Primetime Ratings: ‘Empire’ Up a Tick on Fox
Fox was the big winner Wednesday, as Empire rated a 3.4 in viewers 18-49, per Nielsen’s overnight ratings, lifting Fox to a 2.6 and a 9 share. Empire, offering a flashback of a young Lucious and Cookie, went up 3% over the previous week.
ABC was next at 1.8/6, then CBS at 1.6/6, NBC at 1.3/5 and The CW at 0.5/2.
Lethal Weapon, which Fox has ordered a full season’s worth of episodes for, led into Empire with a 1.9, up 12%.
On ABC, The Goldbergs and Speechless rated flat 1.8s, before Modern Family climbed 9% to 2.4 and Black-ish grew 13% to 1.8. In the 10 p.m. hour, Designated Survivor scored a flat 1.6.
On CBS, Survivor grew 5% to a 2.0, then Criminal Minds elevated 21% to 1.7, and Code Black’s 1.1 was up 10%.
NBC’s Blindspot scored a 1.1, down 15%. Law & Order: SVU and Chicago P.D. both grew 8% to 1.4s.
The CW’s Arrow rated a flat 0.7 and Frequency a 0.3, down a tenth of a point.
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Michael Malone is content director at B+C and Multichannel News. He joined B+C in 2005 and has covered network programming, including entertainment, news and sports on broadcast, cable and streaming; and local broadcast television, including writing the "Local News Close-Up" market profiles. He also hosted the podcasts "Busted Pilot" and "Series Business." His journalism has also appeared in The New York Times, The L.A. Times, The Boston Globe and New York magazine.