‘the titan games’ starts strong; ‘gotham’ slips in final season opener, ‘s. W. A. T. ’ eyes ratings highs

NBC took Thursday in the demo as its _The Titan Games_ (1.8, 6.50M) launch scored the network’s best demo performance in the slot, excluding sports in nearly two years. Marking a second

strong unscripted series start this week, the Dwanye Johnson-hosted series launch handed NBC its first ever nightly win for a non-sports Thursday against an original T_he Big Bang Theory_

(2.2, 12.55M) on CBS. _BBT_ topped the night in both metrics. But _Titan Games_ edged CBS’s original _Young Sheldon_ (1.7, 10.89M), Fox’s _Gotham_ premiere (0.7, 2.58M) and _The Orville_

(0.6, 2.82M). _Gotham’s_ final season starter slid slightly, while _The Orville’_s move to its regular timeslot dropped 9/10th relative to  Sunday’s NFL-fueled season starter, to mark a new

series low. Over on CBS, _Both Big Bang Theory_ and _Young Sheldon_ had moved up 1/10th over last episode. WATCH ON DEADLINE Following _Titan Games,_ NBC’s 10 PM _The Blacklist_ debut (0.9,

5.95M) tied CBS’s _S.W.A.T._ (0.9, 5.95M), which climbed 2/10th from most recent episode and is poised to hit season highs. At 9 PM, ABC’s special T_he Last Days of John F. Kennedy Jr._

(0.7, 5.44M) drew the network’s biggest non-sports audience to the 2-hour time period in one year,building on its lead-in: back to back _The Connors_ repeats (0.7, 3.77M; 0.6, 3.51M) CBS

(1.3, 8.119M) owned the night in total viewers, but NBC (1.5, 5.732M) took the demo win.  ABC (0.7, 4.841M) was No. 3 for the night, followed by Fox (0.6, 2.699M) and CW (0.2, 687K), which

had aired repeats of _Supernatural_ (0.2, 760K)) and _Legacies_ (0.2, 610K).