The USA Network miniseries Helen of Troy, which was entirely shot in Malta last summer, averaged 4.1 million viewers when it was aired on prime-time TV in the US on Easter Sunday and Monday, according to Variety News.
Local televiewers should be able to watch the series on Italy's Mediaset next autumn.
Produced by Fuel Entertainment and directed by John Kent Harrison, the viewership marked a 70 per cent increase on the USA's season average of 2.5 million viewers for the same time slots.
The first part of Helen nabbed 4.3 million viewers and was the top-rated cable programme on Easter Sunday. It did not, however, beat the following of USA Network's "Attila", which had seven million viewers in 2001.
The four-hour, two-part series, shot over a period of three months at Fort Ricasoli - where the set of Warner Bros' Troy has now been built - may not have received critical acclaim, but reviews commented positively about Malta as a location, which seems to be ideal to double as ancient Greece and Troy.
"Filmed in Malta, the sets and locales are not used to their full potential; almost non-existent are the splendiferous backdrops and widescreen beauty that viewers have come to expect thanks to Gladiator," said Variety.
"The Malta filming and pageantry are sweeping," according to the LA Times, which, however, goes on to say that "this Helen of Troy is so tragically bad, it's good".
In the reviews, the cast list includes local actors Manuel Cauchi in the role of Paris's father and Edward Mercieca. In fact, 23 speaking parts, around a third of the entire cast, went to Maltese actors, with about 8,000 extras days.
According to the New York Times TV review: "In every third scene or so, tunics are ripped either in battle, or in passion. The warfare scenes mimic Gladiator, without Ridley Scott's sombre shadows and flung mud. The love scenes borrow from soap operas, with the camera volleying back and forth between the stares of the amorous, who break the silence with utterances like 'Without you, I have nothing'."
The New York Times described the acting as empty-headed and the screenplay vacuous.
"The costumes are splendid, but not imaginative. The soundtrack seems inspired by both Enya and electro-clash. The landscapes are handsome, but marred with computer-enhanced fleets and phalanxes. The sets are expensive, but too reliant on pale pinks and blues," the critics said.
According to the Washington Post, Helen of Troy is "a long, silly Iliad".
For The Financial Times, "the storytelling is bland and desultory for the most part, and the battle scenes, of which there are too many, are seemingly endless".
"Perhaps it is just that the source material has been done so many different times and in so many different ways - including much better ones than this."
Moreover, there are no performances worth praising, although, to the credit of Harrison and writer Ronni Kern, there are a few arresting sequences over the course of the film.
Helen of Troy has also been described as "less a movie than a staring contest".
Other critics have said that as ambitious as it is, USA's Helen of Troy is "personality-free folklore, a stiff portrait of mythology that hides within the comfort zones of elaborate costuming, special effects and accents".
The story of Helen of Troy, the woman who pitted brother against brother, nation against nation, triggering a fierce, 10-year war between Greece and Troy just by looking great, has stimulated the minds of many other film-makers.
As actor Rufus Sewell, who played King Agamemnon, had told The Times: "What renders a story universal and eternal is the fact that it is about lust... about the quest for power... about men and women and what they want to do to each other.
"It is about a woman who drives men to do some crazy stuff, which is just as topical now as it was a long time ago. If you go to St Julian's at 2 a.m., there are plenty of mini Helens everywhere."
The reason why the story of Helen of Troy is still being told is because it is about "basic humanity - greed, lust and what drives us - which is the same as when we were living in caves. It is about wanting to possess and not wanting to share".
One of the first adaptations of Homer's epic tale of love and war dates back to 1956. And cameras are now rolling on Warner Bros' Troy, directed by Wolfgang Petersen with a stellar cast, including Brad Pitt in the role of Achilles and Orlando Bloom as Paris.