Love Island kicked off its new series this week as a new batch of singletons headed into the famous Mallorcan villa ready for a summer of love.
But it could be trouble in paradise for the ITV2 dating show, as ratings for this season have already begun to plummet on the second episode – which saw the first dramatic recoupling of the series.
Monday night's premiere episode boasted a peak of 1,543,000 live viewers, according to The Sun, which is one million down on 2022. While the second episode saw a mere 1,111,000 viewers tuning in live on Tuesday.
ITV has confirmed that Monday's launch ratings grew to 1.7 million when viewing figures for its streaming service, ITVX, were included.
It's a far cry from popular seasons of the past, such as the series four finale – which drew in 3.4M viewers for it's live finale.
It seems that ITV boss Kevin Lygo isn't too worried about the prominent dip, as he has previously insisted that TV ratings aren't the primary focus.
Speaking previously at the Edinburgh TV Festival, he said: "This is a pattern you see when new programmes come along and they’re huge phenomenons. On catch-up, it’s the best-performing series ever.
"Who would think you could invent a programme that runs every night at 9pm for eight weeks and keep viewers, especially young viewers who are hard to find now?"
While the public may not be tuning in, there has already been some drama inside the villa after episode two saw new bombshell Zachariah Noble couple up with Catherine Agbaje, 22, stealing her from André Furtado in the first dramatic twist.
The hunky bombshell, 25, who arrived with presenter Maya Jama following a night of playing dares in the villa, had 24 hours to decide on who he wanted to share a bed with and get to know better.
While he spent some time getting to know everyone, it appeared he had the closest connections with Catherine and Ella Thomas, 23.
While Andre dusted off his wounds during Wednesday's episode by heading on a date with new girl Whitney Adebayo -it appears the drama is only just getting started.
In a first look for the upcoming fourth episode, things appeared to heat after Molly Marsh and bombshell Zachariah Noble share a kiss during a challenge.
The clip saw the pair share the smooch, after Zach was told to kiss the islander he wanted to have a "sneaky link" and picked Molly. In a second clip, Molly could be seen talking about the kiss to another islander, as she said: "I didn't expect that at all. Zach's a good kisser you know."
It could be the first bump in the road for the actress and Mitchel Taylor, who she is currently coupled up with and appears to be growing close to.
READ MORE:
- Click here for today's top Love Island news
Love Island fans ask where 'missing' Islander is as they're labelled 'furniture'
Source: Read Full Article
