‘Black Panther’ And Chadwick Boseman Tribute Lead ABC To Sunday Ratings Win

The world continues to remember Chadwick Boseman, evident on Sunday night when ABC aired Disney/Marvel’s groundbreaking Black Panther uninterrupted followed by the 20/20 special Chadwick Boseman: A Tribute for a King.

The Best Picture Oscar-nominated superhero movie starring Boseman dominated primetime, delivering a 1.4 rating in the adults 18-49 demographic and 6.09 million viewers. The ABC News special (1.1, 4.72M), which featured Boseman’s Black Panther co-stars Michael B. Jordan, Lupita Nyong’o, Forest Whitaker, Danai Gurira, Daniel Kaluuya and Angela Bassett, followed.

Also last night, for first time ever the MTV Video Music Awards (0.2, 758,000) was simulcast on the CW. The telecast was up 145% in the demo compared to last Sunday’s lineup in the 8-10pm timeslot that included Fridge Wars and a rerun of Supernatural. This was expectedly driven by younger audiences in the 18-34 demo which was up. These numbers are just part of the ratings story for the annual ceremony as ViacomCBS aired the VMAs across 11 of its brands. We’ll have a better idea of those totals later in the day.

On CBS, Love Island (0.3, 1.47M) made its Sunday debut, even with Friday’s episode, while Big Brother (0.9, 3.82M) ticked down in the demo from last week. CBS began its night with a new 60 Minutes (0.5, 6.10M), steady with last week, and wrapped with a repeat of NCIS: New Orleans.

NBC’s overrun of the PGA BMW Championship (0.6, 3.75M) affected the network’s night, which included a rerun of Cannonball and a second-round game in the NHL playoffs (0.5, 1.56M), with the New York Islanders beating the Philadelphia Flyers. Those ratings are expected to be adjusted in the finals.

Fox continued its Sunday summer rerun block of Last Man Standing, Duncanville, The Simpsons, Bless the Harts, Bob’s Burgers and Family Guy.

 

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