ENTERTAINMENT

'Roseanne' ends run as most-watched comedy in U.S. in last week

David Bauder The Associated Press
Published Wednesday, May 30, 2018 5:50PM EDT

This image released by ABC shows Roseanne Barr, left, and John Goodman in a scene from the comedy series 'Roseanne.' (Adam Rose / ABC via AP)

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NEW YORK -- "Roseanne" was the week's most-watched comedy among American audiences for what suddenly became its final episode.

The series reached 10.58 million last Tuesday, second only to the CBS drama "NCIS" in the weekly Nielsen rankings.

"Roseanne" was expected to come back next year, but ABC cancelled the series on Tuesday following a racist tweet sent out by star Roseanne Barr. The show's revival lasted three months.

Another ABC comedy that had its last episode last week, "The Middle," was seen by 7.09 million, Nielsen said. That last episode was planned.

The ratings were dominated by the NBA conference finals. The Western Conference series between the Golden State Warriors and Houston Rockets were a bigger draw than the series between the Boston Celtics and Cleveland Cavaliers.

CBS won the week in prime-time, averaging 5 million viewers. NBC had 4.4 million, ABC had 4.1 million, Fox had 2.7 million, Univision had 1.3 million, ION Television had 1.1 million, Telemundo had 1 million and the CW had 840,000.

ESPN was the week's most popular cable network, averaging 4.64 million viewers in prime time. TNT had 3.04 million, Fox News Channel had 2.22 million, MSNBC had 1.45 million and USA had 1.43 million.

ABC's "World News Tonight" topped the evening newscasts with an average of 8 million viewers. NBC's "Nightly News" was second with 7.7 million and the "CBS Evening News" had 5.7 million viewers.

For the week of May 21-27, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: "NCIS," CBS, 12.07 million; "Roseanne," ABC, 10.58 million; NBA Conference Finals: Houston at Golden State, Game 6, TNT, 9.47 million; NBA Conference Finals: Golden State at Houston, Game 5, TNT, 9.32 million; "The Voice" (Tuesday), NBC, 8.78 million; "Dancing With the Stars: Athletes," ABC, 8.77 million; "American Idol" (Monday), ABC, 8.68 million; "The Voice" (Monday), NBC, 8.67 million; NBA Conference Finals: Houston at Golden State, Game 4, TNT, 8.37 million; NBA Conference Finals: Boston at Cleveland, Game 6, ESPN, 8.27 million.

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ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox is owned by 21st Century Fox. NBC and Telemundo are owned by Comcast Corp. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks.