Very good rating for the X-Factor, getting nearly 11m during the auditions must surely bode well for the upcoming live shows. Share is very strong as well. Unless there is some kind of diaster/upset I can certainly see the live shows rating around the same level as last year once they get going. The movie premiere did pretty well last night too, I thought that might come in below 4million.


Not too good for BBC1; Casualty did OK with the share and rating pretty much level with last year's new series opener, and although it is September this weekend is still part of the summer holiday season I suppose (albeit the last).

Seeing as I always have a go at the Beeb for scheduling Casualty up against BGT & X-Factor, I say well done for good scheduling last night. (and bad BBC for putting it against X-Factor next week ).

Next week will be interesting, largely due to 71 Degrees North, as ITV will be desperate for it to do well so they could have a returning hit reality show, and it could also finally get them some decent ratings on Tuesdays
A word of caution for ITV1 none of their new reality shows have done well since the launch of I'm A Celeb( you could class the X Factor as a reality show, but it's really a singing contest). Ladette to Lady appears to be in its death throes with later starts each week, Marco was a total flop, All At Sea struggled in the ratings and going further back, rotters like Love Island, Celebrity Wrestling and Celebrity Fit Club were cancelled as they were so bad.

Ah, if only I could be as impartial, balanced and objective as the ITVistas on this forum...

(sighs)

You're more objective than some, but I'd say it's your trite criticism for both BBC and ITV which can rub people up the wrong way.

I enjoy it though

Although, due to Last Night Of The Proms, they don't really have much choice in the matter.

Nor do they have much choice in the matter when the live X Factor shows start as, at least for the first few weeks, they will be close to 2 hours long, 8pm to 10pm. (I presume that if ITV want to avoid a clash with Strictly, they'll start X factor at 8pm like last year.)

is it true that ITV aired an X-Factor audition that ended in a fight?

Should ITV not have taken the high ground, and refuse to air it?

Er, maybe you should watch it? Come on, ITV airs fights all the time on The Jeremy Kyle Show.

Why take the high ground?!?!

After all the hype in the promos and press for weeks, it was hilarious. She just whacked her in the face, not hard, both storming off, had bad attitude and so on.

Didn't have Casualty though last week. UBB though seemed to quickly lose it's novelty value after a promising start and soon dropped back down to BB11 ratings.


Exactly. I'm no fan of the audition stages either - never have been really due to the emphasis on the bad over the good. Suspect though next weeks show will rate even higher with Cheryl's malaria outbreak - even though we know it happened a couple of days after the auditions.


I'm leaning towards flop on that one too - not quite Prisoner levels, but probably sub-4m. Even if the premiere does well after The X Factor I can see it losing a couple of million on Tuesday night.

Speaking of Op Knocks, this ran for 21 series, though with three breaks, and even in its later Bob Monkhouse phase with stronger opposition attracted 16 million viewers. At its height in the mid seventies the grand final attracted 26 million viewers, the winners LPs always sold well and roadshows of winners were well attended. Perhaps this is what Cowell is hoping for, to be the next Hughie Green.

well should ITV not take the moral high ground when it comes to fights on The Jeremy Kyle Show, I certainly have no interest in a TV channel that is just memebers of the public fighting each other, in the name of "entertainment"

those people should have more diginity? and if they think that is the way to behave on TV, maybe they should be banned from appearing on TV.

Maybe, but, it doesn't seem to have been much of a fight....


....and BBC1 has been promoting Peggy Mitchell's departure from Eastenders with a montage of the poisonous, evil witch slapping just about every resident in Albert Square.

Rumour has it that Peggy will perish in the Queen Vic fire. Nah! Just chuck a glass of water. That's how Dorothy killed the Wicked Witch Of The West. (The Wicked Witch Of The East got crushed by Dorothy's house.)

You've lost me , what has my post got to do with EE? The point i was making by the time we've actually seen it, it turned out to be something of nothing or whatever the saying is.

Sorry, I was just using your quote to indicate that it wasn't really a fight, just a slap on the face and that the BBC have been promoted Eastenders with a whole montage of slaps.So it's not just ITV that use violence to try and boost ratings.

I have now edited my post. Hope it now reads better.

A word of caution for ITV1 none of their new reality shows have done well since the launch of I'm A Celeb( you could class the X Factor as a reality show, but it's really a singing contest). Ladette to Lady appears to be in its death throes with later starts each week, Marco was a total flop, All At Sea struggled in the ratings and going further back, rotters like Love Island, Celebrity Wrestling and Celebrity Fit Club were cancelled as they were so bad.

I'm leaning towards flop on that one too - not quite Prisoner levels, but probably sub-4m. Even if the premiere does well after The X Factor I can see it losing a couple of million on Tuesday night.
Yes I think it will do an All At Sea and get 3 million viewers, not a complete flop, but still poor. I think ITV should take note that the celebrity reality genre is exhausted and nothing they have done since I'm A Celeb has gone the distance.

Oh right i see now lol. Problem solved, i would use a smilie but google chrome is corrupt

My entire post was aimed as tongue in cheek, Robbie...

ITV's running a bit late tonight, Coronation Street went from 19:01 to 20:01 - and DS tomorrow will cut the first 5 minutes off Heartbeat's rating, as that's only just starting.

Don't mean to post 3(!) times in a row, DS's rating for Heartbeat and U Be Dead will be different to the rest, Heartbeat's will go from 20:05 to 21:05 I think with U Be Dead from 21:05 to probably 23:00.

Nothing has deliberately overran, just the way its played out.

A near 50% share tells me X Factor benfited from some very easy competiton. Merlin should take away some of the casual viewers X Factor gets on a quiet BBC1 night.

Does anyone know if Merlin has clashed fully with X Factor before and if so, how did it fare?

Excellent rating for TXF. Is 10.9m the tape-checked rating or for the full slot? TXF ended 5mins early last night.

The X Factor won

The very first episode of Merlin started at the same time as X Factor, 7.30 on Sept 20th 2008. Merlin had 6.64m in the overnights to TXF's 9.26m.

Episode 4 of Merlin (start time 7.05) had a 15 minute head start of X Factor (similar to what it has next week) and had 5.86m to TXF's 10.35m.

Episode 7 of Merlin started at the same time as TXF (7.30) and had 5.75m to TXF's 10.94m.

BBC had a habit of swapping Merlin and Strictly over for various reasons in 2008. Amazing that Merlin did so well with such shoddy treatment.

Thanks for that detailed response George.


Thanks Iain. All decent figures then and should be aiming for 5.5m+ next week, especailly with a Strictly lead-in.

The X Factor bounced back and did well off a lower lead in than it go last year. Surprised that You've Been Framed got below 4m, but guess it was on early. Both Odd One In and The Bourne Ultimatum did well, but how much of that was off the lead in and lead out?

Casualty did well for BBC1 but that was the only thing. BBC1 is just treading water until Strictly returns now. Merlin should do well enough next week with that aiding it.

Big Brother did ok including plus one so the standard of the Friday show didn't affect it too much.