“Roseanne” Has Highest Sitcom Ratings in Three Years

Tuesday night’s premiere of the Roseanne revival had the best Nielsen rating out of any sitcom in the last three years, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

The first two episodes, which aired on ABC, got a rating of about 18.1 million viewers. In contrast, its biggest competitor in that timeslot, The Voice on NBC, only scored 1.6 million. Particularly impressive is that 5.1 million viewers were in the all-important 18-49 demographic, which means that it is not just nostalgic older fans who are tuning in.

Originally airing from 1988 until 1997, Roseanne focuses on a lower middle-class family named the Conners, including the title character (played by Roseanne Barr), her husband Dan (John Goodman), her sister Jackie (Laurie Metcalf) and the children Becky (Lecy Goranson), Darlene (Sara Gilbert) and D.J. (Michael Fishman). With the new series, however, these kids are now grown up, with their own offspring as the snarky, lovable children.

The premiere focused on a few plotlines, all topical and some of which seem like they may continue throughout the nine-episode season. The first episode was largely about a feud that Roseanne and Jackie have been engaged in over politics; while names are not mentioned, Roseanne clearly voted for Trump while Jackie supported Hillary. The show took no side, but had fun with the pair sniping at each other with various political references (some a bit dated, but still). Ultimately, the two reconciled.

The second episode largely focused on Darlene’s son, Mark (named for his deceased uncle from the original run, who died along with his actor, Glenn Quinn). Mark likes to dress up in girls’ clothes, though he is decidedly not transgender; much of the conflict was about the various family members wondering how he would be treated in school as a result of this, with Mark choosing to suffer through any teasing.

A third storyline going through both episodes, and continuing beyond them, involves Becky. With her husband (the aforementioned Mark) dead and money tight, she has opted to be a surrogate mother for $50,000. Roseanne and Dan disapprove, because the child will be conceived with Becky’s own egg, meaning that she will be selling her child. In a neat twist, the woman paying for the baby, Andrea, is played by Sarah Chalke, who shared the part of Becky with Goranson in the older seasons.