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Drama viewership ratings for the week of May 4-10, 2020

Having had so many dramas end last week, our chart’s looking that much smaller. We’ll be getting a good number of premieres soon, this month and next month, but for now, let’s see how the current crop of shows are doing.

The Monday-Tuesday slot is looking especially empty, having only two shows to check in with. Born Again’s ratings took a slight dip, as did Good Casting’s, but at least Good Casting is still hitting those double digits. Onto the Wednesday-Thursday slot, Hospital Playlist is still hitting double digits as well. Newcomer Soul Repairer joined the lineup with 4.7 percent, a decent number compared to its predecessor Welcome.

Interestingly enough, the weekend shows seem to have hit a wall. The King: Eternal Monarch’s numbers continued to drop, Rugal and When My Love Blooms had their numbers drop… Even A Couple’s World, the current ratings champion, saw a pause. Even so, these dramas are still bringing in the most viewers. Perhaps, like everyone else on the chart, they’re just having a bad week. Let’s hope they get their groove back.

Drama viewership ratings for the week of May 4-10, 2020

Ep. # Station Rating
Monday, May 4
Born Again 9 KBS 2.3%
Born Again 10 KBS 3.3%
Good Casting 3 SBS 9.8%
Tuesday, May 5
Born Again 11 KBS 2.4%
Born Again 12 KBS 2.9%
Good Casting 4 SBS 11.1%
Wednesday, May 6
Soul Repairer 1 KBS 4.7%
Soul Repairer 2 KBS 5.2%
Find Me in Your Memory 27 MBC 3.4%
Find Me in Your Memory 28 MBC 4.1%
Thursday, May 7
Soul Repairer 3 KBS 3.1%
Soul Repairer 4 KBS 4.4%
Find Me in Your Memory 29 MBC 2.6%
Find Me in Your Memory 30 MBC 2.8%
Hospital Playlist 9 tvN 12.1%
Friday, May 8
The King: Eternal Monarch 7 SBS 8.1%
A Couple’s World 13 JTBC 21.1%
Saturday, May 9
Once Again 25 KBS 22.1%
Once Again 26 KBS 26.6%
The King: Eternal Monarch 8 SBS 8.1%
A Couple’s World 14 JTBC 24.3%
Rugal 13 OCN 1.3%
When My Love Blooms 5 tvN 4.2%
Sunday, May 10
Once Again 27 KBS 25.1%
Once Again 28 KBS 30.2%
Rugal 14 OCN 1.9%
When My Love Blooms 6 tvN 3.9%

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SBS must be unhappy with ratings for The King.

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You are so right!( the script is a mess) With Lee Min ho in it, hype was even a year before this was aired. It must be very disappointing for them and to the actors, staff and producers. But oh well, people just have to accept that life has ups and downs. Hopefully ratings will pick up before it ends.

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They are definitely not happy with this type of rating, nor are the sponsors & advertisers. SBS relies on viewership for advertising money, advertisers relies on viewership to get demand up.

KES & production company already earned their money by selling broadcasting rights to Netflix, but SBS barely gets the scrape of profit.

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Yup! I bet they did not expect low ratings since KES dramas Descendants of the Sun, Goblin and Mr. Sunshine did well.

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But those dramas have nothing to do with how well this drama does. I personally do not like the drama and am very disappointed with not only the writing, directing, production but also the acting of LMH which is very lack luster. All the early hype just makes this more of a disappointing drama.

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I get that what you mean. My point is that since it’s a KES drama, there is that expectation that it would be good and a hit in the ratings like her previous ones. I had that expectation since I love her dramas but I was discontented. I stopped watching at episode 3.

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MBN was the original choice to air The King. And then leading up to the premiere of The King, it got switched from MBN to SBS.

If the show aired on MBN, it would maybe not been labeled that way.

At the same time, I heard that b/c of this show airing on Netflix and such that combined ratings were close to 30% or so...I think it's probably faring better internationally than domestically rn.

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I'm really happy that my favorite show atm Hospital Playlist is steadily getting those double digits. Same for Good Casting.
Been watching The King. Hope it can get back those viewers because the show is just picking up its pace. Episode 8 was good. Best revelation so far.

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having only two shows to check in with

Interesting how drama-watching habits change. I remember how only two shows per day used to be the norm, and it wasn't too long ago. I was able to check out more dramas back then, which resulted in a high bean count in 2017, for instance. I've given up on that because there are too many dramas now and I can't be bothered to waste my time trying all of them.

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I wish I could just have a show to watch daily but some times all average dramas line up together(or well the ones that do not interest us). Watching two dramas in a day lol those were the times.

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I'm not surprised that The King's rating is down. The word of mouth is bad, and no one is willing stay even if it improves somewhat.

I've been to TheQOO, and not many likes The King. The script is a mess, and actors/actresses' acting regress.

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What's The QOO website?

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Korean forum, TheQOO. People tend to talk about drama or news or Kpop in there. It's not a trash websites like Nate, or sometimes Naver Entertainment section.

The people in TheQOO tend to be mature, so they talk about the drama in neutral perspective, but even then they criticize the drama for its plot and acting.

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Thanks, will check it out. Hate websites that bully viewers when they disagree.

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Understandable. There is one website called Koala something, and there are some hardcore LMH stans who will fight you for any disagreement on The King. LMAO.

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Personally speaking, I've been called various levels of stupid, pseudo-intellectual and even heartless (among other things) in other forums just because I pointed out the show's shortcomings. Ironically, even discussing/speculating on plot points gets them going. 😏

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Which other forums you're referring to?

I don't go to that many English forums, lol. I go to Reddit and Dramabeans for Kdrama mainly.

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I’ve seen LMH fangirls in a facebook group page and even in a comment section in Soompi defending the drama to no end. It seems like they can’t accept criticisms and don’t understand the concept of people having their own opinion.

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Mostly English sites like Soompi and the comments section on various Youtube videos. Unfortunately, my knowledge of Korean is too weak for a forum. I usually steer clear of rabid fans, but seems they're like heat-seeking missiles these days, LOL!

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The ratings have been going down every single week since the drama started and I will not be surprised if it goes down even more next week. This is just a bad drama in not only writing but acting as well, especially by LMH which I expected to be better than this but his acting is lacking IMO. Too bad because I was hoping it would be worth waiting for but it just isn't.

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Lee Min Ho for me always have the same role in each drama. I know he is handsome but picking the character of a Rich Guy with girls chasing him is always his comfort zone. I hope he will challenge himself on his next drama and pick a role that will make the viewers believe in his acting skills.

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Happy for Hospital Playlist!

But I wonder how the investment from these PPL go when ratings come. Because this week's ep from The King had too much, imo, and it wasn't creatively added too. Bring back my Be Melodramatic PPL writing team!

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I was actually embarrassed for the actors having to say those PPL lines! They were just too obvious with no subtlety.

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The King's ratings are not completely shown here .Each episode has two parts and here only the second part's rating is mentioned which is comparatively higher.Its actiual ratings
On Friday-7.0, 8.1
On Saturday i think-6.1 , 8.1
The plot is becoming interesting now as things are slowly falling into place but the damage done by initial episodes is irreparable. Hence ratings are going down day by day. But I m really curious about how these things regarding the two worlds finally wrap up.

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It should increase back up a little bit, but word of mouth is really bad in Korea.

I think if it maintains 9-10%, it is considered to be decent.

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SBS official ratings is the last part of each episode. Hence why only one rating value is displayed here.

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Nope, sorry but 8.1 is a bad rating for a major network which SBS is in Korea. Good try though try to make it seem better than it is. The ratings are low on Netflix too which does not surprise me. The ratings have gone down every single week since the drama started. This is not only not a hit drama, but already considered a bad one.

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I agree. Finally we are getting some answers and more clarity. Though the chemistry is mess, but story is somewhat making sense to me now!

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Unless they're still filming, there really isn't much that can be done to save TKEM. I've read somewhere that one of the PDs has been moved to editing, which most likely helped to improve the pacing of Episodes 7 and 8, but still not by much.

A drastic shift in focus from the much-maligned love story to a probably more exciting underlying plot could turn things around for the series, assuming they have enough material to work with.

I'm rather curious if SBS worked with test audiences, or were they that confident that a KES/LMH/KEG didn't need such an effort?

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They are still filming and they roped in Hi Bye Mama PD. I don't think the ratings will increase much for future episodes. But I sure hope the plot moves swiftly and everything makes sense somehow. Hehe

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@katakwasabi A pity that we would then end up with a series with 9.75 episodes, but I guess it's better to go down in a blaze of glory.

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The situation is so bad for TKEM that the production team brings in another PD to join the team. So far, it is the only drama this month that requires another PD to fix the quality and etc.

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I like the script but hate the execution so I think TKEM needs all the help it can get.

I have no idea how did they even think that episode 1-3 would be considered good when all jokes were falling flat! Did they not do a quality check?

Now that the opportunity for humour is missed, I hope they can execute suspense/thriller aspects well.

They say the best action directors can come up with the softest romantic scenes... this script needed that!

Not big on ratings but I can understand why word of mouth around TKEM is bad.

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They have roped in another producer for this drama. Unfortunately, they can't do anything to save the chemistry between the two leads

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The ratings for The King is disappointing, but i believe this low rating is really justified as this drama still havent delivered the best yet. They have so much potential but i feel like some scenes they are not even trying to.
Just using LMH will not save the show. There is so much more to a drama than one actor to be focused on. LMH is doing his normal acting and i dont have much expectations from him.No complaints against him.All other actors are also doing very well, but what about the direction, the writing, the editing? The beautiful cinematography also deserves some poetic lines, smooth transitions and engaging scenes. All episodes so far, the only engaging scenes are when the episode is about to end. Cut to the next episode, all of that is forgotten and we are left with cheesy romance between leads and they surely have some awkward lines to say too.
I wont be surprised if the show gets 5% in future, if they continue like this in future episodes.

PS:- Just had to rant,because episode 8 has some scenes which made me really angry.

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Since LMH's acting is not good in the drama, there is no way his pretty face will be able to save it. This drama is doomed IMO. The idea of the drama had so much potential, but the writing did not capitalize on it and is just a mess. Acting not good, no chemistry between any of the characters, production is lacking. The only nice thing about the drama is the scenery.

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For a titular character, LMH isn't even really given much to actually do in the past 8 Episodes. And even in scenes where he *could* have shown a bit more range, he's either totally wasted by poor writing and direction, or he's overshadowed by a better actor.

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Imo, Gon is written as calm and collected, unfortunately that also makes him boring because the others around him are more exciting.

Eg: Gon was overshadowed by more layered and complex Shinjae in ep 8. Same goes when he's in same scene with Eunsop and Joyoung, Gon blends into the background because the bickering doppelgangers were more fun to watch.

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The bigger problem, IMO, is that we aren't given that much layers into Gon's persona or mindset beyond the calm and controlled facade, or his mathematical approach to almost anything. Gon suffered severe trauma as a child, yet he grew up fine, and occasionally even bratty, thanks to the people around him. There seems to be a kind of lingering pain and building rage inside him, but we, as an audience, don't get to see that from him. I'm not sure if this is from a lack of acting range, direction or writing (or maybe all of the above).

Eg: The library scene with Yeong when Gon wonders why his saviour had never come forward. It could have been an opportunity, even briefly, to see the kind of pain and loneliness he had endured. Instead, it's Jo Yeong, whose eyes are full of sympathy, who shows us this. That brief "break" in Yeong's usual stoicism shows the audience the depth of their friendship, and the heart that drives this loyal bodyguard.

Gon also seems to suffer from PTSD, but again we only get to see it from Lady Noh's concerned words and Jeong's swift reaction.

Even in the scene where he bids goodbye to Tae-eul in Episode 6, there's barely any change in his reaction when she speaks his name.

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The productions failed in this drama. And what's with their CGI? And every moves they make there's PPL everywhere. I think this is the drama of all time with most PPL. CLOY had a lot of PPL's too but it's not like the King do they Just chicken and drink milk tea every time they met? Halfway of the drama but i don't know where it's going. The only thing I like is in Episode 8 when Yeong came to the Republic of Korea.
Kim Kyung Nam chemistry with Kim Go Eun is better than Lee Min Ho. I think this drama is better of without romance.

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Writing, directing, acting, editing, chemistry, likeability, angst, emotions etc2 play a part to make a drama or variety show more engaging and viewers want to stay for more. However I noticed the quite consistent low ratings mid week. Therefore, a research was made to study this phenomenon.

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Objective
To search an explanation why dramas have lackluster ratings, especially the midweek dramas.

Method
Compare all show ratings: dramas, variety shows, news and more that share the same time slot.

Results and findings
1) dramas don't only compete with dramas, they also compete with variety shows, news and other shows.
2) A summary of some ratings (drama vs variety show (VS) in the same timeslot):
a) meow boy got 1 % vs VS 9%
b) memorist 2% vs VS 7%
c) find me in your memory 3% vs VS 9%
d) eternal monarch 8.6% vs 3MAD 9.3%
e) eternal monarch 8.1% vs knowing bros 15%

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Notes:
1. Variety show ratings are more flexible, ratings spike is common eg: Knowing Bros previous ep was 9ish%, this week the guest were Mr Trot contestants and the ratings jumped to 15%.
2. 3MAD new season started airing on Friday last week and got 9+% avg rating.
3. The highest rated cable show of all time is Mr Trot with a whooping 35%!

Conclusion:
Variety/other show ratings do have an impact to drama ratings. Drama ratings and variety show ratings should not be treated as separate lists, as it gives an impression that a drama/show is flunking without any competition.

End of research.

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Most impressive. Other factors to consider are holidays. It was Children's Day last week (May 5th) so people may have been gathering with family instead of watching dramas.

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To make a long story short, this is a bad drama and that is the main reason the ratings are low. Just check out the forums and the thumbs down on Netflix and the low star ratings as well. People just do not like the drama and are writing comments that they do not like it.

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Errr..what drama now? 🤔

This is a general observation. Refer the objective of the research and also my first comment and the comment below. To be clear the intention of this research was not to conclude a drama is automatically bad because of low ratings. There are lots of underrated but awesome dramas.

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With that said....Don't blame variety shows or other shows for a drama lackluster ratings because of lackluster writing plot, directing etc. Refer the first sentence in the first paragraph: Writing, directing, acting, editing, chemistry, likeability, angst, emotions etc2 play a part to make a drama or variety show more engaging and viewers want to stay for more.

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Since the quarantine the ratings for most dramas are really low, I wonder why since they suppose to be at home and it's likely to watch TV but it seems not like I think of.
Poor SBS, they thought they can gain benefits since writer's drama always get sky-rocket ratings and viewers but I have to admit that the story and editing are very bad compare the previous dramas.
And Lee Min Ho! Poor him not lucky as Joon Ki with the drama post military service :(

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But the ratings for the King are still the lowest on the major networks. Regardless of whether people are watching less dramas, they are watching the King the least of all compared to the other networks.

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You can sell or promote the drama as much as you want, but at the end if you cannot deliver the promised quality in terms of research, acting, chemistry, directing and editing, there is nothing you can do, except watch the drama lack behind other dramas, in terms of viewership and ratings.

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That's true. I don't really like Heirs too but it got high ratings than King.

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One question for the ratings displayed on public channels, are the ratings for the highest for the double % counted? As in Find Me in Your Memory for episode 29 is 2.6% and episode 30 is 2.8%, do the official channels count episode 30 (2.8%) as their rating? I assume they don't combine them, and take the highest rating.

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They take and post the part with highest rating. It's a marketing strategy, that how they attract advertisers.

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Thanks for the reply! So basically these channels post both ratings but in actuality, the episode with the highest rating is the actual rating/one that they only count in the end?!

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I'm happy for Soul repairer and When my love blooms. I am really enjoying both currently!!

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