The ratings for the season three finale of Game of Thrones are in a day early this week. The Hollywood Reporter broke the news: the initial airing of “Mhysa” delivered 5.4 million viewers. James Hibberd of EW notes that this is up 28% over last year’s finale.

TVByTheNumbers has the details: 5.393 million watched at 9 PM with another 879k tuning in at 11 PM, for a total of 6.272 million on the night.

Winter Is Coming: Surprised it didn’t top 5.5 million, I guess that will have to wait until the season 4 premiere. Overall, the numbers this season have been a huge success. And the announcement that Thrones recently became HBO’s second most-watched show ever means that the show is not going anywhere.

UPDATE: In addition, the season finale has set a new piracy record with over a million downloads in less than 24 hours; this according to TorrentFreak.