America Loves 'Doctor Who' Too

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By Amanda Wills2013-08-07 19:36:54 UTC

Step aside, Trekkies — the Whovians are taking over the world of sci-fi fandom. The BBC's surprise unveiling of Peter Capaldi as Doctor Who's 12th Time Lord smashed social media records in the United States on Sunday, proving the British series' popularity stretches across the pond.

In the U.S., the Doctor Who live special was the No. 1 telecast in social media for Sunday (excluding sports), according to data from Trendrr.TV, Tumblr Analytics and Union Metrics.

See also: 'Doctor Who' Explained in 25 GIFs

Doctor Who 's current star, Matt Smith, announced in June that this year's Christmas special will be his last episode as the 11th Time Lord. Showrunner Steven Moffat told Entertainment Weekly last month that he would reveal Smith's successor "within days of finalizing the new Doctor." The BBC announced the live special just three days before it aired, and Moffat's crew kept a tight lid on the big secret.

The announcement ran during primetime in the UK, but it was the middle of a weekend afternoon on the East Coast, making these rankings even more surprising. According to BBC America, Doctor Who Live raked in 895,000 total viewers — one of the network's most-watched telecasts outside of primetime, second only to the Royal Wedding.

At the height of Twitter activity, six out of the 10 trending topics in the U.S. were related to the 12th Doctor's reveal. The graph below shows Who-related tweets per minute on Aug. 4 leading up to the announcement (in BST):

Twitter wasn't the only social hot spot for Whovians. The official Doctor Who Tumblr accrued 11.84 million views and fans created 3 million Who-related reblogs on Sunday alone. Mashable live blogged the announcement, drawing more than 10,000 very passionate Whovian commenters.

As expected, the live special was a success in the UK as well. The announcement triggered 542,000 tweets, averaging 9,000 tweets per minute. As Peter Capaldi was revealed as the next Doctor, tweets jumped to 22,081 per minute — the highest TV tweet minute peak recorded this year, according to the BBC.

What did you think of the reveal of the 12th Time Lord? If you watched, did you share on social media? Tell us in the comments below.

Image: Mashable composite, BBC

Topics: BBC, BBC America, Doctor Who, Entertainment, ratings, Television, TV Ratings, Twitter