TV Ratings: ‘TKO: Total Knock Out’ Has So-So Launch on CBS

By Joe Otterson

LOS ANGELES (Variety.com) – The series premiere of the competition series “TKO: Total Knockout” was something of a mixed bag on CBS Wednesday night.

The Kevin Hart-hosted series averaged a mediocre 0.9 in adults 18-49 and 4 million viewers, airing at 9 p.m. in the post-“Big Brother” time slot. While by no means a breakout, the show still tied for number one in the key demo in its time slot and scored the largest premiere audience for a new alternative series this summer.

Earlier on , “Big Brother” (1.5, 5.4 million) bounced back from its 4th of July dropoff and was handily the top-rated show of the night. At 10, “Code Black” (0.8, 5.7 million) was also up from the holiday last week.

An “America’s Got Talent” clip show drew a 0.9 and 5.9 million viewers on NBC. A new episode of “Reverie” ( 0.4, 2.4 million) was up in total viewers from its last new episode two weeks ago.

On Fox, both “MasterChef” (0.9, 3.3 million) and “Gordon Ramsay’s 24 Hours to Hell and Back” (0.9, 3.1 million) ticked down from their last original episodes.

On The CW, “The Originals” (0.2, 0.75 million) was down in the demo.

ABC aired only repeats.

CBS won the night with a 1.0 and 5 million viewers. Fox was second in the demo with a 0.9 but third in viewers with 3.2 million. NBC was third in the demo with a 0.7 but was second on viewers with 4.7 million. ABC was fourth overall with a 0.5 and 2.3 million viewers. The CW averaged a 0.2 and 775,000 viewers.