The recent ‘Plane Ride From Hell’ episode of Dark Side of the Ring pulled in the lowest viewership in the show’s history.
According to Showbuzz Daily, the show pulled in 153,000 viewers, with 96,000 in the 19-49 year old demographic. This is a rating of 0.07.
The previous episode which aired in June, focused on the Dynamite Kid, drew 242,000 viewers. That’s a drop of 36.77%.
It’s worth noting that the show was directly opposed by Thursday Night Football on the NFL Network. The Week 2 meeting between The New York Giants and Washington drew 7.7 million viewers.
The episode has sparked a great deal of controversy online after an air stewardess alleged that she was sexually harassed by Ric Flair.
The ‘Plane Ride From Hell’ took place following the UK exclusive pay-per-view Insurrextion in May 2002. During the now infamous flight, several performers were involved in incidents that would result in fines, lawsuits and, in the cases of Scott Hall and Curt Hennig, releases from the company.
Following the episode, A Car Shield commercial featuring Flair has been “paused.”
Tommy Dreamer has been indefinitely suspended by IMPACT Wrestling as a result of comments he made about the incident on the show.
Meanwhile, former WWE Superstar Maria Kanellis has called for change in WWE following the documentary.
Writing on Twitter, Kanellis initially hit out at what she saw as the culture within WWE during that period. In a follow up Tweet, Kanellis said that “playing dumb kept her safe,” adding that “we were all afraid in WWE.”