GSN’s “The American Bible Challenge” Debuts to 1.73 Million
Congratulations to GSN. They have their first mega-hit game show ever and their highest rated show ever. Last night’s debut of The American Bible Challenge, hosted by Jeff Foxworthy, scored a jaw dropping 1.73 million viewers and did a 0.4 rating in the key 14-49 demographic. The American Bible Challenge is now GSN’s highest rated show ever, dethroning the long-reigning champion, the 2003 television documentary Big Bucks: The Press Your Luck Scandal. The rerun at 11:00PM saw an additional 571,000 people tune in. The bad news came for Beat the Chefs which by any other standard would have great numbers but dropped off huge. It lost almost 70% with 521,000 viewers. We’ll see how it does in week two.
I still think it’s a boring show given any quiz topic, but you have to hand it to GSN…they actually promoted this right. They heavily marketed towards conservative blogs and networks like Fox News and Glenn Beck and other major religious places. They hunted their audience. They didn’t ask to be hunted. They did a PR bomb there and it paid off huge. It’s hard to argue with those numbers. Let’s just hope The Pyramid sees this much love.
The ratings prove that we were right, though. The drop-off from Bible to Chefs was huge. The people that watched Bible had no interest in anything after it. But more came back after Chefs for the Bible rerun. We repeatedly said that this would not necessarily fit GSN’s core audience and they need to bring in the hardcore religious people. They did, and it’s worked beyond any of my expectations. I hope it helps the rest of their lineup. It certainly helped get above-average ratings for Chefs. I’m very interested to see week 2′s ratings and how it affects everything else.
However, despite how anyone feels about the show, let’s just be happy that they did this well for a very traditional game show and not one of their impending failures in the “Real Life Game” category. They can still do popular game shows. Keep this up with Pyramid, guys.
Source : Son of the Bronx
That brings up another problem. If ABC gets 2 million viewers, but those viewers don’t watch anything else on GSN, is that really a victory?
Though I have to say, seeing GSN in TVBytheNumbers’s cable Top 100 was pretty cool.
Congrats to GSN for promoting the heck out of this show and getting people to tune into the premiere episode. That being said, I have to agree with Alex though. It’s boring. It took almost 10 minutes before they started the game, and then after 3 questions, they jumped to a commercial break.
The first few questions were funny, because they threw in some funny answers, but after that, it got dry pretty quick. Jeff wasn’t as funny as he was on 5th Grader, and it seemed about as boring to me as You Deserve It last year on ABC. I just can’t seem to get into charity-based game shows. They don’t seem to be as exciting to me as a game show where the contestants are competing for themselves.
Also, the music for the gameplay of Bible Challenge was almost non-existant. Sure, the choir was there, which felt odd because they didn’t seem to fit into a game show, but as far as music during actual gameplay? I don’t think there was any. Sound effects were good, and at least they timed them correctly, unlike in 2011 Lingo.
All in all, I don’t know how Week 2 for the ratings is going to go. Usually, that will tell us how many people have decided to stick around watching it. The premiere got so many viewers because of all the promotion – CNN, The Tonight Show, etc. Now we’ll see if people come back for more.
Also, as I predicted, Beat the Chefs wasn’t even close to Bible’s ratings. I think Chefs might fall below the 500k number next week, but we’ll see.
I agree with your last sentence, Alex. I also hope that this will bring in a whole new audience to GSN. If people watching saw classics that they know and love…and maybe realized that 70′s and 80′s classics are still on in the mornings…maybe…just maybe…the network just got a very big boost.
If nothing else, this could bode very well for “The Pyramid”.
A rare bit of PR brilliance from GSN! :-D
They did promote this right, but as you said, week 2 will be telling, and the fact that many of the viewers left once it went off is a bad sign. We’ll see, I guess. I tend to agree with you; it’s a little boring, and could stand to allow Jeff to do more.
What you have to understand is that there are hundreds of cable networks…so anything over 2 million viewers is awesome! ABC is one of the big 3 (4 if you want to count CW), they should put on programming to exceed 7-8 million people. They can’t. So it’s a victory for GSN!!!
The big 3 Al? You do know that Fox has been considered a major network for almost 20 years now. So it is the big 4! As for the CW, it is regularly outviewed by Univision.
Err, I’m pretty sure that by ABC, they meant American Bible Challenge, not American Broadcasting Company (The ABC network).
Very possible Chris. Then what did he mean by “4 if you want to count CW?” That is why I thought he meant the network.
Not that beating the CW is an accomplishment or anything, but Bible got more total viewers then the premiere of Oh Sit did, although it had a lower 18-49 rating
Actually, it just reminds me that Oh, Sit is doing much better than I thought it would.
Not that beating the CW is an accomplishment or anything, but Bible got more total viewers then the premiere of Oh Sit did, although it had a lower 18-49 rating.
Just posted even more numbers to put last night’s historic night for GSN in context:
http://www.tvmediainsights.com/2012/08/american-bible-challenge-scores-big-on-gsn/
Alex, you basically summed up my thoughts: Even though this show isn’t quite my cup of tea, I’m glad to see them have a hit (so they stay in business!), and all the more so because it’s a traditional game show.
hope the pyramid has 2 million viewers on it’s debut show
I think you nailed it Jay, in the fact that this has to stay popular to send a message to GSN that, when promoted right, traditional game shows HAVE a place in today’s TV. Do they have to do monster numbers like that every week, no. But, as long as they stay in the upper six figures, to low million, they should be a lock for a second season. On another note, if you noticed, they did promote Pyramid heavily during promotional/commercial breaks, so hopefully that does mean good things in about 2 weeks.
I think Foxworthy on Tonight Show on Tuesday may have helped too. Also, I think as far as the show goes, I think you are seeing a mix of Michael Davies meets Extreme Makeover (it is the two teams that produce this after all.) I think Embassy brings the great game elements to the show, while Makeover team is great at producing the featurettes that you see during the show, which is their strong suit.
As far as the knock that it’s a boring quiz show,. it is fairly slow, but so is Jeopardy, and look at the monster ratings it does. It is a wholesome great show, so I am not surprised to see the young demo ratings do great numbers. People like quiz shows out there – do I think it could work for a half hour setup definitely, but GSN has to be extremely happy with the hour format numbers for Week 1.
Also, the Beat the Chefs show was halfway decent suprisingly for those that liked Food Network fare – the problem was that they did not nearly promote this show half as good as they did Bible Challenge. They are promoting it more on the network now, because I think they realized the show lacked promotion.
I enjoyed both shows, will tune in next week, and I do hope this is the start of a good roll for GSN!
Keep up the great work GSN and great job last night!
Jeopardy! is slow? Come on, Lingo was a lot slower then Jeopardy! is or will ever be.
I don’t get GSN, so I will miss this & Pyramid. I can pass on the former, but I would like to watch the latter.
Yeah, 61 questions in 22 minutes… there aren’t going to be many quiz shows matching that pace, and certainly not in the US. University Challenge is around that on most shows, but I can’t think of many more that are currently on air. Of course, that brings us to the old show 100% – 100 questions in a half hour block.
The Chase, too, but that’s in an hour. If you converted to the half-hour scale, it might be on par with Jeopardy!
Thank you. I do hope that this show’s popularity brings more viewers to the network…and, that it’s not just a fluke because it’s a Bible game show. There have been some great shows on the network…classic and original. So, it deserves an audience. Hopefully, this is a trend.
It is faster than Bible Challenge, but the point is that Jeopardy traditionally skews towards older audiences, and doesn’t change all that much. Not saying that’s a good or bad thing, neither here nor there. Just saying there is a market for traditional quiz shows that don’t have to be all that flashy to pop a rating. This proves that. All it takes is a little promotional muscle, which GSN has done – they could learn from this as far as how to correctly promote a new show of theirs to appear big league when it comes to network status and ratings. I agree that the speed of Bible Challenge could speed up a bit, I think half hour would serve it great. Again, the people of Makeover are probably using that extra time for the behind the scenes stuff. If you like more knowledge of contestants, this probably works for you. If you just tuned in for the game, and game alone, probably slow for most of those folks. I think as it goes on, Jeff will get more comfortable and hopefully a bit looser as well. He was funny, but yes, not as funny as 5th Grader.
Jeopardy! always has been a great show…and still is…and, that’s a good thing.
As for the speed of the show, people had a problem with LMAD at first. Look at it now…no one’s complaining.
As for Jeff’s comfort level…it’s a new show. So, everyone’s new to it and nervous about how it will go. I’m sure he’ll find his groove like he did with 5th Grader.
Good point about Deal, and you are right, you don’t hear it anymore. Hopefully it is a case of working the bugs out over the first show or two. Again, I think it would be awesome as a half hour format. Knowing makeover team, I expected a bit of filler in that hour. I agree that it does border on a bit too much. For the record, I hope Jeopardy goes a really long time and is the quintessential quiz show. Again, hopefully it doesn’t get criticism just because of the content, because this and Pyramids success will go a long way in determining whether gsn tries more soon
About ‘Beat the Chefs’: I immediately turned off of the show after five minutes. When I heard previews of two of the ‘Singing Weavers’ cutting their fingers and/or hands, I’ve had enough. I can get my fix of ‘cooking reality’ shows on Food Network. ‘Chopped’, ‘Cupcake Wars’ and ‘Iron Chef America’ are 100X better than this crappy GSN knock-off.
On Bible challenge. I thought it had a niche and they hammered it and were handsomely rewarded. Those people are nothing if not loyal, so I don’t expect a huge dropoff…but the show itself…badly flawed. It’s not a good sign that an agnostic couple like me and my wife not only kept pace but answered more bonus round questions than either team. (5, the team won with 4 eek)
If you’re catering to hardcore evangecals (Would a Catholic, Mormon or Orthodox team even be allowed to compete?) it will get old fast that the questions are so easy that “non believers” can get it right. Especially since pastors have been included on some teams. They need tougher questions. I was able to answer the elimination questions perfectly from my knowledge of art (Namely the swords at the last supper and the finger of god the latter was so obvious I explained the answer to the wife by pantomiming the painting) rather than any true Bible knowledge, not good in the long run especially since the teams struggled.
Too much procedure as well. I think most of Jeff’s blandness came by how much he had to explain the rules. Maybe that wears off over time but the tournament structure makes me think otherwise.
There were some cute moments (the Faithbook segment was hilarious) but the game plodded. I also minded the extensive contestant videos, namely jeff should have been able to do that, that’s a key part of the host’s skill they took away from them and it also made it feel more like a half reality/half game show.
As for beat the chefs…maybe the main problem is that it’s AWFUL. I was expecting something good with them going against Food Network’s weekly Chopped stripping. I betcha the chopped REPEAT airing at the same time did about the same…god help them in 3 weeks when the new Chopped season (not counting the special grilling tournament they did on Sundays) bows. The Chefs had little cache and also seemed to be trying too hard to be Iron Chefs. The contestants were too over the top and rude. And the food from both would not pass muster on most cooking competition shows on the air. Also the host was WAY over the top and the cooking was poorly edited.
The rest of the show was structurally sound (Aside from the STUPID idea of revealing BOTH winners at the end of the show.) but the presentation was just plain BAD. I’ll be watching my Chopped repeats thank you very much.
The problem is… I strongly think most people, especially most who would seek out this game show…aren’t as smart as that, even if it’s about the Bible. IMO, it’s like saying “Rock & Roll Jeopardy!” had questions that were too easy (which I did find most of them easy), but others might not find them so simple.
It could be that you’re smarter than most or (my thoughts) this country has a lot of unknowledable people. haha.
I do totally agree though that the Faithbook segment was brilliant and Jeff should’ve been used in the other prerecorded moments.
I also think, too, that the show is SUPPOSED to have that sense of half game show/half reality show. I tend to think those sort of prerecorded emotion-grabbing reality-esque segments really resonate with the targeted audience (I remember a LOT of my very religious friends LOVED “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition,” for example).
My two (or four) cents, I think. I will say…..I definitely think the audience will shrink, but I don’t think it’ll diminish THAT much.For at least this first season, I think GSN has a hit!
I agree that the dropoff won’t be huge…and I like GSN having a hit…but I see the cracks and that may have issues with future seasons if not fixed. You may be right about the ease of questions. But I do think they need to kick it up in the bonus round (especially with the 10 minute cram session) Also I am NOT a fan of having the same questions. Yes it’s more fair and I know why they do it, but it’s boring TV the second time around. Not the first or last show to do it but something I’m not a fan of but that might just be me :)
Yes, the prerecorded segments likely grab viewers, but again, can’t Jeff do those, or have them shorter and more emotion grabbing with Jeff doing a contestant interview of a deeper level (Like groucho level) that’s what I’m arguing. Perhaps when people get more accustomed to the rules, they can let Jeff do more of the contestant interviews and have a chance to shine more. We know Jeff is a great host (I’ve always said he was a great choice for this show and have called him the Modern day Bill Anderson more than once) let him shine like he can.
I want this show to succeed and it has…and that’s great for GSN. But I do think to keep it going there need to be some tweaks, but not as many as the post may suggest, I’m a nitpicker especially when its a show like this which needs to pander to a specific target.
American Bible Challenge… is the American Bible different?
It’s all in the marketing.
Does anyone here see this show selling abroad?
If it did, then I wonder what it would be called in the countries that bought it. I doubt that “The Canadian Bible Challenge” or “The Australian Bible Challenge” would make good titles…
I’d assume something generic when abroad, like “The Ultimate Bible Challenge” or “The Bible Challenge.”
There are a quite a number of locales this could be “ported” to without really having to do the PR bomb GSN did to launch it in America. UK/Israel seem ready for their own versions (both more than likely with a serious tweak in the difficulty level of questions, however)
UK Would have to be much tougher and also much stuffier…as reliegon is less pop (for lack of a better word) and much more seriously presented in the Church of England. I think where it may fit better are in Catholic countries, namely in Mexico and South America.
As for a Torah challenge in Israel…it could work, but there are enough controversies and comments on the meanings of some of the passages. questions would have to be very black and white. It would be interesting however.
I do think it has legs but not sure if it would fly as high as it does in America.