It seems like you can't go a week without hearing how Netflix keeps breaking its own records. The streaming giant has been on quite the roll throughout 2022 and is looking to close out the year with a similar showing. Several months ago, Stranger Things season four dominated the conversation online with a series of scenes that became meme fodder. Plus, it brought Kate Bush back into popular discourse and the Billboard charts. Shortly after Stranger Things was crowned king, Monster: The Jefferey Dahmer story briefly took the crown. Hell, The Crown even recorded some record viewership, too, after Queen Elizabeth's death.
However, there can only be one queen regarding viewership figures; and her name is Wednesday Addams. The Jenny Ortega-led Wednesday, created by Smallville masterminds Miles Millar and Alfred Gough, has turned everyone's favorite goth outcast into the new cultural "it girl." According to Variety, Wednesday now holds the record for the biggest second week of streaming in history.
After a string of records broken on the Netflix Top 10, "Wednesday" has arrived on the Nielsen Streaming Top 10 to do the same.
The Tim Burton-directed series starring Jenna Ortega as the iconic Addams family daughter was watched for nearly 6 billion minutes during the Nov. 21-27 viewing window, during which it was only available for the last five days. This marks the second biggest week of streaming ever recorded by Nielsen, following only the first full week of availability of "Stranger Things" Season 4, during which the series was watched for 7.2 billion minutes.
It's also presumable that "Wednesday" will best itself on the chart next week with the measurement of its first full week of availability. According to Netflix's self-reported numbers, the series jumped from 341.2 million hours watched in its first five days on the streamer to 411.3 million the following week. There's an obvious discrepancy due to Netflix and Nielsen's differing measurement methodologies (Netflix measures hours watched across all devices globally whereas Nielsen measured minutes watched on TV screens in the U.S. alone), but the trajectory will likely stay the same.
