In "House of Cards," Frank Underwood kills a congressman and pushes a reporter into the path of a Metro train. But at least among viewers of the Netflix hit series, the fictional president is still more popular than his real-life counterpart, Barack Obama, Reuters reported based on a poll it conducted with the market-research firm Ipsos.

Television presidents across the line seem to have an easier time gaining approval from their viewers than actual White House residents do among the voting populace, the March 5-19 survey showed. Josiah Bartlet from "The West Wing," David Palmer of "24" and Laura Roslin of "Battlestar Galactica" are all popular among more than three fourths of their virtual citizenry, while Obama's favorable rating currently logs at 46 percent.

It is unlikely that any real-life president would ever be as appreciated as a fictional character, presidential historian Tevi Troy said -- and not just because an actual leader might lack "camera-ready looks and perfect timing."

"Pretty much half the country is going to be predisposed against you just because that's the way we line up with Republicans and Democrats," said Troy, the author of "What Jefferson Read, Ike Watched, and Obama Tweeted," a study of popular culture in the White House.

Ronald Reagan, who was an actor before becoming governor of California and later president, may have been the exception, argued Troy, who served as a top domestic policy adviser in President George W. Bush's administration.

"(Reagan's) media people would say how great it was that he always hit his marks," he said.

Meanwhile, even Obama -- an avowed "House of Cards" fan -- admitted his appreciation of Underwood, the ruthless president played by Kevin Spacey.

"This guy's getting a lot of stuff done," the president joked during a White House photo-op with Reed Hastings, Netflix's chief executive, in December 2013. "I wish things were that ruthlessly efficient."

And while he cannot compete with Underwood, the Reuters poll showed that Obama is in good shape as long as he sticks with real-life equivalents: Russian President Vladimir Putin, for example, has the approval of only 24 percent of Americans.