I’ll take Game Show Hosts for Better Ratings.
“Jeopardy” ratings fell 8% last week from the previous week, to 4.8 million. That’s the first time the show has been under 5 million viewers in months.
It’s also a trend under current host Mayim Bialik. Her previous weeks were at 5.3 million and then 5.2 million. The last of those was for the week she took over from Ken Jennings.
On social media, Jennings abruptly announced in mid May that was he leaving, and that Bialik was taking over for an undetermined amount of time. Jennings may return when Bialik goes back to shooting her Fox sitcom in August.
Jennings is far more popular with the regular “Jeopardy” crowd than Bialik. The fans may be showing their displeasure by tuning out until or if he returns.
Under Jennings, there were also several runs of big winners which propelled his ratings above 6 million last winter. His low was at 5.7 million right before his exit.
Last week’s 4.8 million was such a tumble that it permitted “Family Feud,” an insipid show, to take over the lead among game shows.
Stay tuned. New ratings will be in soon for two weeks ago, and we’ll see if the trend continues.
Also down, by the way, are the “Judge Judy” reruns on CBS. They were off by 5% last week, down to 4.2 million. I don’t understand how these reruns draw any audience since they are just on a loop. Some of them are a hundred years old. There are references on camera that give away the year, and it ain’t 2022. Or even 2021. But Man Bites Dog is always a popular story!
