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[Breaking] “The Walking Dead” Lost Another Half Million Viewers
AMC’s “The Walking Dead” continues to free fall.
Showbizdaily has posted the cable ratings for this past Sunday’s episode of “The Walking Dead”, now in its seventh season, and it has dropped significantly.
A few days ago we wrote about the show’s steady decline, resulting in the worst ratings since Season 3. This season’s premiere pulled in a record 17 million viewers, only to see a massive 25% drop down to 12.46 million, and then 11.72, 11.40, and eventually 11 million. Today’s report claims that AMC’s zombie series has dropped yet another half million viewers, down to 10.4 million. Is it time to hit the panic button?
Yes, in the sense that there’s a steady decline that’s becoming a trend. We are talking about five straight weeks with a substantial drop off, negative press swarming the show, and angry fans that hit peak frustration when the producers decided to opt for a cliffhanger at the end of Season 6.
With that said, 10 million or 17 million, that’s an insane amount of viewers; even with another slide in ratings the show could survive for another few seasons.
But this is still alarming because of the rate of decline. We’re talking about a half million people per week, which could have “The Walking Down” to its worst ratings since Season 2 by the mid-season finale on December 11th.
[Related] “The Walking Dead” Must Combat Declining Ratings By Breaking the Obvious Pattern
And here’s the biggest question mark: AMC already has the next two episodes in the can, meaning that there’s nothing they can do to try and salvage the damage that’s been done. What decisions have been made this time around leading into the mid-season finale? What if – and hear me out here – the showrunner, producers and writers wanted to rub the angry fans’ faces in the cliffhanger and do it again? Would they be so bold as to think they were immune to those bullets when filming commenced earlier this year?
No matter, AMC has got to be panicking at this point. There’s two episodes left and if they lose another million viewers before the break, will they be able to get them back by the time the show returns in 2017? There are many thoughts as to why “The Walking Dead” is floundering – Squires shares his opinions in this piece – but none of them matter if AMC can’t figure it out before it’s too late.
Bloody Disgusting readers, do you still watch “The Walking Dead”? What are your thoughts? Is there something you adamantly hate about the show? Or do you still love it to death? What do you guys think is going on?!
Let’s all cry together…
Only one episode remains in Season 3 of “Chucky,” and what a bloody road it’s been so far, especially for actor Devon Sawa. The actor has now officially died twice on screen this season, pulling double duty as President James Collins and body double Randall Jenkins.
If you thought Chucky’s ruthless eye-gouging of the President was bloody, this week’s Episode 7 traps Randall Jenkins in an elevator that feels straight out of an iconic horror classic.
Bloody Disgusting spoke with series creator Don Mancini and actor Devon Sawa about that ultra-bloody death sequence and how the actor inspires Mancini’s writing on the series.
Mancini explains, “Devon’s a bit of a muse. Idle Hands and Final Destination is where my Devon Sawa fandom started, like a lot of people; although yours may have started with Casper. I was a bit too old for that. But it’s really just about how I love writing for actors that I respect and then know. So, it’s like having worked with Devon for three years now, I’m just always thinking, ‘Oh, what would be a fun thing to throw his way that would be unexpected and different that he hasn’t done?’ That’s really what motivates me.”
For Sawa, “Chucky“ is an actor’s dream in that the series gives him not one but multiple roles to sink his teeth into, often within the same season. But the actor is also a huge horror fan, and Season 3: Part 2 gives him the opportunity to pay homage to a classic: Kubrick’s The Shining.
CHUCKY — “There Will Be Blood” Episode 307 — Pictured in this screengrab: (l-r) Devon Sawa as President James Collins, K.C. Collins as Coop — (Photo by: SYFY)
“Collectively, it’s just amazing to put on the different outfits, to do the hair differently, to get different types of dialogue,“ Sawa says of working on the series. “The elevator scene, it’s like being a kid again. I was up to my eyeballs in blood, and it felt very Kubrick. Everybody there was having such a good time, and we were all doing this cool horror stuff, and it felt amazing. It really was a good day.”
Sawa elaborates on being submerged in so much blood, “It was uncomfortable, cold, and sticky, and it got in my ears and my nose. But it was well worth it. I didn’t complain once. I was like, ‘This is why I do what I do, to do scenes like this,‘ the scenes that I grew up watching on VHS cassette, and now we’re doing it in HD, and it’s all so cool.“
It’s always the characters and the actors behind them that matter most to Mancini, even when he delights in coming up with inventive kills and incorporating horror references. And he’s killed Devon Sawa’s characters often. Could future seasons top the record of on-screen Sawa deaths?
“Well, I guess we did it twice in season one and once in season two,“ Mancini counts. “So yeah, I guess I would have to up the ante next season. I’ll really be juggling a lot of falls. But I think it’s hopefully as much about quality as quantity. I want to give him a good role that he’s going to enjoy sinking his teeth into as an actor. It’s not just about the deaths.”
Sawa adds, “Don’s never really talked about how many times could we kill you. He’s always talking about, ‘How can I make this death better,’ and that’s what I think excites him is how he can top each death. The electricity, to me blowing up to, obviously in this season, the eyes and with the elevator, which was my favorite one to shoot. So if it goes on, we’ll see if he could top the deaths.”
CHUCKY — “Death Becomes Her” Episode 305 — Pictured in this screengrab: Devon Sawa as James Collins — (Photo by: SYFY)
The actor has played a handful of distinctly different characters since the series launch, each one meeting a grisly end thanks to Chucky. And Season 3 gave Sawa his favorite characters yet.
“I would say the second one was a lot of fun to shoot,“ the actor says of Randall Jenkins. “The President was great. I liked playing the President. He was the most grounded, I hope, of all the characters. I did like playing him a lot.” Mancini adds, “He’s grounded, but he’s also really traumatized, and I thought you did that really well, too.”
The series creator also reveals a surprise correlation between President James Collins’ character arc and a ’90s horror favorite.
“I saw Devon’s role as the president in Season 3; he’s very Kennedy-esque,“ Mancini explains. “But then given the supernatural plot turns that happen, to me, the analogy is Michelle Pfeiffer in What Lies Beneath, the character that is seeing these weird little things happening around the house that is starting to screw with his sanity and he starts to insist, ‘I’m seeing a ghost,‘ and his spouse thinks he’s nuts. So I always like that. That’s Michelle Pfeiffer in What Lies Beneath, which is a movie I love.”
The finale of “Chucky” Season 3: Part 2 airs Wednesday, May 1 on USA & SYFY.
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