David Farnor | On 28, Dec 2014

The Walking Dead is the most talked-about TV show of 2014, according to Twitter.

The social network has a close link to the small screen, thanks to its real-time nature and use of hashtags to group discussions by topic. Indeed, the company has repeatedly positioned itself as the “social soundtrack to TV”, offering advertisers the chance to target fans of particular programmes, even during the hours of broadcast.

So Twitter’s recently released list of the most tweeted about TV shows in 2014 is a reliable indicator of the series that have generated the most conversation. The Walking Dead, which has just delivered a season featuring everything from shocking deaths to touching reunions, is a programme almost designed to spark buzz. As a result, AMC’s show has been the most tweeted-about by quite some margin, with an average of 576,000 tweets per episode – more than double its closest contender, The Bachelor (215,000 tweets per episode).

The US-centric nature of the chart mean that some series are ones that have significantly smaller followings in the UK – or are not shown at all – but there are many that are popular worldwide. Game of Thrones and American Horror Story: Freak Show are both in the top five most tweeted-about, followed by Teen Wolf (sixth) and Scandal (seventh).

 

 

Facebook has also released its own list of the most talked-about TV shows this year. While the social network is less associated with real-time reactions to TV shows, its more delayed discussion of programmes leads to a similar – but also distinct – array of series. Game of Thrones tops the list, with The Walking Dead in third, but other shows in the top 10 are perhaps less known for dramatic plot twists or shock killings.

Orange Is the New Black, for example, is in second place, a show that has spread largely by word of mouth (Facebook is arguably more suited to sharing than Twitter). Similarly, True Detective and The Big Bang Theory are in the top 10. The former, in particular, has been a hot topic of 2014, but is also one watched by comparatively fewer people – partly due to its short run and smaller nature of its broadcast (the show was on HBO).

Combined with seventh place Sons of Anarchy, which was released exclusively on VOD in the UK, the two lists present a rounded overall picture of the year’s most talked-about shows. With the highest overall aggregate rating, The Walking Dead is by some distance the most discussed programme of the year.

1. Game of Thrones
2. Orange is the New Black
3. The Walking Dead
4. The Big Bang Theory
5. Downton Abbey
6. American Horror Story
7. Sons of Anarchy
8. True Detective
9. How I Met Your Mother
10. Scandal

While there is no mention of Amazon’s Transparent, Penny Dreadful, Gotham, Arrow, The Flash, The Leftovers or Extant – which was bought out exclusively by Amazon in the UK, beating Netflix to the rights – it is also revealing that so many of the popular US shows are shown on Sky in the UK. Equally telling is that Pretty Little Liars, the third most tweeted-about show, has just been bought up by Netflix – a sign of just how important social media buzz is in the TV industry.

Click on any of the TV titles above to see where to watch them on VOD. For Game of Thrones, see Where can I watch Game of Thrones online? – or for AMC’s zombie series, see Where can I watch The Walking Dead online?.

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