What a mess this would've been if they left us hanging with all those unanswered questions.

@Thebridge said:

What a mess this would've been if they left us hanging with all those unanswered questions.

I guess it's an indication of how many choices there are now, but in spite of its deceptively low ratings Colony is the number one scripted drama in its time slot. And apparently USA employs some type of supplemental ratings service that estimates contributions from DVR viewers, streaming services, iTunes, and even (gasp!) illegal downloads, instead of relying exclusively on the rather outdated Nielsen system. When all that is taken into account I understand the numbers look quite good. Hence the renewal.

Yay. so happy. I know so many people who watch it, I couldn't understand the low ratings. Even Mad Men had low ratings for the first few seasons. Then word of mouth seemed to pick up. You know the line, "One of the best shows you've never heard about" type of thing where people hear about it for the first time and give it a try.

@Thebridge said:

Yay. so happy. I know so many people who watch it, I couldn't understand the low ratings. Even Mad Men had low ratings for the first few seasons. Then word of mouth seemed to pick up. You know the line, "One of the best shows you've never heard about" type of thing where people hear about it for the first time and give it a try.

From what I understand the offering of season 1 on Netflix more than doubled the audience for the show, and most of those had never heard of it before. They thought it was a Netflix original series. One thing USA needs to do more of is advertising on other stations, the way networks like AMC and Syfy do. Colony is not typical of USA's programming, so ironically the best place to reach its target demographic is elsewhere. For years TV studios have relied on the Nielsen ratings system which sticks exclusively to viewers of the real-time broadcast. Thirty years ago that's pretty much all there was. These days of course, there are many other options. Ignoring those gives you an imperfect picture at best. Science fiction and horror content in particular appeals to a more tech savvy viewership. So the percentage who download or stream instead of parking themselves in front of the tube during prime time is greater than average.

That's how I found it, Netflix.

@Thebridge said:

That's how I found it, Netflix.

Proof that USA needs to do a much better job advertising. I first read an article about the show while season 1 was still in production, and thought it sounded interesting. Otherwise I probably would've discovered it on Netflix too.