In thrilling fashion, AMC’s hit zombie show The Walking Dead returned to television last night with its third season and the episode Seed. Despite some grumblings over how the second season was handled, a strong marketing campaign and critical acclaim propelled the premiere to 10.9 million viewers, the highest ever telecast for any drama series in basic cable history.
This number, which grows to 15.2 million viewers when taking into account encore showings, represents a 50-percent increase over last season’s debut which roped in 7.26 million, a record itself at the time. As you can imagine this is the highest viewed episode of The Walking Dead and for AMC as a network.
The show scored big in its target demographic of 18-49 year olds and even managed to outpace hit shows Hatfields & McCoys, Jersey Shore, Modern Family, The Big Bang Theory and The Voice.
With ratings rising steadily over the first three seasons it’s becoming pretty clear that The Walking Dead will be with us for some time and is gaining viewers far outside of its originally intended audience.
In case you missed it for some reason or are just becoming interested, check out the full episode courtesy of AMC below.
