'Citadel' Ratings: Nielsen Viewership Remains Low After Three Weeks
Missing for the third week in a row from Nielsen’s weekly streaming rankings is “Citadel,” Amazon Prime Video’s $185 million spy series starring Priyanka Chopra and Richard Madden.
The May 8-14 viewing window marked the series’ second full week of availability and its third week with a chance at making the chart, as it premiered on April 28, meaning that viewership during its first three days of availability would have counted towards the April 24-30 charts. During that first window, Nielsen noted that “Citadel” just missed the streaming originals chart (not to be confused with the overall Top 10 chart) bringing in 306 million viewing minutes and losing out on the tenth place position to John Mulaney’s “Baby J.” Nielsen did not provide information regarding the series’ viewership for the May 1-7 or the May 8-14 windows.
It was expected that “Citadel” would take time to make a significant showing on the Nielsen Top 10, in part due to Amazon’s prioritization of international marketing — spinoffs of the series are already set for India and Italy. Because Nielsen measures in the U.S. alone, viewers in other countries are not accounted for here. Still, the fact that the series was unable to chart after two and a half weeks of streaming demonstrates that the show has failed to resonate with American audiences the way that franchise projects of a similar price point would typically target to do.
In the No. 1 position on the overall Top 10 chart was “Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story.” This is the second week in a row that the Shonda Rhimes series has taken the crown, with 1.9 billion minutes viewed both times. This week, “Queen Charlotte” also caused renewed interest in “Bridgerton,” which it serves as a prequel to. “Bridgerton” rejoined the streaming original rankings for May 8-14 in eighth place with 413 million minutes viewed.
Interestingly, the No. 2 and No. 3 positions both went to movies this week, which happens less often due to their shorter runtimes when compared to films. Jennifer Lopez’s action film “The Mother” took second place with 1.4 billion minutes watched in its first three days of availability, and was followed by “A Man Called Otto,” which premiered in theaters in 2022 but landed on Netflix just before this viewing window began. The Tom Hanks drama was watched for 1.4 billion minutes from May 8 to May 14.
In fourth and fifth place were “NCIS” (875 million minutes) and “Bluey” (706 million minutes) — two shows that regularly make the Top 10 as audiences rewatch them. The same is true for “Cocomelon,” which took eighth place with 648 million minutes.
“Firefly Lane” came in at No. 6 with 697 million minutes watched. The drama serires concluded its second season on Netflix on April 27, and has remained a fixture on the Top 10 in the following weeks.
“Ted Lasso” took seventh place with 670 million minutes watched in the May 8-14 window, during which the ninth episode of its third season premiered on Apple TV+.
Rounding out the bottom of the chart was the docuseries “Missing: Dead or Alive?” with 634 million minutes watched in its first five days on Netflix and “Sweet Tooth,” which was watched for 575 million minutes in Season 3’s second full week of availability on Netflix.
See Nielsen’s list of overall streaming rankings for May 8-14 first, followed by original streaming titles, acquired titles and then films.
Source: Variety
