A.D. The Bible Continues debuted on NBC last night and had the highest premiere ratings for a new drama series on the network this season.
The episode earned a 2.3 rating in the 18-49 demographic with 9.5 million viewers tuning into the show. A.D. serves as a sequel to 2013’s The Bible that was also executive produced by Mark Burnett and Roma Downey. However, A.D. could not top the original series’ premiere ratings, which drew a 3.3 demo rating and 13.1 million viewers on the History cable network. The Bible managed to retain most of its viewers for the remainder of the miniseries, with 11.7 million viewers for the final episode.
A.D. did not greatly help NBC’s other new drama that premiered after it on Easter Sunday. American Odyssey debuted with a 1.2 demo rating and 5.4 million viewers, which was about half the amount of people who watched A.D.
ABC decided to compete with NBC’s premiere of A.D. by showing its annual airing of 1956’s The Ten Commandments on Easter Sunday instead of the Saturday night before the holiday. It pulled in 6.8 million viewers and an average demo rating of 1.4.
