Wednesday, February 7, 2007

Peyton Manning: No Alan Alda

This year's Super Bowl, buoyed by strong viewership from the Chicago market, was the second most-viewed Super Bowl of all time (behind the '96 Pittsburgh-Dallas match-up), and the third most viewed telecast of all time.

The #1 most-watched show ever? That would be the MASH finale, which aired in 1983. That episode pulled in some 106 million viewers and had an astonishing 77 share, meaning that 77 percent of televisions that were turned on were tuned into MASH. Super Bowl XLI, by way of contrast, attracted 93 million viewers and had a 64 share. The finale of Seinfeld, in 1998, pulled in 76 million viewers and had a 58 share -- not even really in the same league as MASH.

Can you imagine a single program that three-quarters of Americans watching TV would tune in for today? Given the proliferation of channels since the early '80s, our increasingly divided attention, and our growing power to watch TV on our own schedule, I wonder if the MASH finale -- which was a 2.5 hour feature, by the way -- will ever be dethroned.

Interesting MASH finale trivia: Though a spinoff ("AfterMASH" -- not kidding) failed, the original series, all eleven seasons worth, lived on for years in reruns, which is how I came to meet Hawkeye, Hot Lips, Radar, and the gang. Yet the finale seems only to have aired a few times in its original form (i.e. not cut up into 20 minute episodes). According to the Wikipedia entry on the episode, CBS did release the final episode -- called "Goodbye, Farewell, Amen" -- on video back in 1983, which I have to imagine was pretty novel at the time. Of course now it's got its very own disc in the MASH Season 11 set of DVDs. Just put it in my queue.

Posted by John Swansburg at 03:14 PM

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