"Zero Day" leads streaming charts in political thrillers

Political thrillers are very popular right now. This is shown in the Nielsen streaming charts for February 17 to 23. The show Zero Day, starring Robert De Niro, debuted and took the top spot with 1.84 billion minutes viewed. The success of Zero Day was driven mainly by viewers aged 50 and older, who accounted for 63% of the watch time. Zero Day outperformed the third season of Reacher, which had 1.81 billion minutes viewed. This is notable since all episodes of Zero Day were new. Reacher's new episodes were popular too. Nielsen reported that 78% of its views came from the three new episodes. Reacher still has 16 episodes available, giving it an edge in the rankings. Most viewers of Reacher, 58%, were male. Other shows like The Night Agent and Paradise did not make the overall list but did feature in the streaming originals Top 10. The Night Agent took eighth place with 619 million minutes viewed, while Paradise was ninth with 502 million. Severance and The White Lotus also performed well with 649 million and 736 million minutes, respectively. In a separate highlight, Saturday Night Live made its first-ever Nielsen streaming chart appearance. The 50th anniversary special encouraged viewers to watch past episodes, particularly from Season 50. About 68% of the streaming viewing during this time focused on these episodes.