Ms. Marvel is apparently struggling to embiggen itself within the hearts of viewers, as according to a new report, the young super heroine’s solo outing has opened to the lowest viewership numbers of any of Disney Plus’ Marvel Cinematic Universe tie-in shows.
On June 17th, television data analytics company SambaTV, whose data is aggregated from roughly “24 Smart TV brands from countries around the world” including LG, Sony, and Sharp, announced that only “775k US households watched the premiere of #MsMarvel on Disney+ in its first 5 days.”
“While less than other MCU series, it was a hit with #GenZ,” they added. “Viewers age 20-24 watched at the highest rate of any MCU show, and it drew a more diverse audience with Black, Hispanic and Asian households watching at a higher rate.”
Unfortunately for Kamala Khan, these numbers leave Ms. Marvel with the worst such numbers for any MCU-related television series (save possibly the animated What If…? series, as the five-day data for its first episode has not been made publicly available) as recorded by Samba TV.
As per their insights, the premiere of Moon Knight – the most recent MCU series prior to Ms. Marvel – managed to pull in 1.8 Million US households across its first five days.
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Traveling backwards, the small screen debut of archers Clint Barton and Kate Bishop in Hawkeye drew in 1.5 Million US households, with its second episode likewise managing to keep 1.3 Million of those households in the same amount of time.
The Tom Hiddleston-led Loki toppled the competition with a massive 2.5 Million US households, subsequently taking its currently held record as the most watched Marvel premiere on Disney Plus.
Bucky and Sam’s wild ride in The Falcon and the Winter Soldier wasn’t far behind, as the widely-panned team-up managed to draw in 1.8 Million viewers.
And WandaVision, arguably the only series which has thus far had any real repercussions for the MCU, kicked off the Disney Plus era of the MCU and teased its eventually-squandered, high-strangeness-laden potential to 1.6 Million viewers.
While an exact reason for Ms. Marvel’s low viewership is unknown, though undoubtedly due in some part to Marvel fatigue and the series’ main audience being younger viewers rather than fans as a whole, the show is notably facing something none of its predecessors had to: competition.
Through its first three episodes, Ms. Marvel was scheduled to release each of its new entries directly alongside Obi-Wan Kenobi, whose central character and franchise hold a much larger fanbase among the general population.
Offered a choice between watching a series centered on a relatively new character whose history is mired in controversy and whose stories have only declined in quality since her debut or one focused on a cultural icon whose character and story (at least prior to Disney’s subversions) have inspired fans for 45 years, it’s not hard to imagine that most viewers would choose the latter.
What do you make of Samba TV’s debut numbers for Ms. Marvel? Let us know your thoughts on social media or in the comments down below.
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