HBO’s ‘Girls’ Dips In Season 2 Premiere, ‘Enlightened’ Up In New Night Return
Last night’s Season 2 premiere of Girls at 9 PM drew 866,000 viewers, a slight drop from the 872,000 viewers the HBO show drew for its series premiere on April 15 last year. Sunday’s premiere was also down from the series-high 1 million that watched the Season 1 finale on June 17. Over three plays last night — 9 PM, 10 PM and 11 PM — Girls had a total audience of 1.6 million, up 42% from the double showing of the series premiere. HBO was happy right away with Girls, rewarding the series with a 10-episode second-season pickup April 30 after only three airings. Sunday’s premiere came the same night the show’s creator and star Lena Dunham won a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Comedy Series and the show won Best TV Comedy.
Related: HBO Makes Plans For Potential Third Season Of ‘Girls’
Enlightened was also back for its second season Sunday but on a new night. The 9:30 airing pulled in 300,000 viewers, a 43% rise from its series Monday series premiere on October 10, 2011. The show drew 609,000 viewers overall in all three of its plays Sunday. HBO renewed Enlightened for an eight-episode second season on December 11, 2011, after two months on the air. Friday’s 10 PM premiere of Alan Ball’s Banshee on the HBO-owned Cinemax had 483,000 viewers. The freshman series’ 11 PM rebroadcast got 235,000 viewers and the 12 AM airing of Banshee pulled in 247,000.
Hooray for Laura and Enlightened!
Well, to be fair, it was up against the Golden Globes — a Girls lovefest. Kind of weird timing by HBO.
Don’t forget that this shows target audience watches show on DVR. They don’t watch the shows live.
Funny how Game of Thrones, True Blood, and other actual HBO hits (which are also big on DVR and repeates) can draw a large live audience for the network. Girls is all hype. The divide between how much it’s talked about and how few people watch it might be one of the largest of all time.
Amen to that. So sick of hearing about this overrated crapfest. It reminds me of something Roger Ebert ince said about films made specifically for movie critics. By and large, most HBO subscribers avoid this show.
Game of Thrones and True Blood have a more diverse viewership that doesn’t specifically only watch things on DVR or online or HBOGO. Girls does.
Who ONLY watches shows on DVR? That doesn’t even make sense.
I almost never watch anything that isn’t on my DVR, everything I wanna watch is programmed into it ahead of time and then I just watch at my leisure, especially because I keep odd hours working nights.
Considering cancelling HBO until they restart some real entertaining series. Girls and Enlightened are the worst! Not worth the price of the subscription.
I really have to agree with you. Series like Game of Thrones and TrueBlood and etc. relate to a much wider audience men and women and these shows are constantly streamed online or DVR but still pulls in it’s live viewers. I believe Girls was over hyped they wanted to create another Sex and The City but if fell short. The audience that is trying to relate to doesn’t have cable and the people that actually view HBO are mature adults between ages 25 and up and I think girls just doesn’t and won’t find it’s audience on HBO. I’m not saying it’s a terrible show but the hype does oversee the writing and characters. It’s hard to really care about any of the characters. At least Sex and the City provided you with being able as a women to see yourself in on of the 4 ladies this show does not, they just are white girls with minor problems in which they created for themselves.
no one does.
The empress has no clothes, literally and figuratively.
These ratings were at the same time Directv had HBO and other movie channels having a free preview weekend. I would think more people would have checked it out. I personally enjoyed watching Shameless on Showtime, a hilarious show for sure.
Free preview viewers wouldn’t be counted in this.
… why not?
I don’t know but HBO does not include the free viewers in the ratings reported.
Guessing the Globes is responsible. Interested to see the DVR numbers and how many watch on HBO Go.
The Globes didn’t hurt Shameless, which pulled in more than double these numbers, so I’d say you guessed wrong.
Shameless is actually good.
Was going to kill myself after seeing GIRLS win awards last night, but this gives me a reason to live…
You were going to kill yourself because you have bad taste and can’t recognize great writing? Really?
Yes! I have terrible taste and can’t recognize great writing! I like Mad Men, Breaking Bad, Homeland, Community, Downton Abbey, loved Battlestar Galactica and Buffy and pretty much everything Judd Apatow has done until this…but I must have terrible taste if I think Girls is sloppy, boring, and lame. The only explanation is that I have bad taste.
Sloppy, boring, and lame – couldn’t have described Girls better myself. I think many of us girls had high hopes about the show, which contributed to the hype. I am bored to tears watching, not laughing and thinking, “Was that supposed to be funny?”
Don’t be a putz…. GIRLS is a crapfest.
It’s a truly horrible show with some of the most unlikeable un-empathetic, selfish, mean-spirited characters I’ve seen since the first 3 or 4 seasons of Family Guy.
Yes, and Lord knows that show was taken off the air quickly. Or, wait…
Also, since HBO is not ad supported, they count the cumulative viewership. So, if 509,000 people watch live and 3 million watch OnDemand/DVR/Repeat viewings, it doesn’t matter to HBO as long as you’re watching.
agreed.
Actually, HBO doesn’t give a hoot whether you watch or not, as long as you’re paying for the service.
I don’t have HBO but even if I did, I would have been watching the Golden Globes.
Don’t forget that this show is garbage.
Girls and Enlightened, any non chick shows for a guy to watch on HBO right now?