Emmy darling Mad Men was also the DVD sales darling its first week in release with nearly 100,000 units sold. Although, that's not a particularly impressive first week total. True Blood and 24 both had much more impressive first week sales.
I'd never heard of The State, the #2 DVD seller for the week. It aired on MTV about 15 years ago, way past my MTV viewing days.
2009's TV show DVD sales leader, True Blood: The Complete First Season, saw its unit sales increase 8% to just under 50,000 for the week. It keeps hanging on and is now the #15 DVD seller by revenue for the year. 24 is the only other TV show on the year's top 50 at #45.
Four other titles are near the bottom of the overall top 30 DVD sellers and could all be in the last week we will see their sales information. Weeds - Season Four has sold 414,000 units, and has been on our list 5 weeks out of the 7 its been on sale. Family Guy - Volume 7 has sold 406,480 in 5 weeks . Stargate Atlantis - The Complete Fifth Season unit sales dropped to 38,988 in its third week. In its third week, Entourage - The Complete Fifth Season unit sales fell 47% to 37,164.
Even though it was the first week of sales for ER - The Complete Eleventh Season it didn't appear on the top 30 seller list that we see. NHL: Stanley Cup 2008-2009 Champions: Pittsburgh Penguins fell off the list after only one week.
Next week we will see the opening week DVD sales numbers for Monk - Season Seven, Prison Break - The Final Break, Psych: The Complete Second Season, Pushing Daisies - The Complete Second Season, and Stargate SG-1: Children of the Gods.
US TV Show DVD Sales for Week Ending July 19, 2009
| Title | Units this Week | % Change | Total Units | Sales this Week | Total Sales | Weeks in Release |
| Mad Men: Season 2 | 94,774 | 94,774 | $3,173,981 | $3,173,981 | 1 | |
| The State: The Complete Series | 51,555 | 51,555 | $1,803,909 | $1,803,909 | 1 | |
| True Blood: The Complete First Season | 48,528 | 8.20% | 1,164,914 | $1,618,409 | $40,190,922 | 9 |
| Family Guy - Volume 7 | 40,279 | -1.10% | 406,480 | $836,998 | $10,701,008 | 5 |
| Stargate Atlantis - The Complete Fifth Season | 38,988 | 13.60% | 179,473 | $1,018,756 | $5,294,008 | 3 |
| Weeds - Season Four | 37,205 | -16.00% | 414,292 | $515,289 | $9,507,366 | 7 |
| Entourage - The Complete Fifth Season | 37,164 | -47.70% | 275,233 | $602,057 | $5,896,636 | 3 |
| 24 - Season Seven | 538,649 | $17,630,872 | 9 |
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You can see past weekly lists of TV Show DVD Sales numbers here.
Source: the-numbers.com
Hmm, it’ll almost certainly pass Sopranos’ Season 6.1 (44.2 mil), may or may not pass Heroes Season 1 (62 mil), and I can’t see it passing Planet Earth (147 mil). Still, impressive for a show that gets less than 4 million viewers. Or, wait, actually Planet Earth is on 2008′s bestselling list when sorting for revenue; if the two separate chartings means their cum is a sum, then that’s $179 mil. Which puts it among the top DVD’s overall.
Well, this isn’t TV, but impressive Potter-ness:
Harry 1 Worldwide Rental: 600 mil
[Others are US sales.] Harry 2: 237 mil
Harry 4: 216 mil
Harry 5: 220 mil
’twas the gays, teh gays I tell ya! They read on this site how vital they were to TRUE BLOOD’s success, and so they decided, hey, what’s this all about, maybe I should get the DVDs. You’ve created a self-fulfilling prophecy!
Dollhouse is coming…
I’d be curious what Mad Men did its first season. I was one of the people who missed it when it first aired and bought the DVD to catch up after the Emmy wave last year.They timed it well this time too with the premier not too far away.
The State…how fondly I remember the days when stoned college kids were MTV’s prime demo, as opposed to 15 year old alpha girls.
I hope Mad Men S2 continues to do well, they’re one of the few DVD’s where the commentary is informative enough to justify the purchase.
I just bought my copy of Dollhouse!
Could Dollhouse DVD do as good as the True Blood DVD?
To blame True Blood DVD sales on just gay people is ludicrous considering it’s obvious True Blood is so popular outside of its HBO audience.
Nothing on Pushing Daisies Season 2?
RJ, PD numbers come next week. I will update with the upcoming list in the post.
I just don’t get True Blood. I just watched the 7th ep of the first season, and I have NO idea how it’s as big as it is. It’s not bad acting, just…I don’t get it.
Dollhouse will not come close to True Blood’s numbers.
nkinsey said, “I just don’t get True Blood. I just watched the 7th ep of the first season, and I have NO idea how it’s as big as it is. It’s not bad acting, just…I don’t get it.”
It’s because it’s a very well written show past the 1st 4 episodes.
Don’t forget that Anna Paquin did win Best Actress forr her role as Sookie at the Golden Globes. Also, True Blood was nominated for Best Drama.
The same thing happened with Glenn Close and “Damamges” and they still struggling. “True Blood” is popular for one thing: SEX
It’s also well written and vampires are in at that moment. It’s like Twilight only better.
True Blood is just as well written as Buffy was!
YAYAYAYA for trueBlood It’s the best show Ive ever seen!!
As someone who watches Mad Men religiously, let me also just point out that it’s one of those shows with a hard-core following that might have a more front-loaded sale than most. So the solid-but-not-spectacular number might also be a little deceptive, it’ll take a few weeks to see.