’s DeeKay I just learned something