It's the weekend TV luvvas and the question on everyone's lips is: How many people are tuning into Scandal! on Saturdays and Sundays?
Okay, maybe that's an exaggeration and it's not
everyone who's curious to know but we definitely are, especially after seeing the impact it's had on S3's 19h30 Saturday night show.
As you may have seen in
July's Top Shows On TV, S3's 19h30 timeslot plunged by 60% after Scandal! extended to weekends, which started on Saturday 13 and Sunday 14 July.
We were able to make this deduction from the Broadcast Research Council's Top Shows on TV lists but the actual Scandal! weekend viewership numbers aren't on it.
So what are they now? - a month after the move.
TVSA asked the BRC who sent us these figures for the weekend of 10 and 11 August:
| Date |
Viewership |
| 10 August 2024 |
1,775,529 |
| 11 August 2024 |
2,070,072 |
| Weekend total |
3,845,601 |
Our reaction: impressed.
That's a lot of people who've adjusted their weekend evenings to catch the show. Picture that number of people watching TV, or in multiple stadiums.
The most watched week night episode in July attracted 3,682,170 viewers so each weekend episode is attracting more or less half of that, and together the number surpasses the most popular week night episode.
This is impressive for these reasons:
1. The extension happened suddenly and it's a big adjustment for viewers because no other local soapie has the same set-up - it would be unrealistic to expect it to perform the same as week night episodes in its first month.
2. When you compare Scandal!'s viewership this past weekend with July's Top Shows, it's owning both Saturday and Sunday nights across all channels.
It's outperforming Shuga Down South on SABC1 on Sundays at 19h30, which had a viewership of 1,546,506 for its most watched episode in July - this happened the week before Scandal! moved to Sundays.
It also outperformed the Uzalo daytime Omnibus on Sundays and all shows on SABC2, S3 and DStv across both nights.
The only property to beat it was the GI Joe: Retaliation movie on e.tv.
In other words, there is no show on South African TV that's performing better over the weekends.
Will viewership increase or is this the saturation point of viewers who are willing and able to tune in? And how will this impact on week night episodes?
Juicy stuff.