Outlander season 3: The impact of all these Caitriona Balfe – Sam Heughan TV appearances

Caitriona Balfe - Sam Heughan

If you are an Outlander fan, odds are you know that there are numerous TV appearances for Caitriona Balfe – Sam Heughan right now as the season 3 press tour marches on. The two stopped by The View earlier today, and this comes a day after Sam was on Live! with Kelly & Ryan. (Caitriona appeared on Live! this morning.) They’ve also appeared in segments for Entertainment Tonight and Access Hollywoodand we certainly don’t think that the TV spots are done just yet. As a matter of fact, we know that Balfe will be on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert tonight on the same night as former Presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.

CarterMatt will certainly have some videos and highlights from some of these appearances coming up (so be sure to check back with us), but for now let’s focus on establishing what the end game for the show is going to be through all of this press. It marks a strong attempt by Starz to expand the show’s fan base. The network showed both at San Diego Comic-Con (when they went all out with a Print Shop display and a premiere screening) and now with their TV press tour that they want the Outlander season 3 premiere episode to be the most-watched episode in the network’s history.

Could it make it there? It’s possible, but at this point trying to measure Outlander premiere ratings is like holding a beautifully wrapped gift box and guessing what’s inside. There is certainly some evidence that it could happen, but there are no guarantees. Outlander has been off the air since the spring of 2016, and in that time the show may have grown its audience through word of mouth as fans help to create more fans! Remember what Game of Thrones did leading into season 7? It already had huge ratings, but it still found some way to expand all the more to the point where it’s now closing in on The Walking Dead. The show’s been off the air for so long that it’s hard to gauge its ratings and it’s even harder when there are some people who have seen the first episode already, but we don’t foresee that detracting from the show’s premiere numbers. You’re talking thousands of people as opposed to the millions who will be watching the show live or streaming.

The goal of the TV press tour is to appeal to prospective viewers who have not seen the show already or maybe watched casually the past two years. Starz knows that diehard viewers will watch, and while it may be frustrating in some ways to see the cast be asked formulaic questions that you’ve heard several times already, remember that this may not be the case for the majority of the show’s casual viewers. If that ends up getting more viewers to watch Outlander, that’s a good thing. One of the things that Starz has done a good job at so far is cultivating a great deal of balance between appealing to casual and diehard fans.

Take a look at Caitriona’s Live! interview below, plus some more footage from The View.

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