The Walking Dead returned to television on Sunday night, and it just happened to beat its own record for ratings at the same time. The show, as you may know, returned from a midseason hiatus, hooking in users anxious for its return.
The AP reports (via ABC), citing Nielsen numbers, that the midseason premiere set a series record on Sunday night with 12.3 million viewers, beating its previous record, which was set when AMC ran the season premiere in October (10.9 million). According to the report, 7.7 million of this past Sunday’s viewers were between the ages of 18 and 49 – a record on its own, for a cable show for that demographic.
Earlier this week, AMC posted a couple of behind-the-scenes videos looking at the record-setting episode. The network also posted a preview of the next episode.
For those who have yet to see the midseason premiere, AMC is offering it online for free until Sunday, March 10th. The network will not be offering other episodes of the series as free online streams, but they want to get fans started off, so if you’re interested, you have a few weeks.