"Black-ish" Premiere Ratings Almost Equal to "Modern Family"

It hardly seems possible that the 21-time Emmy-Award-winning comedy series Modern Family could have any competition. But ABC has found it's counterpart, Black-ish, which premiered after Modern Family Wednesday and its ratings aren't looking all that bad!

According to Nielsen estimates, now covering the 9:30 p.m. slot, Black-ish drew in a 3.3 rating with adults 18-49 and 10.8 million viewers in live-plus-same-day figures. Modern Family averages a 3.7 rating with adults 18-49 and nearly 11 million viewers in live-plus-same-day figures.

Did the provocative title about an African-American family make the ratings, or did the starring role for Anthony Anderson gain viewers?

ABC has tried to match their Modern Family golden child with similar family comedies. The Goldbergs moved to Tuesday night and ABC also has Nashville to up their network ratings, though it dropped 1.5 ratings with adults 18-49, a 25 percent drop from last year's episode.

They were the top shows of the night in the 18-49, 25-54 total viewers.

Digging into the new comedy series, creator Kenya Barris tells the Washington Post: "There's been the diffusion of black culture to everyone else and there's been a diffusion of black culture from black culture."

The show depicts a family man (Anderson) struggling to gain a sense of cultural identity while raising his kids in an upper class white neighborhood of LA. Anderson plays Andre 'Dre' Johnson, an advertising exec. His biracial wife Rainbow Johnson (Tracee Ellis Ross) is an anesthesiologist.

"One of my favorite lines that Kenya wrote in the pilot, is the white kid is at [the black family's house], and he's looking for grape soda, and it's like, 'Why would you assume—' and he's like, 'Found it!'" writer Larry Wilmore explained. "That's kind of our relationship with appropriation. 'How come white people can't appreciate our thing?' 'Oh, they're appreciating our thing. How dare they take it away?'"

Comment below, what do you think of the series? Think it will stick around?