“Biggest audience since the moon landing.” That was the headline when Nielsen launched viewership numbers for Super Bowl 2024. About 123.7 million folks within the US watched the sport, greater than another sport since Nielsen began protecting observe and, sure, near the 125 to 150 million folks within the US who watched the moon touchdown in July 1969. Despite the scores of streaming choices and different issues to look at, folks nonetheless tuned in to look at dwell—to see the Kansas City Chiefs win in time beyond regulation, to see Taylor Swift, to watch Usher, to see Martin Scorsese’s alien-invasion advert, to catch the new Deadpool & Wolverine trailer.
Maybe dwell TV isn’t useless in any case.
It is, in fact, simple to chalk this as much as the occasion being, effectively, the Super Bowl, which remains to be the one hottest US sporting occasion of the yr. Also of notice: A billion-plus folks watch occasions just like the World Cup globally. Still, the Big Game wasn’t the one factor folks tuned in for this week. On Monday, Jon Stewart reclaimed his place at The Daily Show desk and introduced in 1.9 million viewers—probably the most the present has seen since 2018. It’s an election yr, and as Alison Herman wrote in Variety, “anyone who has living memories of the War on Terror is powerless to resist Stewart’s particular blend of cynicism and moral righteousness.” Or, perhaps after seeing Tucker Carlson’s interview with Russian president Vladimir Putin, they’re simply eager for the times when Stewart would go on CNN to name Carlson a “dick” on Crossfire.
While this may occasionally look like a craving for the times of extra appointment tv and setting our VCR to tape My So-Called Life, and it’s, there’s one thing else at play. There is a malaise related to streaming nowadays, when scrolling by the countless libraries of “Eh, OK, Sure” TV on Netflix or Hulu doesn’t really feel all that totally different from the senseless channel-surfing folks did within the ’90s whereas they had been ready for Friends to start out. With streamers elevating costs and including commercials, perhaps the urgency of watching one thing because it’s occurring has the juice to deliver folks again to broadcast.
Streamers definitely suppose so. In a quest to get extra subscribers, considered one of their greatest performs has been to safe the rights to dwell sports activities. Apple TV+ has baseball and soccer, Amazon Prime Video has Thursday Night Football, Netflix simply landed WWE wrestling. Hulu and Disney+ could be bundled with ESPN. Outside of sports activities, Max has the CNN dwell feed. Netflix simply hosted the Screen Actors Guild Awards. The Oscars will air on ABC on March 10, however you can too watch them on Hulu or YouTube TV.
All of which to say, even when dwell TV is making a comeback, it’s a comeback buoyed by streaming. One of the explanations, past Taylor Swift and Usher, that a lot of folks tuned in to the Super Bowl was that, along with CBS, the sport additionally aired on Nickelodeon, the place it was hosted by SpongeBob SquarePants and Patrick Star. (I’m advised it was enjoyable to look at on edibles.) The sport additionally streamed on Paramount+, and though some viewers reported glitchiness early within the sport, the straightforward entry throughout a number of platforms boosted the sport’s viewership numbers. HBO’s present Sunday Night Sad present True Detective: Night Country has surpassed the primary season in complete viewers. Plenty of them watch the present when it airs on Sunday, and an enormous chunk watch on Max. Nearly one million folks—930,000—watched Stewart’s return to The Daily Show; some 6 million extra have watched his return monologue on YouTube.
For years we’ve been debating whether or not the watercooler present is over. Was Game of Thrones the top? Has Last of Us revived that zombie idea? I stay on the fence. There’s much more area of interest programming for area of interest pursuits than seemingly ever earlier than, however international sporting occasions and world information occasions will at all times seize the general public’s consideration in a means viral moments can’t. People watching the Super Bowl nonetheless knew the Chiefs gained in time beyond regulation earlier than they noticed it on X.
On Wednesday, my telephone buzzed with an alert from The New York Times. Something terrible had occurred in the course of the Chiefs’ victory celebration in Kansas City. Later, I discovered that one particular person, a preferred native radio DJ, had been killed, and greater than 20 others had been injured, in a mass taking pictures on the occasion. But I didn’t be taught that by diving additional into my telephone. I turned on MSNBC.