Game of Thrones came roaring back to life on Sunday.
The HBO smash’s Season 4 premiere attracted a series-high 6.6 million viewers — making it the cabler’s most watched program since The Sopranos’ finale in 2007 (11.9 million viewers).
Per HBO, the opener improved 52 percent and 23 percent off of last season’s premiere and finale, respectively.
Leading out of Thrones at 10/9c, the debut of Silicon Valley averaged 2 million viewers, the largest launch for a half-hour on HBO in nearly five years (since Hung‘s 2.8 million viewers in 2009). The Season 3 opener of Veep, meanwhile, averaged 955,000 viewers, down 3 percent from the Season 2 finale and off sharply from both its Season 1 (1.4 mil) and Season 2 (1.2 mil) premieres.
Over on Showtime, Shameless‘ shocking Season 4 finale drew a season-high 1.93 million total viewers — up 18 percent from its previous finale, and up 23 percent from its January opener. With encores, the show amassed 2.8 mil.
Leading out of that, House of Lies‘ own season ender drew 731,000 viewers (and 1.4 mil for the night), up 16 percent from its sophomore finale.
