Lethal Weapon season 3, The Gifted season 2 ratings rise amidst midterm coverage
Sometimes, we’re willing to take a big ol’ bite of ratings crow when our predictions go awry and today this is one of those cases.
Entering Tuesday night, it felt somewhat baffling for Fox to program both The Gifted and Lethal Weapon opposite the midterms. There were a number of people out still voting and, beyond just that, there were so many other things on the minds of many – namely how the election results were going to shake out.
In the end, it turns out that some of this counter-programming actually worked! Since there wasn’t much else in terms of scripted programming on the air, these two shows were the beneficiary of either viewers rediscovering them or people not interested in the midterms deciding to check them out for the first time. Let’s break this all down for you:
The Gifted – We’re not going to say that getting a 0.7 rating and improving on last week’s outing is going to be the thing that saves this X-Men universe series, but it at least allows them to actually take a win for a change, which is nice considering that hasn’t happened all that much lately. The #1 problem The Gifted still faces is that it’s one of Fox’s lowest-rated scripted shows and with the Disney merger on the horizon, there’s a reasonable chance that Marvel just dumps most established X-Men properties into a barrel somewhere and sets it on fire.
Lethal Weapon – Meanwhile, getting a 0.7 rating here is potentially a little more positive, mostly because Fox has been intent on supporting this show in almost every way possible … even when they’ve been given some easy opportunities to bail on it. Heck, even Damon Wayans has been trying to bail on it as of late, at least per some of his past statements.
Yet, here we are with this show still finding a way to cling to life. It’s surprising that it’s still here alive and kicking, and that it does still have a chance for a season 4. Seann William Scott is bringing in some great energy as Wesley Cole, but even with some ratings improvement this week there is no guarantee it will last and outside of the name recognition with the movie franchise there isn’t a huge reason to bring the show back even if the ratings rise. It’s created a billion or so negative headlines away from the series and its ratings are still lower than just about every other show (save for The Gifted).
We’ll circle back with these two next week to see if the competition buries them, or if they can somehow keep what little momentum they got out of midterm night.
What do you think about the latest ratings for both The Gifted and Lethal Weapon? Be sure to share right now in the comments.