Maybe people will catch up with Upstairs Downstairs today if they chose to watch the 2nd half of Arsenal vs Chelsea last night. Hopefully tonight's final episode will get an improved rating.

I can understand the good rating for Die Hard 4.0
Film4 showed Die Hard and Die Hard 2 on the previous two nights. (So I wonder why they didn't show Die Hard 3 With A Vengance last night - maybe the Beeb own the rights for that one).

Recent history suggests ITV will probably axe it then rather than give it another chance - but I do think 71 Degrees North is possibly more limited as a returning series than things like I'm a Celeb and Survivor due to the limitations of the environment. That said though I'm a Celeb has hardly evolved over the years.
A few people referred to 71 Degrees North as I'm A Celeb with ice. Also the cost, the fact it didn't set the ratings on fire and the declining interest in Z list celebs in reality shows, barring IAC, will count against it, although ITV did persevere with the similar rating Celebrity Love Island for two series.
Survivor was always an odd one. While it is still a success in America, it died after one series here. However, its influence was felt when ITV launched the most successful reality show of all time the following year. For all that has gone now, Shipwrecked owed quite a bit to Survivor as well.

Two series.

Sorry, but its influence lives on. I'm A Celeb, Shipwrecked, 71 Degrees North, all owe something to Survivor. Being shown against Big Brother didn't help either.

Strong ratings for Emmerdale and EE. Corrie looks abit low after it's recent run of good ratings, but Corrie is always abit up and down over the festive period. Casualty possibly denting the first episode.

HO is very low as usual. I think in 2011 it will either be axed or moved to E4 on a permanent basis because even after the fire episodes but soap hasn't recoverd. Also I wasn't expecting UD to slip almost 0.9m especially after seeing the 15 minute breakdown for the first episode as it built it's audience. I was expecting something very similar to the 7.5m we saw from the Boxing Day episode.

Ermm... Shipwrecked came before Survivor though. In fact it was both that and Castaway that debuted at the beginning of 2000, before Big Brother or Survivor hit our shores, though BB had begun months before in Holand. I think Survivor owes more to the first 2 shows if anything.

Gawd, I'd forgotten about Castaway. I do remember the 2007 revival stiffing and being shown opposite Corrie, which was like a death sentence. I thought Shipwrecked was far more recent than 2000, though, unless there was a long break between series.

It ran for three series from 2000 in a 'social experiment' sort of format, much like Castaway 2000.

Of course that format was quickly trumped by reality shows which developed more competition style formats using evictions - Big Brother, Survivor and then I'm a Celebrity. So when C4 revived Shipwrecked in about 06 they adopted a "Battle of the Islands" format.

I used to quite like those 'Social Experiment' days - it all felt worthwhile and quite dignified. But of course, people got bored pretty quickly. One of the main problems with the Castaway revival was that the BBC seemingly never decided whether it was another Social Experiment, or a reality competition. In the end, it sort of did both very badly.

Going even further back I was one of the loyal few who stood by The Living Soap, which was about a group of students in Manchester in 1993. This was crushed in the ratings by Coronation St, but to the few that watched it was quite interesting. Perhaps this is probably where reality television springs from, fly on the wall documentaries with a game show element and celebs added.

Fantastic figures for EE considering it was up against the ever-popular Three Men offering on BBC2 and the equally ever-popular repackaging of 20+ year old home video clips on ITV1.

Pants for Celeb Mastermind which I might have expected to hold up better against CoroSt, but then it did have the Three Men to compete with.

Upstairs did bang on what I expected without the benefit of a strong lead-in last night - still a great figure with many viewers perhaps expecting the next instalment on Sunday, and with tougher drama competition than on the previous night. It will suffer for airing on 3 consecutive nights - it's too much. It should have aired over 3 consecutive Sundays, to allow people to catch-up etc.

ITV's pensioner-fodder detective dramas seem guaranteed to attract 4.2m viewers - is it the same 4.2m OAPs who tune in to each one?

I don't think the Casualty figure is catastrophic considering very few will have expected to see it there, and it is one of many scheduling faux-pas over the fortnight on the BBC. The popularity of TG again dented BBC1 I think - that repeat figure in an early evening slot against the soaps is fantastic. Takes the overnight figures to 9.1m over the two showings, with timeshift to come. Brilliant stuff. But it is clearly too popular a show to be on BBC2 - it is now actively damaging BBC1 by not being on that network.

Good to see Oz and Hugh getting a lift in a better slot, and Charlie Brooker did creditably to average over 1m for what is very much a BBC4 show.

I used to love Terry and June when I was young. I suppose that's no surprise to anyone on this thread, though, given my other sitcom favourites.

I'm not a Coronation St fan, but I've been forced to see a quite a bit of it lately, dues to the joys of Christmas visitors. I can see why the Barlow stuff would put viewers off, but at least Ken and Deirdre don't appear to be having affairs at the moment. The constant shouting between Kevin and his wife must be driving viewers away, too. Terrible stuff.

I've seen Emmerdale, too, and surprisingly, it was much, much better than its big sibling. If I had a clue who any of the characters were, I might even have enjoyed it.

Just noticed looking on the ever so reliable Wiki that ITV still have nine episodes left of The Royal to burn off. Given that the last episode that aired was in July 2009 I wonder if these nine episodes will actually make it to air? I'm presuming they'll be burned off in the Summer next year.

Sad seeing the ratings for the 2007 series and before, only to divebomb 2m from 2008 onwards.

I've long thought that. I'd shut the Fiver channel, and rename the other digital channel as Five World, showing the American stuff it screens now, with the addition of the two Aussie soaps' digital screenings.

Yeah, I expect they'll show them next summer.

what about 5two?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7TWO

I think dear old Corrie will go back down to its average of 8-9 million once the tram effect wears off. However, it would be interesting if Emmerdale overtakes it as 20 years ago Coronation St had three times as many viewers and the soap came close to being cancelled in 1993. I still think Eastenders will stay as top soap dog, it has a broader geographic and age appeal than Corrie, which fares less well in the South and has half its audience over 50.

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Yeah I reckon these will be saved for Summer 2011. I remember when the axe for both shows was announced ITV said they had enough episodes stockpiled to last till 2011. They should bring in a solid 4-5m in the Summer too.

Such a shame Heartbeat isn't comercially viable anymore, because it was ITV's top rating drama whilst it was on for its last series and consistently above 5m in a tough Summer slot, and around 6m with a Corrie lead in.

ITV killed Survivor by trying to schedule what is a weekly show as a daily show ala Big Brother. Initially they aired two regular episodes a week on Monday and Thursday, with two extra studio episodes with John Leslie on the Tuesday and Friday - and those studio shows just stopped the show from getting any early momentum and just didn't work as unlike the Big Brother evictees, there wasn't really any interest in the Survivor evictees - especially as the evictee had been back in the UK for weeks before their interview.


The second series worked slightly better airing in a weekly slot with the interview show, recorded at the time of the departure on the island, airing in a post-News at Ten slot - but the damage had already been done, and then I'm a Celeb came along and the rest is history - especially as ITV couldn't get any voting revenue out of Survivor.


As for the Fiver/Five USA debate - people forget that should they merge the budget would be slashed, so it wouldn't be one channel filled with the best of both. I think there is clearly room for both IMO, although perhaps rebranding Five USA wouldn't be a bad idea and rather than being solely US focussed perhaps make it a more general male entertainment channel to complement the female skewing Fiver.

Yesterday between 6-7am:

BBC1: 430k (26.5%)
Sky Sports 1: 276k (17.0%)
BBC News: 106k (6.5%)
ITV3: 76k (4.7%)
Channel 5: 58k (3.6%)
ITV2: 58k (3.6%)
ITV1: 48k (2.9%)
Channel 4: 46k (2.8%)
BBC2: 40k (2.5%)
E4+1: 33k (2.0%)
ITV2+1: 28k (1.7%)
Channel One: 23k (1.4%)
CBeebies: 21k (1.3%)
Sky3: 19k (1.1%)
ITV4: 18k (1.1%)
Sky Sports News: 17k (1.0%)
Yesterday: 16k (1.0%)
Sky News: 16k (1.0%)
E4: 12k (0.7%)


Yesterday's ratings weren't tape-checked.

I believe DHWAV has a different distributor worldwide which is Touchstone which is owned by Disney, the rest of the series is owned by Fox.

I do think they merge Fiver and Five USA and keeping elements from each channels like soaps from Fiver, US imports from Five USA, stuff like Burn Notice and Human Target seem more suited to Five USA than Fiver.

Regarding 71 Degrees North, Richard Herring mentioned on Twitter a few weeks ago that he'd been asked to do the second series (he didn't seem interested though). That's not a definite indication that it'll be back because they could just be feeling out potential participants to see what kind of cast they could muster, but it does mean they must be seriously considering it.

My only surprise there is that BBC News is so high for a simulcast and that ITV2 and ITV3 beat ITV1.

Not surprised Sky Sports 1 is second for obvious reasons.


In which case, tape-checked both Coronation Street episodes may have been above 10m... not as bad as first thought, I don't think.

Moving CSI out of Tuesday would be risky although I think The Mentalist would fit quite well with NCIS remaining on Wednesday with CSI on Friday but keeping CSI: Miami on Tuesdays in the summer. They need more US imports to eventually replace the CSIs, Walking Dead should do well with heavy promotion but they need new shows, maybe Blue Bloods would be a good companion show to CSI: NY on Saturday.