Tracy Morgan's New Comedy Is Crushing In All The Ways, And I Need Everyone To Keep Watching

Recent years have been a struggle for network TV comedies, with seemingly fewer than ever, both on the new and returning side, to compete with an endless number of streaming options. The silver lining, at least, is that the majority of the 30-minute time slots on the 2026 TV schedule are filled with top-tier efforts, from St. Denis Medical to Ghosts to — [cue Daniel Radcliffe miming a happy trombone] — The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins. Tracy Morgan’s latest is already among his greatest, critically speaking, and it’s thankfully gaining an attentive audience.

For those still unaware, Reggie Dinkins stars Morgan as a former athlete whose career scandalously imploded, making life more difficult for his agent and ex-wife Monica (Erika Alexander) and his luxury-loving son Carmelo (Jalyn Hall). In steps documentary filmmaker Arthur Tobin (Daniel Radcliffe) to bring Reggie back to his former glory, despite having his own fall from grace (that involves a great on-screen meltdown from Radcliffe). Also, Bobby Moynihan is in the mix and is absolutely amazing.

Everyone should be watching this thing, and it looks like a lot of people are, so let’s talk about it.

Reggie Dinkins Is My Favorite Robert Carlock Co-Creation Since 30 Rock

Just to quickly champion this thing for anyone who hasn't seen it yet, The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins is another match made in comedic heaven between Tracy Morgan and 30 Rock co-creator Robert Carlock (who co-created the new NBC show with Sam Means). It's as silly and reality-skewing as everything in the creative team's filmography, including Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, and peppers runtimes with so many jokes that pausing and rewinding can be necessary.

Even though it's the umpteenth mockumentary series to hit network TV, and though that format is inherent to the hilarity, every character immediately feels fleshed out and familiar, which allows for the jokes to fly without tons of needless set-up. Plus, any time the footage jumps back to a previous cringe-laden point in Reggie's career, it's automatic gold. If this show was only Tracy Morgan pronouncing words with five or more syllables while Erika Alexander gets increasingly frustrated, it'd still be a winner.

Reggie DInkins' Audience Numbers Are Solid

Unlike most winter debuts, The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins dropped more than a month ahead of the season's official start for a prime post-NFL time slot. The ep brought in a highly impressive 5.8 million Live + Same Day viewers, with an even more impressive 1.4 demo rating with viewers aged 18-49. Also at the time, it was noted as being NBC's biggest comedy series premiere in the three years since Night Court.

Now, according to Variety, the premiere episode has racked up nearly 13 million views across delayed viewing, the time-slot repeat, and those streaming via Peacock subscription. That marks a viewership gain that surpasses 100% across the episode's first 50 days.

Naturally, the follow-up eps in the regular Monday night slots without the NFL lead-in haven't done quite as well as the premiere, but also haven't been too shabby. The premiere's repeat hit 3.8 million, with the second episode following it up with a 2.63 million viewers. That number dipped again, with the third episode bringing in 1.96 million viewers.

That said, Variety also pointed to Peacock reporting that Reggie Dinkins' second episode, "Nittany Means Big," is currently the platform's most-watched comedy episode of the 2025-2026 TV season. Which would seemingly put it somewhere over the 3-million mark. Better than the numbers for shows airing at the same time on Fox and The CW, but still trailing its direct competition, CBS' DMV, which brought in 2.89 million.

Everyone Still Needs To Keep Watching!

Despite some of those totals noted above being solid for a broadcast TV comedy, that's no reason for anyone to assume that they're going to 100% stay so high for the rest of the season. I mean, the evidence is already there that the live audience watching on Monday nights has dropped. Which is a perfectly normal pattern for nearly every TV show in existence. But the point is to keep that number from getting any lower.

It sounds like enough fans are watching on Peacock to make up for it, at least for now, but I cannot stress enough how important it is for everyone to hype the bejesus out of this show to make sure NBC knows to renew it ASAP and keep Reggie Dinkins' sordid existence in our faces for as long as can be.

The Fall and Rise of Reggie Dinkins airs Monday nights on NBC at 8:30 p.m. ET.