TV ratings: 'Roseanne' still strong, pulls 15.2 million in week 2

Roseanne is on a roll. The ABC sitcom, naturally stumbling a bit after its boffo premiere, still managed a remarkable showing in week No. 2 — topping all other scripted telecasts of the night and, in all likelihood, the week.

ABC's half-hour episode of the revived sitcom averaged a 3.9 rating among adults 18-49 and 15.2 million viewers. Compared with the live showing of the one-hour premiere a week ago, the audience dropped by 17 percent. Among adults 18-49, the second week marks a steeper 24 percent drop.

The comedy was bound to have at least a few viewers bolting after the premiere. Openers of any kind generally set a high bar, and the curiosity around the reunion was noticeably significant. Three days of time-shifting have already seen the Mar. 27 episode soar to 25 million viewers and a 7.3 rating in the key demo. The only scripted broadcast series with those kinds of numbers in recent memory is the post-Super Bowl episode of This Is Us.

All of the good news landed Roseanne with a speedy renewal from ABC. The network has already committed to 13 episodes of the sitcom for the 2018-19 season, four more episodes than the current run. It's hardly a rash decision. The premiere alone was so good, ABC won the last week of March across all of broadcast.

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Six more episodes of Roseanne remain, and it will be interesting to see how much of the original audience it holds onto once all time-shifting is included.

Second-place status for the evening went to Roseanne lead-out The Middle. The exiting sitcom pulled a season high 2.2 rating among adults 18-49 with the advantageous time slot. ABC easily won the night in the key demo, also posting new episodes of Black-ish (1.5 adults) and freshman comedy Splitting Up Together (1.4 adults), though CBS retained its overall audience crown. (ABC freshman For the People continued to languish at 10 p.m, earning just a 0.8 rating among adults 18-49.)

Elsewhere on the dial, The Voice reclaimed some ground on NBC with a lift to a 0.2 rating among adults 18-49. Rise (0.9 adults) and Chicago Med (1.1 adults) followed. CBS was steady with new episodes of NCIS (1.3 adults), Bull (1.2 adults) and NCIS: New Orleans (0.9 adults). On Fox, The season finale of The Mick was up ever-so-slightly to a 0.7 rating among adults 18-49, sharing the same score as LA to Vegas.

Black Lightening held its 0.5 rating in the demo on the CW.

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