The preliminary numbers are in for Sunday night’s debut of “Merlin” and they’re not great.
The American premiere of the British import debuted to a 1.3 rating/4 share in adults 18-49 and 5.3 million viewers overall from 8:09 to 10:09 p.m. The show started almost ten minutes late due to an overrun of golf coverage from the U.S. Open on NBC.
Overall, the numbers helped NBC finish second for the evening, behind repeats on CBS.
Also, because of the Golf overtime the second episode of Merlin lost the last 15 minutes on my DVR. I wonder how many others this happen to just as Prince Arthur was getting ready fight with Knight Valiant and his magic snake shield. Bummer!
Happened to me too, Sam. Thank the gods for hulu. 🙂
I wanted to watch this show, but I’d rather watch paint dry than golf.
NBC gets so little of my business this certainly didn’t help them at my house.
I watched, and cried. It was one of the worst pieces of garbage I have ever seen. Everyone involved in the production, directing, and writing should be sacked. I would rather spend time changing the bandages on my grandmother’s bedsores than watch another episode of Merlin. Don’t waste your time with this one. It will never air a full season. It was excrutiatingly terrible.
I agree with anachronite.
I don’t mind a re-make, but this stunk. I think that you should not be allowed to butcher a legend just to “modernize” and “youthanize” it. If the powers-that-be have any taste, they will “euthanize” this one.
Merlin has been airing in Australia for a while now and the ratings are very good.
It’s a great family show, you shouldn’t take it too seriously.
One to watch with the kids.
I think the target audience is younger than 18-35, but I liked it. There was a dragon, what’s not to like. It’s a simple mental retreat into a fantasy world, and may develop a complex story line as it goes along. If it does flop, I hope they keep it around and just take it off prime time.
While I gave it a shot for the sake of Tony Head and Richard WIlson, its seems like the kids are going to grow on me. I’m particularly impressed by Colin Morgan (Merlin, much less annoying than we was on Doctor Who) and Angel Coulby (Gwen) thus far. Yes, there are anachronisms and departures from (some aspects of) Arthurian lore, but it hits my origin-story sweet spot in the same way that early seasons of Smallville did. The first two episodes were good enough that I’ll keep watching for a while to see where it goes.
Sam Sloan I had this same problem, had to sit and watch on internet to get the end…not happy!