Rampage Ratings Up Almost 53% For CM Punk’s AEW Debut

Rampage Ratings Up Almost 53% For CM Punk’s AEW Debut

AEW held the second-ever episode of Rampage this past Friday night in Chicago, which was built around an unadvertised yet known to be the happening return of CM Punk to wrestling. Only the biggest AEW haters would criticize how the company presented his debut, and the internet was buzzing with videos of his appearance trending on YouTube all weekend. While all this is great for AEW in terms of buzz, the key indicator on how successful his debut was would always be the ratings, and on Monday afternoon, the official numbers were revealed.

It can now be confirmed the episode was watched by an average of 1.1 million viewers on TNT, which is a massive 52.6% increase from the previous week’s premiere episode. Additionally, in the key 18-49 demo, Rampage would deliver a 0.53 rating, which was an increase of 71% week on week, and the highest demo AEW has produced since the first-ever episode of Dynamite back in October 2019.

While both WWE and AEW play down the promotional battle at times, obviously, comparisons will be made with SmackDown on Fox airing directly before Rampage. This week’s episode featured Edge giving Seth Rollins a “Brood bath,” Bianca Belair wrestling, and a face-to-face between John Cena/Roman Reigns. Overall the episode would handsomely beat Rampage with an average of 2.1 million viewers. However, SmackDown only just edged out Rampage in the key demo with a 0.57 rating.

Considering it’s believed TNT was happy with Rampage’s premier numbers, it’s assumed they will be delighted with this week’s. The big question will now be whether Rampage can continue to deliver in the ratings, which may be challenging at times because most episodes are scheduled to be pre-taped and won’t feature such significant debuts.

JAMES RYDER

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