Dexter’s fourth season is off to a “killer” start with its debut show bringing in 1.52 million viewers. Up by 25%, its third season opener in 2008 brought in 1.21 million viewers.
This makes it a series high for this serial killer drama. Starring Michael C. Hall, this makes it Showtime’s most-watched telecast since 2004. Dexter’s encore of the segment at 11:00p.m., brought in a further 403,000 viewers.
An American television drama series, Dexter airs on the premium channel, Showtime. Set in Miami, it centres on Dexter Morgan, played by Michael C. Hall who is a covert serial killer governed by a strict moral code, and works for the Miami Metro Police Department as a blood splatter analyst.
Based on Jeff Lindsay’s characters created for his series of Dexter novels, it was adapted for television by Emmy Award winning screenwriter James Manos Jr, who also wrote the pilot episode of Dexter.
Last October, Showtime renewed the Dexter series for a fourth and fifth season with each consisting of 12 episodes. Production began in early 2009, and the fourth season premiered on September 27, 2009. America’s favourite serial killer, Dexter in the fourth season takes on a role that more people can relate to now that he embodies what it means to be a husband and a father as well. Titled ‘Living the Dream’, the fourth season opener of Dexter is really a clever play on words as Dexter Morgan has everything he could possibly want except for one thing – time to kill.
The Big Bang Theory hit series highs last week and now boasts a higher profile time slot. Big Bang was in top form against its ‘not-so-hot’ competition including drama premieres – NBC’s new ‘Trauma’ and Fox’s second year ‘Lie to Me’.
The show built on its ‘Two and a Half Men’ lead-in by its largest margin yet, while ABC, NBC and Fox all showed declines in the 9:30 half hour. Taking a look at the numbers, Fox led the broadcasters in adults 18-49 behind ‘House’ (5.8/15 in 18-49, 14.71 million viewers overall), which dominated the 8 o’clock hour.
CBS’s, ‘How I Met Your Mother’ is still looking good (3.6/10 in 18-49, 8.71m), however, ‘Accidentally on Purpose’ (3.1/8, 8.03m) has once again lost two shares of that lead-in while dropping in ratings versus its premiere.
At the 9p.m. slot, the network rallied with ‘Two and a Half Men’ (4.8/12 in 18-49, 13.86m) and at 9:30 p.m. with ‘The Big Bang Theory’ (5.3/13, 13.27m), both moving up versus their season premieres. ‘Big Bang’ built up by its biggest margin to date on ‘Men’ (10% in 18-49) and has grown by a big 20% week to week in adults 18-34. Over a fortnight, ‘Big Bang’ is averaging a 4.9 rating in 18-49, which is a 40% increase 2008 ratings which stood at 3.5 when it aired at the 8 o’clock half-hour.
Falling just a bit from preem, CBS’ ‘CSI: Miami’ remained the broadcast leader (4.1/11, 13.96m).
Opening with a weak start, NBC’s “Trauma” earned a 2.2/5 in 18-49 and 6.68 million viewers overall, while at 10 p.m., net’s ‘The Jay Leno Show’ was down a tad, week to week (1.7/4, 5.52m).