Sony’s Twisted Metal TV series has earned a spot among Peacock’s top original series after scoring the streamer’s “most-binged” comedy premiere thus far.
According to a report from Deadline, people raced to stream Peacock’s new Twisted Metal TV series when it premiered on July 27, with NBCUniversal revealing the average subscriber watched roughly three episodes in a single sitting, while others opted to binge-watch the entire 10-episode season in one viewing.
It’s safe to say Peacock’s video-game adaptation starring Anthony Mackie as John Doe is off to a great start, with Nielsen data showing the series racked up a massive 400M viewing minutes in the weekend following its debut on the platform, making it one of the most-watched streaming originals that week.
Twisted Metal also shot up the charts to become one of the top five original series launched on Peacock to date, ranking alongside other popular titles such as Bel Air, The Best Man: Final Chapters, Poker Face, and Based on a True Story.
The show’s success may come as somewhat of a surprise after fans of the cult PlayStation franchise expressed mixed feelings about the series prior to its release. One clip that raised eyebrows among viewers showed Mackie’s character getting smacked around by Sweet Tooth before pausing to sing Sisqó’s “Thong Song”.
However, Twisted Metal is more than just a comedy series. It sees a “motor-mouthed outsider offered a chance at a better life, but only if he can successfully deliver a mysterious package across a post-apocalyptic wasteland”, which, according to Mackie, raises a topical political issue about real-life “class wars”.
IGN’s review of the Twisted Metal TV series gave it a solid 8/10 score, praising the show for using the games’ crude humour as a springboard to create “its own dark and warped wasteland sensibilities” and ultimately deliver “a miraculously enjoyable blend of comedy, violence, and thoughtfulness” across the ten episodes.
Adele Ankers-Range is a freelance entertainment writer for IGN. Follow her on Twitter.