Ratings: ‘Big Brother 16’ proves itself immune to controversy (and time)
We were somewhat curious going into this season of “Big Brother” when it comes to the ratings, mostly because of the fact that when the racism scandal broke last year, everyone was already invested in the season. Often, you want to see something through once you have started it, and that is what we figured was going on with many of the casual viewers. Therefore, we thought that may be some would bail in between last summer and this summer.
However, that turned out to not be the case at all. Despite everything from a cast of newbies to more controversy before this season even began to even the Canadian version alongside this one potentially giving some people too much of a good thing, “Big Brother” drew a 2.3 rating in the 18-49 demographic for its premiere. That is a tiny increase of a tenth from last season, but in this age with “American Idol” and “The Voice” falling sharply season-to-season, this is a huge victory to keep your numbers steady.
We wonder whether or not the inclusion of Ariana Grande’s brother Frankie played an enormous role in the numbers increasing, but we doubt it. Even back when Justin Bieber was well-liked by most Americans, he was not an enormous ratings draw to most of what he appeared in. Therefore, we can’t imagine a huge bump outside of maybe 50,000 or so people for the brother of a pop star, and not even the pop star herself. We feel like “Big Brother” stays popular because there is a little bit of interactivity, but everyone loves to watch and play along with strategic games. It’s a far smarter show than it looks sometimes, and last night it looked pretty dumb with people getting globs of sunblock thrown at them in the backyard.
We’ll see if the numbers hold up tonight with the second half of the premiere, but we’re not that worried. Typically, “Big Brother” doesn’t lose many viewers from one night to the next.
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Photo: CBS