The latest addition to the world of police procedural dramas soared near the top of television rankings as the first season of “NCIS: Sydney”—a spin-off of its ultra popular namesake show—enjoyed a strong run on the broadcast charts in recent months when it moved stateside to fill programming gaps left by last year’s actors and writers strikes.
Key facts
- “NCIS: Sydney,” the fourth spin-off from the original “NCIS” series, first premiered on Paramount+ in Australia last year before making the move to American CBS airwaves in November to fill the regular Tuesday night “NCIS” slot after strike-related production delays.
- Starting with its premiere on Nov. 14, “NCIS: Sydney” was regularly among the most-watched programs on broadcast television, averaging 5 million viewers per week and drawing between 4.7 million and 5.5 million, Nielsen data shows.
- The series finale, which aired on Jan. 23, was the 10th most-popular broadcast program of the week, falling only to NFL conference championship programming, “Chicago Med,” “Chicago Fire,” “60 Minutes,” “Chicago PD” and “Law And Order: SVU.”
- In its eight-episode run, “NCIS: Sydney” regularly beat other top-ranking shows like “The Masked Singer,” “Shark Tank” and “Celebrity Jeopardy!” and in four of its eight weeks, “NCIS: Sydney” outranked everything on broadcast television with the exception of NFL programming and staple shows “60 Minutes,” “The Voice,” “Survivor” and “Dancing with the Stars.”
- CBS says the show reached nearly 24 million unique viewers in its first season, and was the network’s No. 1 primetime entertainment series based on multi-platform viewing.
What we don’t know
A second season of the spin-off has not been confirmed despite the cliff-hanging final episode.
Key background
Viewers have flocked to police procedurals for decades. The fascination can largely be traced back to the 1950s show “Dragnet,” which was regularly beaten only in the rankings by “I Love Lucy,” according to the New York Times.
The popularity of crime drama continued through the years with shows like “Starsky & Hutch,” “Hill Street Blues” and “Cagney & Lacey” in the 1970s and 80s.
The modern-day version of such series broke onto the scene in the 1990s and early 2000s with “Law & Order, “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation,” “The Wire” and “Criminal Minds.”
Today, shows like “Law & Order: SVU,” “Chicago PD” and “FBI” are regularly toward the top of the ratings charts. Police procedurals are also the exception to the rule when it comes to the wishy-washy success of spin-off series.
Of the four series that have spun off from NCIS, two are still running, and the others, “NCIS: New Orleans” and “NCIS: Los Angeles,” ran for seven and 14 seasons, respectively.
“Law & Order: SVU,” the first spin-off to “Law & Order,” is one of the longest-running live-action series in the United States. “Law and Order: Criminal Intent” and “CSI: Miami” ran for 10 seasons and “CSI: NY” ran for 9 seasons.
In the week of Jan. 22 to Jan. 28, the most recent Niselen ratings data available, “Chicago PD,” “Law & Order: SVU,” “Law & Order,” “Law & Order: Organized Crime,” “FBI,” and “FBI: Most Wanted” were all in the top 40 most-watched shows of the week.
Surprising fact
“NCIS” is itself a spin-off of the show “JAG,” which ran from 1997 to 2005.
Big number
39.4 billion. That’s how many minutes viewers streamed the original “NCIS” on Netflix and Paramount+ last year, making it the third most-streamed program of the year, according to Nielsen data.
“Suits” and the children’s show “Bluey” were the only shows that scored more viewing time. More than 450 episodes of “NCIS” have aired.
Tangent
“NCIS: Sydney” follows a joint task force of NCIS agents and Australian Federal Police that investigates crimes usually related to American military personnel.
“NCIS: Sydney” follows the same pattern as similar shows like its original series, “CSI: Crime Scene Investigation” or “Law & Order”—a lack of originality that showrunner and creator Morgan O’Neill told the New York Times is by design.
“If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it,” he said. “NCIS: Sydney” isn’t the only “NCIS” spin-off currently running. “The third season of “NCIS: Hawai’i” (Vanessa Lachey, Yasmine Al-Bustami, LL Cool J) will premiere on Monday. The show’s release was delayed due to last year’s Hollywood strikes.
This article was first published on forbes.com and all figures are in USD.
