May the profitable needs of BBC Worldwide outweigh others...

The Merlin Season 2 DVD in the shops at the moment is Part 1, containing the first 6 episodes, Part 2 is released in Februay. So the episodes on DVD have already been shown before it was released. Gavin and Stacey on the other hand, not even half the series will have aired by the time its on DVD!

Emmerdale, Coronation Street and I'm A Celebrity... were just too strong a combination for anything - and Waterloo Road and Spooks were a strong combination to put up against it. They'll both be up next week.

As for the OFCOM complaints list...Coronation Street has received more than EastEnders - bit surprised at that considering I thought EastEnders was Disgruntled from Tunbridge Wells' wet dream.

Oh, and to carry on my comment on Big Top last night, I'm now watching it and I don't mind it. I said I liked the stuff others hated.

I loved Hope Springs this year. It's such a shame that it rated so badly in the end. The opening episode got 6 million if I remember rightly but it just trailed off and the ratings decreased. By the end, it was only getting half the audience it started with! I think that's why they edited the ending. It would have been good to have seen it return but because it rated so badly, I think it was edited to give the drama an appropriate conclusion so it couldn't really ever return. It was aired over the summer and pushed back by the BBC too, which didn't really help matters. However, I believe both Colour of Money and Demons deserved to flop!

I agree with you about Skins and the Inbetweeners. Probably the biggest hits of digital TV this year? The Inbetweeners really got noticed this year and rightly so! It bodes well for the next series.

Seeing as we seem to be doing this, here's my take...

BBC1 has done really well from expanding the charity events. The Kilimanjaro climb, The Apprentice and Lets Dance For Comic Relief all made use of a strong brand then the Children in Need RAH concert. Total Wipeout was a new entertainment hit over the summer. The stripped Torchwood series performed beyond most expectations. And British sporting success has helped them with Wimbledon and Formula One ratings. I suppose In It To Win It deserves a mention, getting 7m on Saturday nights at the start of the year but with very little fuss.

ITV1 has obviously been driven by the Cowell formats showing incredible ratings increases from last year to levels which would not have been thought possible 2 years ago. That has helped launch the likes of The Cube and Piers Morgans Life Stories but also been good for existing shows like TV Burp and Family Fortunes by strengthening the overall schedule. However, they've also found success with drama, particularly their thriller/crime drama series. They've had Whitechapel, Murderland, Unforgiven, Above Suspicion, Law and Order and Collision. That's an impressive number of new drama hits in one year. Not to mention strong returns from Doc Martin and Benidorm. All while facing the recession and the fact that STV no longer fund drama output (another 10% loss for ITV). On the sides, News At Ten is improving a bit and they are finally competitive at 5pm after years of trying.

They've each had their failings. In entertainment, ITV failed with The Colour of Money and the BBC flopped with Totally Saturday while the Lloyd Webber contest was below expectations. ITV still have issues with factual entertainment and Tuesdays nights, FA Cup ratings and a disappointing relaunch for The Bill.

The BBC still lack major entertainment hits outside Strictly. Some of their established hits have wobbled or slipped (Mistresses, Spooks, Hotel Babylon, Who Do You Think You Are?) and there has been a lack of new hits coming through. That's OK for one year, but they will surely hope to bring through some new hits in 2010?

Both have struggled with family drama. Robin Hood, Demons and Primeval all faced the axe while Merlin is down due to a poorer slot. ITV are still without any younger skewing drama and an attempt with Boy Meets Girl seemed half hearted. Their biggest drama woes were mainly in burning off old series (Monday Monday, Moving Wallpaper, The Fixer, Pushing Daisies).

I'd say ITV have the most to be pleased about and that has been particularly noticeable in the last quarter of the year (and reflected in their financial performance). But there are still major gaps in the schedule to be addressed in 2010. BBC1 can be satisfied. It has been a steady year and they don't really have any majorly pressing problems to sort for 2010 (just as they didn't have any major issues coming into 2009).

Channel 4 and Five are suffering, IMO. Neither seems to know what it is doing. Channel 4 is ailing from declines in its lifestyle and cookery output not to mention huge falls from Big Brother. Five has become more reliant on US imports with Minder failing and no other entertainment hits of note. Then there's Live From Studio Five... oh dear!

On digital, E4 took 2 big risks that really paid off in the first part of the year. Recommissioning The Inbetweeners on middling ratings was a risk but I've never seen anything like it where a show practically trebles its ratings in a year. The other move was the new cast on Skins which worked out really well.

I agree with pretty much all of that, except two little things.

Total Wipeout was a new hit when it first aired at the beginning of the year, but BBC1 did ruin it by screened a second series so soon after the first and people soon tired of it. The second run during the summer didn't do very well in the ratings, particularly towards the end.

Also, I think Five are slowly creeping in the right direction. Flash Forward has worked well for them and although some things aren't working out, I think overall its going the right way. I think its done well to increase its share of the audience while reducing the programming budget by 25%.

I still think Five is a bit of an irrelevance. Its imports are doing well but their homegrown content leaves a lot to be desired.

I'm sure I'll have a longer look back at the year come the end of the month (and might dig up the predictions lots of us made on the thread at new year ), but a couple of brief comments:

In particular, BBC One has really struggled with new shows in 2009. They've still got a very steady returning line-up, so theres no panic yet, but theres just been a few signs of things going a touch stale.

New Tricks, Waking the Dead, Hustle, Lark Rise, Ashes to Ashes. etc. anchor the drama line-up well, but some of the more recent offerings like Mistresses, Casualty 1909 and all of the new dramas they've tried this year seem to have fallen by the wayside quite severely. They also seem to be focussing on several critically-acclaimed, but weakly rating serials such as Criminal Justice and Occupation - which are obviously out of the top drawer but don't do them any favours as far as this thread is concerned. (Actually, Criminal Justice was only about 0.2m down on its 2008 run - though this series did run in the autumn and I think Torchwood had raised expectations).

Theres a similar story across the other genres too. The Apprentice was a big plus in the factual entertainment column - but Who Do You Think You Are? and Have I Got News For You? are showing their age (albeit against very tough ITV opposition).

Meanwhile, I think their weekday pre-watershed line-up is suffering in many areas from soap suffocation from ITV. It particularly doesn't help when Corrie and Emmerdale switch slots around to accommodate ITV's "event" weeks - hitting stuff like Big Top and Waterloo Road last night.


Overall, this year, you can probably rate the following as the biggest new successes on BBC One:

Entertainment - Lets Dance (using the Comic Relief brand)
Factual - Countryfile (promoted from daytime)
Drama - Torchwood (nicked from BBC Three/Two)
Comedy - Gavin and Stacey (ditto)

That tells its own story. The channel just needs a few of its own ideas to stick in ratings terms next year. Things need to evolve, or the current line-up could become stale.

OK, so I lied about the "brief comments" bit...

I agree with that statement, Five are doing well in some areas like US imports and factual but they're struggling in others, one of the success stories outside of the US imports are The Gadget Show and The Hotel Inspector which for the latter grew its audience and managed to reestablish itself with Alex Polizzi, they need more brands like that to sell the channel. I think axing stuff like Fifth Gear and Trisha was needed especially Fifth Gear which was on its last legs and was overshadowed by the superior and I imagine much cheaper Gadget Show.

For 2010 and beyond, they need to find an entertainment format or two preferally one that isn't gameshow based, build on already successful factual strands and formats and look for talent who could become the face of the channel, one success story was Cowboy Builders which I expected to flop but became a solid hit and finally think about investing in homegrown drama preferably crime dramas and use the US shows as lead ins.

On a final note, if they are thinking of acquiring more US drama, I think take a break from crime dramas and look at shows like Parenthood, Flashforward has proven that a non crime drama on Five can be successful.

No, it was on a Friday night. Here's a list, which I did on the Commentators Thread the other week...

World Cup 1982 - Saturday 6pm BBC1
Euro 1984 - Not shown
World Cup 1986 - Sunday 7pm, shown during Sports Review of the Year on BBC1
Euro 1988 - don't know
World Cup 1990 - Saturday afternoon, shown during Grandstand on BBC1
Euro 1992 - Friday 3pm, shown during Sport on Friday on BBC2
World Cup 1994 - Not shown, but it was at 8pm on a Sunday
Euro 1996 - Sunday 2pm BBC1 (unlike all the others this was also live on ITV)
World Cup 1998 - Thursday 6pm BBC2
Euro 2000 - Sunday 2pm, shown during Sunday Grandstand on BBC2
World Cup 2002 - Saturday 10am BBC2
Euro 2004 - Sunday 11.30am BBC2
World Cup 2006 - Friday 8.15pm BBC2
Euro 2008 - Sunday 11.30am BBC2

STV losing 140,000 viewers to ITV1 London

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/8393667.stm

I think one of the standout shows of the year for BBC1 not mentioned so far on this thread was the Michael McIntyre comedy show on Saturdays around 9 in the Summer. It was so entertaining, and I really look forward to it returning.

I think it did pretty well ratings wise too as far as I remember.
Life was another highlight of the year for me and the Street which unfortunatly is not returning.

and the Titanic's captain wasn't worried about reports of icebergs up ahead!

Coronation Street had 8.9m 38%
I'm a celebrity had 8.4m 34% last night

BBC1
1.45pm Doctors 1.61m 22.8%
7.30pm EastEnders 8.58m 39.6%
8pm Bang Goes The Theory: the Human Power Station 2.6m 11%
9pm Gavin & Stacey 5.0m 19%
9.30pm QI 3.6m 15%

BBC2
8pm The Restaurant 1.7m 7%
9pm Natural World 1.6m 6%

ITV1
7pm Emmerdale 7.0m 34.4%
8pm Coronation Street 8.9m 39%; 9.09m (39.2%) per DS
8.30pm I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here! 8.4m 34%

Channel 4
6.30pm Hollyoaks 1.53m 7.7%
8pm River Cottage 2.6m 11% [further 144,000 on Channel 4 +1]
9pm The Queen 2.1m 8% [further 131,000 on Channel 4 +1]

Five
5.30pm Neighbours 1.42m (8.7%)
6pm Home and Away 994,000 (5.3%)
7.30pm Fulham v CSKA Sofia 1.2m 5%

E4
7pm Hollyoaks 620k 3.2%
10pm Misfits 511,000

More 4
Hung 92,000

Sky One
Lie to Me 452,000

BBC3
10pm EastEnders 774,000
10.30pm Russell Howard's Good News 571,000

ITV2
10pm I'm a Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here Now! 791,000
1.05am Coronation Street 104,000 3.7%

ITV3
9pm Lewis 834,000

Fiver
6.30pm Home and Away 505k (2.7%)
7pm Neighbours 172k (0.9%)

Primetime shares:
ITV1 28.3%; BBC One 20.1%; Channel 4 7.5% (+1: 0.7%); BBC Two 5.4%; Five 4.3%.

=============
bit quiet here today? Nobody want to talk about Christmas schedules today?

Another great night for ITV1. The solid scheduling of Emmerdale/Corrie/IAC all in the same slots is working wonders with other terrestrials struggling, especially BBC1 which really struggled yet again, especially in the 8pm hour and QI a million down! Not quite sure why...maybe IAC had a high peak at the end.

Also a very strong figure to Corrie, obviously boosted by weak competition on ITV1, the lead in from EE and people tuning in for the Maggie Jones tribute? I think it would be a good idea for ITV to switch the soap hour around from the new year and see how The Bill copes in its Tuesday slot, because something needs to be done.

And finally..it looks like ITV is to have its second best week this year this week and the second week to beat BBC1 in all hours shares obviously due to the fact ITV is basically on ly airing four of its biggest programmes this week.

BBC One level with Channel 4 in the 8pm slot... when was the last time we said that? Apart from the 8pm poor Bang Goes The Theory rating, a good night for both BBC One and ITV1.

In fact, with the possible exception of BBC Two for unspectacular ratings, it was a solid night for everyone.

As for tonight, I'm a Celebrity I don't think will get over 10 million , I'm going to go for 9.1m. For whatever reason, the final tends not to be the highest rated show of the series... ITV dropped the ball here by choosing to have the final on Friday instead of a Saturday or Sunday... what would have been wrong with this for instance for this weekend [start eliminations a day later of course] :

Friday
19:00 - Emmerdale
19:30 - Coronation Street
20:00 - Tonight
20:30 - I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!
22:00 - Rod Stewart: For One Night Only
23:00 - ITV News and Weather

Saturday
18:30 - You've Been Framed!
19:00 - Harry Hill's TV Burp
19:30 - The X Factor
21:00 - I'm a Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here! Final
23:05 - ITV News and Weather

That would have also got viewers used to the 7:30pm start for The X Factor for this weekend and next weekend.

Also, that'd mean I'm a Celebrity is probably more likely to get 10m+ with a X Factor lead-in.

Of course I'll be eating my hat when the overnights come in tomorrow with I'm a Celebrity at 10.01m.

Yet more evidence Corrie should occupy 8pm on Thursday!

Lots of video previews here for ITV programmes in 2010

http://www.itvmedia.co.uk/itv-progra...onts-2010-home

Or lack of it...

ITV1 Christmas Day now confirmed as :

06:00 GMTV
09:25 Christmas Cooks Challenge
10:25 Creature Comforts
10:55 FILM : Santa Claus
13:00 ITV News & Weather
13:10 FILM: The Polar Express
15:00 HM The Queen
15:10 You've Been Framed at Christmas !
15:40 FILM: Happy Feet
17:40 ITV News & Weather
18:00 Emmerdale
19:00 Coronation Street
20:00 All Star Mr & Mrs Christmas Special
21:00 Poirot : Appointment with Death
23:00 ITV News & Weather
23:15 FILM: Gladiator


Boxing Day

06:00 GMTV
09:25 Christmas Cooks Challenge
10:25 All Star Mr & Mrs Christmas Special
11:25 I Dreamed a Dream : The Susan Boyle Story
12:25 ITV News & Weather
12:40 FILM: Racing Stripes
14:30 Goodnight Mr Tom
16:40 FILM: March of the Penguins
18:15 ITV News & Weather
18:30 Harry Hills TV Burp Review of the Year
19:00 You've Been Framed at Christmas !
19:30 Ant & Dec's Christmas Show
20:45 All Star Family Fortunes Christmas Special
21:30 All Star Impression Show
22:30 ITV News & Weather
22:45 Above Suspicion
00:40 FILM: The Graduate

ITV1 have an extended ITV News to see in 2010 on New Years Eve.

23:35 ITV News : Countdown to 2010 - with Alastair Stewart.



Countrywise is getting a 1hr 'special' on Weds 30th :

NATURE: Countrywise
On: ITV1 Yorkshire
Date: Wednesday 30th December 2009 (starting in 26 days)
Time: 20:00 to 21:00 (1 hour long)

Paul Heiney presents a one hour special of the ITV regions' countryside programme. Paul and the team looks at the age-old rivalry between Yorkshire and Lancashire and set out to discover if it still exists. They travel to the seaside resort of Scarborough on the Yorkshire coast, and to the vast natural wilderness of Morecambe Bay in Lancashire.
(Stereo, Widescreen, Subtitles)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Excerpt taken from DigiGuide - the world's best TV guide available from http://www.getdigiguide.com/?p=1&r=35610

Copyright (c) GipsyMedia Limited.

The drama line-up looks fantastic.

ABC:
8pm - Flash Forward - 7.3m (2.2)
9pm - Private Practice - 9.5m (3.1)

CBS:
8pm - Survivor - 12.8m (3.9)
9pm - CSI Repeat - 9.9m (2.3)
10pm - The Mentalist Repeat - 10.7m (2.6)

FOX:
8pm - Bones - 9.9m (2.9)
9pm - Fringe - 6.9m (2.5)

NBC:
8pm - Community - 5.4m (2.2)
8.30pm - Parks and Recreation - 4.8m (2.1)
9pm - The Office - 8.1m (4.1)
9.30pm - 30 Rock - 6.2m (3.0)
10pm - The Jay Leno Show - 4.7m (1.5)

FlashForward looks like it's heading for cancellation with yet another series low. 2.2 just isn't good enough and it's a major disappointment for ABC. It's going away for an extended break as well.

With no Greys Anatomy or CSI, Fringe got a season high and quite respectable numbers.

The Office was the #1 show of the night for adults 18-49, Survivor was top for viewers.

http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/12/04...-crashes/35242

A couple of other points from those videos,

Odd One In is a new Saturday night show with Bradley Walsh.

Magic Numbers with Stephen Mulhern is live on Saturdays.