Looks like Simon Cowell may have to eat his words. The much-hyped series premiere of FOX’s new singing competition “The X Factor” debuted to numbers well below expectations last night.
I’m sure this was a massive disappointment not just for FOX who spent millions marking it, but Cowell’s ego who predicted that his new should be the highest rated show on television.
To make matters worse, the show’s premiere also lost viewers throughout its two-hour run and placed third in the 9 o’clock hour behind “Criminal Minds” and “Modern Family,” which was the night’s top-rated show.
“X Factor’s” 8.7 overnight rating was almost 40% lower from the 14.2 rating garnered by the “American Idol” premiere in January. In fact, it was only 18% higher than Zooey Deschanel’s new comedy “New Girl” Tuesday night.
“If I didn’t think we could — and its not just ‘Idol’, it’s any show — we don’t enter something for the silver medal,” said the extremely confident Cowell in August. “You do it because you want to be number one, and for the next few months we are going to throw everything at this to try and make it the best show on TV.”
There’s no doubt that his bold prediction could still happen, but when you trip out of the gate like this, catching up becomes much more of a challenge. At this point, we can only see “X Factor” keeping pace but never taking the lead.