According to 'Real' Ratings, People Actually Liked The Idol Finale
It looks like Levinson's finale is not so bad after all.
HBO's The Idol has quickly become one of the most popular television series of the summer, and it's highly unlikely that any other show will steal that title in the coming months. However, the amount of attention the show is currently enjoying is actually less than positive, as fans have been hating on The Idol since the first episode, arguing that the amount of nudity and violent content makes the series completely unbearable to watch.
But it looks like creators Sam Levinson and The Weeknd have at least managed to salvage the situation in the show's finale.
The story of rising pop star Jocelyn being corrupted by sleazy cult leader Tedros led many people to accuse Levinson of predatory behavior, arguing that seeing Tedros treat Jocelyn inhumanely proved the creator was siding with the cult leader, not the pop star. However, the final episode of the show revealed that Jocelyn was actually the real villain all along, using Tedros to her advantage.
Obviously, this twist is quite clever, changing the dynamic of the whole show while forcing fans to re-watch previous episodes. But even though many people have expressed their fondness for this episode online, the original IMDb rating for The Idol finale still sits at an abysmal 5.1.
That, however, doesn't mean that most viewers hated the episode, as IMDb's algorithms are notorious for lowering the ratings. Luckily, we can see the actual voting percentages right on The Idol's IMDb page — and not surprisingly, more than 55% of fans gave the finale a score of 10. And, considering that 13% gave it a 9, it becomes clear that most viewers really loved the last chapter in The Idol's story.
The actual user score for the final episode is 7.8 — much higher than the IMDb's official rating and quite a respectable number for a show as universally hated as The Idol. Only if Levinson and The Weeknd could have made every previous episode as good as the final one, the show would have gone down in history as a worthy successor to Euphoria.
Source: IMDb.