Despite fan backlash, the final
episode of “Game of Thrones” sets new record in terms of rating. Almost 19.3
million viewers tuned in to watch the series finale on May 19, 2019. The finale
episode “The Iron Throne” broke the record of last week’s episode “The Bells”.
“The Bells” had 18.4 millions viewers.
The record was previously held
for a short time by the season’s penultimate episode, which drew in 12.48
million viewers when first aired and a total of 18.4 million during its first
night.
According to HBO, the average
viewers per episode for Game of Thrones is 44.2 million including delayed
viewing. The eighth and the last season of “Game of Thrones,” premiered in
2011, had high viewership.
Each year “Game of Thrones” has
seen its audience grow, a rarity for television shows. Typically, a series will
lose viewership over the course of a run. The first six seasons all contained
10 episodes, season seven was comprised of only 7 and season eight had only 6.
One of the finale plot points
that stuck with most people was that Bran Stark, aka Bran the Broken, became
king of the six kingdoms, with his sister Sansa taking lead of the seventh
kingdom, the North.
The previous HBO series finale
with the most viewers was “The Sopranos,” with 11.9 million viewers, though
that was in 2007, before streaming and other digital services took off.
