Netflix's Addams Family spinoff Wednesday has beaten its first-week record high weekly viewing time stat with its second-week performance, with the Jenna Ortega series set to become a mainstay on the record charts. This success already has the show in the top three of the English-language rankings.
In 2020, it was revealed that Tim Burton would be working on a new addition to the Addams Family franchise. This unnamed project morphed into a spin-off commissioned by Netflix and centered on Wednesday, the daughter of the family and the character that audiences over the years seemed to latch on to the most.
This was proven when the first official Wednesday trailer was released to much fanfare and anticipation. Now, Netflix has confirmed Wednesday once again set an impressive record, netting a whopping 752.52 million hours of view time in less than 2 full weeks on Netflix. Around 411 million of those watch hours came in the show’s first week on the platform, a feat that has only ever been matched by Squid Game, another insanely popular addition to Netflix's roster.
This impressive run places Wednesday just below Dahmer, the Jeffrey Dahmer documentary that similarly drew record-setting Netflix audience viewership when it aired. Signs seem to point to Wednesday eventually surpassing Dahmer, with the show’s viewership seemingly set to be galvanized by viral memes and videos on social media that all seem unanimous in their praise of the series, with a special focus on appreciation for Ortega's performance in the titular role. This appreciation aligns well with the critical reception, which also lauded Ortega's performance as the standout in mostly positive reviews.
The show’s endearing murder mystery meets coming-of-age horror-comedy has proven far more enjoyable than perhaps even the cast expected. More importantly to some viewers, the show seems to have succeeded as an adaptation, even holding higher Rotten Tomatoes rankings than the majority of previous Addams Family adaptations, many of which are held dear by the fans.
While the success has been encouraging for everyone involved, a contingent of fans believes that the Wednesday series misses what makes the Addams Family special and resembles a more contemporary show as seen on modern networks like the CW. Whether these criticisms are valid or just a side effect of adaptation fatigue remains to be seen.
Wednesday is available for streaming on Netflix.
Source: Netflix