I watched The Impressions Show-not sure whether it works or not yet-the writing needs to be top notch as impressions themselves are not the pullers they used to be back in the seventies and eighties.
The Cowell/Cole/Minogue sketches cry out for an X Factor/BGT style judges set up with them commentating on other impressions as acts.
As someone said, Halloween probably has affected X Factor and the Minogue Story didnt fire as much as may have been expected. I also agree SCD is a far better watch now the competition is bedded in-last night was really entertaining though the Sargeant effect is also becoming an issue. Next week is in Blackpool which should be an extra reason to tune in.

X Factor seemed to slip a bit, not that I'm too surprised. Interesting to see if that carries into tonight (people having missed last nights show, not too bothered about result). ITV also seemed to take a hit at 7pm. Life Stories did OK and easily won its slot, though I did expect it to hit 5m.

Nothing really struggling there. Bit disappointing for Harry Hill, but that's about it. Impressions Show debuted well. I thought it was really good.

Last years performance show averaged 10.9m for live show number 4 so its down on last year too. Still, 10.2m is a good result none the less.

I'm assuming the the 20.30 Corrie is for 20.30-20.55? Anyone have the rating for the slot?

The post Casualty slot has proven to be a good slot for comedy with the likes of Outnumbered, Comedy Roadshow and The Impressions Show.

I think X Factor has just been hit by Halloween. It'll be back up tonight.

Which is odd, because before Outnumbered it was a bit of a death slot.

No real surprises for last night. TV Burp and XF hit by Halloween and fireworks etc because they have a younger skewed audience, but a little surprising to see SCD hold all of its audience from last week.

Might have expected Life Stories to be over 5m though considering that every time I turned on ITV this week I saw an advert for it.

Decent start for The Impressions Show and Casualty is holding steady at the 4.5m mark up against the XF which BBC1 should be pleased with.

I expect huge ratings tonight...most people should stay in with schools back tomorrow and I expect XF viewers who missed it last night will watch the results as it has about a 10 min recap of the Saturday show. Also the same for TV Burp. Even Harry himself advertised the Sunday repeat during the show. I'd guess 6m for TV Burp, 7m for ASFF and 13m for XF.

Must have been Halloween hitting ITV last night. I don't think it'll adversely affect tonights XF results show though. Theres enough people who already know the contestants and have their favourites that its hardly like people need to see the performance show to feel involved.

Looks like Strictly is dragging itself forward a bit now - it nwas getting a bit staid and bogged down in controversy, but its fanbase is still fundamentally strong. Being in Blackpool should add to a sense of occassion - they really could do with making it a regular feature. It's a bigger space, they get a better audience in and it revives the whole show a bit from a visual point of view.

Credit too, as always, to Merlin which refuses to part with its solid 5m however early in the evening it gets shunted.

The Impressions Show did about as could be expected on debut. So long as they keep it clear of TXF, it'll be OK I think. That post-Casualty slot is always something of a funny one. Earlier in the year, when Casualty bequeathes it a 6m+ inheritance its really strong - but if they get the timing wrong at this time of year it'll get buried by ITV.

Everything seemed to be down last night.

1st November 2008:
Strictly Come Dancing - 9.36m *down 10%*
Merlin - 5.8m *down 11%*
Casualty - 5.6m *down 19%*
Hole in the Wall - 4.5m *down 20%*
Lottery Show - 4.5m *down 6%*

Harry Hill's TV Burp - 6m *down 12%*
The X Factor - 10.95m *down 7%*

It was weird to see someone doing an impression of Michael McIntyre in a slot that was previously home to the man himself. But actually, thinking about it, it was pretty genius. It should have hit the spot at least.

He tends to get all offended though, doesn't he? He fell out with Chris Moyles briefly earlier in the year after he did an impression of him onstage at some awards ceremony following a series of unfunny remarks from McIntyre earlier in the evening. It was funny to hear that referenced last night in the sketch they did.

The viewers need their John and Edward fix. They'll definitely be back tonight!

Yeah, I get the feeling it wasn't originally intended for Saturday nights. I think it's gone into the Saturday night schedule because there was no suitable weeknight slot for it.

The currently listed schedule for 7th November, when programme 2 of The Impressions Show goes out, is...

BBC1
6.00 Merlin
6.45 Strictly
8.25 Lottery
8.35 Casualty
9.25 Impressions

ITV1
7.00 The Harry Hill Hour (Maybe they should incorporate the 2 programmes into 1 like Rogue Traders and Watchdog.)
8.00 X Factor
9.30 Piers Morgan

...so Impressions kept away from TXF.

Strictly / X Factor overlap down to 25 minutes (which is kinda what ITV were vying for back in September).

Casualty largely sacrificied against TXF but with its high timeshift it should stay above 5m in the offiicals, which is decent enough against that competition, especially if you compare it with The Bill cos if The Bill was getting 5m in the offiicals (pro rata, allowing for STV opt-out) there wouldn't be anybody in this thread questioning its future on ITV.

Waterloo Road didn't last long against The X Factor on BBC1 Scotland I see...

Haha, I agree. Not sure how that's considered poor by any stretch.

yeah Casualty now gets "sacrificied" against TXF and BGT for about half its run. Casualty is dying a slow death then and has now been surpassed by Holby in the ratings.

Waterloo Road is a BBC Scotland so I'm sure they love putting it on against the 2nd biggest programme on the telly. (BGT the first? Yes? Which is bigger, TXF or BGT? There's only one way to find out - FFIIIIGGGHHHTTTT!!!)

WR was moved to Sunday because BBC Scotland screened a live Scottish League Cup match on Wednesday. The next round of the football isn't until February so there's no problem until then.

As I said, it's still doing better than The Bill, despite having much tougher competition.

Have to admire Holby City, though, the way it regularly trounces ITV1's ratings juggernaut Who wants To Be A Millionaire.

And I suspect that if the medical dramas swapped slots they'd swap ratings. Casualty had a respectable 6.37m against You, Me And Dupree. It can still do well when it gets a free run, but its lost its power as serious competition.

In gross numbers yes, but a lot of the Casualty audience would not be attractive to ITV. Heartbeat & The Royal were still doing good gross figures but it didnt save them.

I don't understand how anyone could think The X Factor did poorly last night. It was to be expected because of Halloween. How many other shows get over 10 million on a regular basis? Lower than last week and the equivalent show last year but it is still a fantastic rating.

However, I did expect Piers' show to get over 5 million and inherit more of the X Factor audience because of Dannii being the guest.

Of course if ITV really were concerned for the poor old viewer now The X Factor is down to 90 minutes they'd move it to 8.30pm and avoid Strictly completely.


I'd have moved Casualty alongtime ago if I were the BBC (I'd have doubled up EastEnders on Thursdays at 7.30/8.30, with a comedy in between, and then given Casualty the 8pm hour on Friday - but that was before ITV1 moved all their soaps around!).


As I touched upon a few days ago I think trying the family sitcoms out on Saturday nights might not be a bad idea - it's worked for family drama after all.

I think it's worth a try. 'Allo 'Allo did well there until it moved away from Saturdays for its final two series. Birds of a Feather did well there in 1991. However, since then, new Saturday night sitcoms have been few and far between, and when they have been in the schedule, they've been no earlier than 8.55pm, and more commonly, no earlier than 9.40pm.

My Family at its best, would probably have done huge ratings business on Saturday nights.

I do have to disagree with you there. I wouldn't say it was "expected" at all. One or two commentators, notably C14E, predicted there would be an impact, but on the ratings game the average prediction was still as high as 11.7m (out of 30 players) which is 100k higher than what it got last week. So I think actually, on the whole, most people underestimated the effect Halloween would have.