How can you say BBC have to rely on Christmas for their big hitters. They could have scheduled Doctor Who, Eastenders, Royle Family against the X Factor final and then I think the story would very different.

Those 3 shows could get 10+ million any time of the year. The BBC simply choose to schedule their best shows on Christmas Day and ITV schedule theirs for the 13th December and the end of May.

After complaining about there being no jobs for him in the UK, James Nesbitt has been cast alongside Minnie Driver is BBC One's new five-part (stripped) drama 'The Deep':

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/news/...-the-deep.html

This sounds really good. Hope it is done well and sounds positive by the actors cast and a fairly big budget.

EastEnders rarely gets 10m 'any time of the year'. It can barely rustle up 9m against the likes of Tonight, Grimefighters and Countrywise! And ITV1 have a stronger line up than that on Christmas Day...

Doctor Who's last special didn't hit 10m and often the normal episodes fall around the 9m mark.

The Royle Family is hard to judge as it's a special and would have good figures wherever it is. But 10m? Personally I wouldn't think so.

Well, yes. The story would be "X Factor crushes Doctor Who/Eastenders/Royle Family". Back when it was just a little show , BGT went head-to-head with Doctor Who in 2008.

Britain's Got Talent - 11.52m
Doctor Who - 6.27m


Doctor Who (officials):
April - 9.54m
November - 9.94m

Eastenders hasn't passed 10m since April. Using the officials, all year (and we're talking 200 attempts) it has passed the 10m mark on 5 occasions.

The Eastenders episode that will air on Christmas Day which is the day of programmes which is in question will attract over 10 million. It features the climax to a huge storyline and a murder. Plus if you factor in BBC3 repeats then the show is doing very well still. It would easily get over 11 million like the Danielle death episode did.

A much more eagerly anticipated special coming up of Doctor Who which could easily get 11 million in summer like the climax of last years series did.

Royle Family has always attracted audiences around 10 million.


I like how you call BGT a little show when it clearly wasnt to try and undermine Doctor Who.

Forget to mention the 3 million that watched who on BBC3 or I player.

And I think you will find EE has passed 10 million on more than 5 occasions. I dont think you wasted enough time looking through Barb before.

Same old same old from you then. :sleep:

Strictly has been pulling in a high number of viewers consistently since September while Doctor Who is capable of getting 8-9m viewers on any day of the year. EastEnders meanwhile is nearly always amongst the top shows in the BARB chart and beats Corrie on overall reach.

Since when were EastEnders or Doctor Who aimed at grannies? Or a lot of other things that're on xmas day come to think of it. Do grannies sit down and watch Top Of The Pops? Would've thought they'd prefer Vera Lynn to Alexandra Burke.

It's not like Corrie and Emmerdale or Dancing On Ice come to think of it aren't usually amongst ITV's most watched shows is it so you could say ITV does have some big hitters on Xmas day. Shame they flop.

We shouldn't take the bait really. But you're right it's ludicrous to suggest that people only turn to the BBC at xmas out of habit or because they fall asleep in front of the telly. You only have to look at the effort BBC1 makes right across the whole day with something for everyone to see why it does so well and has the good reputation for its xmas programming that it does. When XF was getting massive ratings week after week people on here were praising it even the posters who are positive about the BBC so I don't know why the defence comes up and the silly playground bitching starts when it's BBC1's turn to get higher than usual ratings.

If one wanted to be petty, on Sunday they could always point out how many viewers ITV have lost from the previous Saturday but I doubt any pro-BBC poster is that immature.

There was a reason for the smilie after that. Though BGT was a less impressive ratings force in 2008 than it was in 2009, it was still the biggest series on TV.

Though I'm still wondering why you think the story would be different.


I thought GeorgeS got widely ridiculed for adding it all up like this? Are we allowed to do it again?

Does this mean ITV allowed to claim the 5m that watched in pubs?!


You could be right. It might be 6. But it's a tiny proportion of its total number of broadcasts.

I don't think there's any doubt that the BBC benefits from Christmas Day. Perhaps it's tradition, perhaps it's the lack of commercials, I'm not really sure. But ITV shows underperform on Christmas day compared to the rest of the year. BBC shows overperform. Though I'm not saying that Christmas Day is the only day that they have big shows.

They don't have anything big in the sense of BGT or XF which get those numbers for extended runs. But discounting them, the BBC does have quite a few big hits like Eastenders, Strictly, Lets Dance, Doctor Who, Cranford and so on.

Haven't you met Robbie yet?!

As you say the reason why BBC1 is left on all day at Christmas is because of the bloody programming with the film premieres, big budget adaptations, top comedy and drama. The whole Granny argument is stupid as its ITV with the Corrie, Mr and Mrs and Poirot that will attract the older audiences.

The real petty thing is when you try to praise a BBC shows rating you just get told its nothing compared to X Factor or BGT. The only 2 shows that can produce any huge ratings.

Wasn't it the BGT final that clashed with Doctor Who though? Wasn't the final a fair bit higher than a normal episode of BGT even back then? I might be wrong but I thought it was. Just like the Dancing On Ice final clashed with EastEnders last year and knocked EastEnders down to 5 million.

If we go with GeorgeS ratings measurement then we have to admit Wallace and Gromit got 23.5 million in 2 showings. Plus the 5 million that watched it in pubs.

Of course but I don't think Robbie is serious about half of what he says. If he was I'd be worried. And he's only one poster. You sort of expect it from him. I don't know why everyone else has suddenly gone as mad it's like the BBC is not allowed to have high ratings ever and if it is set to get high ratings the excuses about grannies falling asleep with the remote have to come out early. Whereas nobody said that about X Factor and I know grannies are hardly likely to fall asleep with the remote in front of X Factor but would you really class Doctor Who and EastEnders as granny programmes?

Good one.

And it's clever plotting that always has a huge storyline coinciding with Christmas Day - but you can't say EastEnders would get 10m 'anytime of the year', the soaps in general don't have that kind of pull anymore.


Same with Doctor Who - Waters of Mars didn't hit 10m on the overnights. OK, you can argue a regeneration would do well (unless it was up against Britain's Got Talent/The X Factor), but generally Doctor Who does not hit 10m.


Even the normal series? I didn't think it did that well.

Arguably they do across multiple showings. They're not really the kind of programmes you need to watch live anymore except for when they pull a big storyline out of the bag hence 10m+ ratings are now usually achieved for big storylines only. Same with The Royle Family and Doctor Who they're sort of shows you can catch up with any time without missing out on much. X Factor and BGT on the other hand are much more of a live event so you need to follow the actual shows as they air to get the most of them. I don't think it's fair to say BBC1 has no hit programming because it doesn't have anything that rates as consistently high as the two titan talent shows on ITV1.

Oh, don't get me wrong - BBC1 has plenty of hit programming, I'm not slating the ratings the likes of Doctor Who/Eastnders get. Just on first showing, they rarely hit 10m, unless they're special episodes (and even then, they tend to perform better on Christmas Day than any other day).

Of course, BBC1 plan it perfectly so special episodes are aired on Christmas Day to attract viewers. I mean, what can ITV1 put up against a shooting and a regeneration? The closest they can get is a murder on Coronation Street, someone being decapitated by an ice skate on Dancing on Ice or Holly Willoughby falling out of her dress on an Xtra Factor special.

It was the final performance show, yes. It actually rated lower than the Friday show, though that was taken to be as a result of the DW clash and an early timeslot.


I'm afraid that the "5m watching in pubs" figure hasn't been reported and verified by the Daily Star and so it won't be acceptable!


It's just TV ratings, I don't think anyone is too serious!

I think the BBC has had a poor few months across the board. And I don't think that's a controversial or bold statement. ITV has had a very good few months. That's quite unusual because the norm is for the BBC to be a mix of stable returning series and a few strongly performing shows while ITV lurches from one disaster to the next. Until Robson Green found his way onto the schedule, it was all going pretty well!

Come the New Year, it could well turn around and so will this thread. ITV's Saturdays could flop again. Married, Single, Other on Fridays could become another Moving Wallpaper. The Prisoner bombed in the US and reviews weren't great.

And, unlike this year, ITV has some "standards" to uphold. In winter/spring 2008, The Palace was on Mondays at 9pm. This year they had Whitechapel, Law and Order, Unforgiven and Above Suspicion. So if they fall back to 3m, it's going to look bad. ITV were pretty consistently mocked through 2008 for some of their drama attempts. Rightly so.

The two Cowell formats themselves have unusually high ratings, so you can't really use them as a yardstick for what other hit programming on either network should be getting. The rise X Factor and BGT has experienced is amazing clearly driven by whipping up a frenzy of hype. Don't forget in the case of the BBC they place a lot more emphasis on multiple screenings than ITV as it doesn't have to focus on the ad revenue.

I know it's been said on here before but where BBC1 excels over ITV is with its middling programmes. It has a strong bank of consistent 4m'ish performers. ITV without its hits practically collapses whereas BBC1 never seems to collapse. I do think maybe BBC1 has more "default" viewers though as I'm sure if they were showing the same shows ITV had on Tuesday evening they would've at least both been over 3.5m. So I don't know what it is as arguably the two networks are as big as eachother yet it's BBC1 that seems to get the default viewers for well anything.

I would denounce all BBC TV if ITV aired Holly Willoughby falling out of her dress. To be fair she has come close before and must be a real struggle to keep things that big tucked away.

I agree - but there has been a change there. Even in 2000, I think ITV had more middling shows than BBC1. BBC1 have regrouped, created a new strategy, broadcast some string programming and have got their just deserts.

ITV have axed a lot of popular programming because it was after 'the wrong audience', struggled to replace them with 'right audience' hits and have limped along since then.

BBC1 has raised it's game, which maybe why they have a default audience. ITV1 need to do the same thing now.


There we go. A bounce on Christmas Day for ITV1.

The BBC did indeed undergo a real creative renewal in the early 2000's. The biggest factor was the switching of the 9pm news to 10pm. It created a brand new prime slot for drama and removed the scheduling head-start ITV had enjoyed there for decades. It's the single most important scheduling move of the decade and worked brilliantly for the channel.

It's when they seized the upper hand on a day-to-day viewing basis, and ITV have never won that back. I'm not sure ITV are even interested in the day-to-day these days though - the emphasis is on the 'event TV' model: the soaps keep them ticking over and football and a few mass entertainment shows make them the profit. The rest of the schedule is meerly damage limitation. I can only see this trend continuing over coming years with more ruthless, business-minded executives.

Wednesday 16th December Overnights
BBC One
18:00- BBC News at Six: 4.3m (23.6%)
18:30- Regional News and Weather: 5.6m (28.5%)
19:00- The One Show: 4.7m (23.4%)
19:30- Big Top: 2.2m (10.3%)
20:00- Waterloo Road: 3.7m (15.8%)
21:00- Spooks: 4.0m (16.2%)
22:00- BBC News at Ten: 4.9m (23.1%)
22:25- Regional News and Weather: 5.0m (25.8%)
22:35- The National Lottery Draws: 4.3m (25.4%)
22:45- Match of the Day: 2.2m (20.4%)

BBC Two
18:30- Strictly Come Dancing - It Takes Two: 2.6m (13.4%)
19:00- One Man and His Dog: 1.3m (6.4%)
19:40- Coast: 1.5m (6.8%)
20:00- Grow Your Own Drugs for Christmas: 1.6m (6.8%)
21:00- The Hairy Bikers' Twelve Days of Christmas: 2.3m (9.4%)
22:00- Buzzcocks: The Doctor Who Special: 2.9m (14.0%)

ITV1
18:30- ITV News & Weather: 3.7m (18.7%)
19:00- Emmerdale: 6.5m (32.7%)
19:30- The Royal Variety Performance 2009: 8.8m (37.4%)
22:00- ITV News at Ten & Weather: 4.3m (20.8%)

Channel 4
18:00- The Simpsons: 2.32m [inc. +1]
18:30- Hollyoaks: 1.5m (7.6%)
19:00- Channel 4 News: 0.7m (3.5%)
19:55- 3 Minute Wonder: This Is Sculpture: 0.8m (3.9%)
20:00- Jamie's Family Christmas: 2.0m (8.4%)
20:30- Come Dine with Me Extra Portions: 1.4m (5.8%)
21:00- The Family: 1.5m (6.1%)
22:00- True Blood: 0.9m (5.5%)

Five
18:00- Home and Away: 0.9m (4.9%)
18:25- Live From Studio Five: 0.2m (1.1%)
19:30- Highland Emergency: 0.6m (2.9%)
20:00- Britain's Best Brain: 0.3m (1.4%)
21:00- The Exorcist: The True Story: 0.7m (2.7%)
22:00- The Exorcist: 0.5m (4.1%)

E4 [inc. +1]
19:00- My Name Is Earl: 400k
21:00- Sahara: 200k

Film4 [inc. +1]
18:45- Flight of the Phoneix: 140k
21:00- The Wedding Date: 230k

More4 [inc. +1]
21:00- Time Team: 190k

All Day Shares
ITV1: 23.8%
BBC One: 18.9%
BBC Two: 8.0%
Channel 4 [inc. +1]: 7.7%
Five: 3.2%
---------------------------------------------------------------
Great rating for the Royal Variety, up 1.3m from last year and it's the show's highest audience since 2005. Big Flop gets its lowest figure yet and the other BBC1 shows suffered against the tough competition. Really poor night for Five; could that be Five's worst 8pm audience ever!?

Those are some shockingly poor figures right there.

Looks like the Royal Variety show was about the only thing that rated well.

ITV NaT also did better than usual.