Showtime kicked off new seasons of two original series last night, with the season premiere of the final string of Dexter episodes and the series premiere of the new drama Ray Donovan (read Allison’s recap here).  The Liev Schreiber-fronted series broke Showtime records, scoring the largest audience for an original series debut in the network’s history.  The show’s 1.35 million take eclipsed the previous record holder, Homeland, which nabbed 1.08 million viewers in its season one debut.

Dexter returned strong for its eighth and final season, scoring 2.5 million viewers and marking the show’s largest premiere audience ever.  That tops last season’s 2.4 million viewers, though it’s still down from the season seven finale’s 2.8 million viewers.