Matt James, the first Black lead in the long-running ABC dating show “The Bachelor,” scored on Monday night, attracting 4.58 million viewers and placing at the top of primetime numbers with a 1.1 rating in the key, adults age 18-49 demographic.
Still, though the drama was particularly over-the-top for the series in the second episode thanks to a villainess that longs to reign over the luxury Nemacolin resort and terrorize her fellow players, the historic Season 25’s ratings are still hitting low. In the Nielsen Live+Same Day ratings, last week’s return of “The Bachelor” scraped a 1.3 in adults 18-49 and 5 million viewers, a record low for the 20-year franchise. Episode 2 was down over 17.3% in the key demo and down about 12.4 in total viewers compared to the premiere.
Elsewhere at 8 p.m., a rerun of CBS’ “The Neighborhood” landed in second place in Monday primetime rankings, obtaining a 0.6 rating and 4.03 million viewers, followed by a new episode of “Ellen’s Game of Games” on NBC, with a 0.5 rating, down 10.8% in the key demo, and 3.05 million viewers, up 6.2% in total viewers compared to last week’s episode. At that same hour, Fox aired a rerun of “9-1-1”, and a rerun of “9-1-1: Lone Star” at 9 p.m.
ABC’s new episode of “The Good Doctor” at 10 p.m. came in third for the night’s numbers (0.5, 3.90), while NBC’s game shows “The Wall” (0.5, 2.74) and “The Weakest Link” (0.5, 2.39) trailed behind in fifth and sixth.
Throughout the evening, CBS aired reruns of “Bob Hearts Abishola,” “All Rise,” and “Bull,” and the CW aired a rerun of “Penn & Teller: Fool Us.” For the second time this week, the CW’s came in last for ratings sorted both by the key demo and total viewers per minute, with the premiere of “All American Stories” at 8 p.m., garnering a rating of 0.1 and 0.38 million viewers.