The Walking Dead Tops 2015 TV And Social Media Nielsen Lists

In case you couldn't tell by the fact that each new episode is spoiled for you before it's even over, AMC's The Walking Dead, based on Robert Kirkman and Charlie Adlard's Image Comics series of the same name, is a huge hit on social media.

Nielsen now has the numbers to prove it. The series is a huge hit both on the air and online, with Nielsen reporting that it's the top scripted show on TV yet again.

The Walking Dead's Live+7 estimates through mid-November, made it the No. 1 entertainment series of the year in adults 18-49 and adults 18-34 and trailed only NBC's Sunday Night Football and CBS' The Big Bang Theory and NCIS in total viewers. It averaged 19.7 million viewers per episode, Variety reports.

Those CBS numbers are meaningful to comic book fans, too -- not just because The Big Bang Theory tends to have a lot of crossover appeal but because both TBBT and NCIS score big numbers outside of the demo en route to being two of the most-watched shows on TV. CBS has similar outside-the-demo success with Supergirl.

The Walking Dead was the year's top show on Twitter, too, according to Nielsen numbers. The venerable organization finally started collecting social media mentions a couple of years ago after long-running complaints that the "Neilsen household" counting method wasn't efficient or accurate.

The Walking Dead was also the most time-shifted television program of 2015. When comparing its viewership done same-day vs. that done within a week of a telecast, Nielsen estimates the series gained almost 11 million viewers in a week's worth of VOD and DVR playback, followed by Big Bang (9.40 million).