B****r all worth watching?

I can't see there being much improvement in Saturday ratings until Doctor Who and BGT return (and sooner the better, as far as the former is concerned).

There are another eleven weeks of it i think. Have to say i dont think the format and subject matter has enough oomph about it to create much interest. Certainly I have not picked up any pre show interest, no paper talk. If last nights show is anything to go by its likely there will be a series of young fit trained contestants whose dance has more to with gymnastics than the stuff we see on SCD. Anyone who just might not be A1 material but who might have a hook story for the public is out the door-infact I dont get why they go to the trouble of doing film promos of people who are promptly dumped straight away.
As for the evening-ITV1 won the night I think-wonder whether the BBC's need to show the uneventful Rugby match the week before has broken the recent habit of tuning in for some people. Or is SYTYCD actually going to be a turn off.

Whilst there were probably high peaks during the ITV years, I think the BBC is the only place for the Boat Race-where it was for all but five years since the last ice age. The race continues purely on its tradition and it just seems to fit with the BBC.
I do agree that there are certain promotional advantages with having your event on the beeb.

Yes 22 and 23 million for premieres in the seventies and eighties. Simply astonishing and yet the films arent at the very top at the box office. I agree about the impact of films now, so many ways to see them before they get to tv, the only times there is the potential of a decent audience is at Christmas and Harry Potter and there only three of those to go I think. It could be that Indiana Jones is the highest this year from the very first day.

How's Boardwalk doing in the overnights?

The first of the four weekly showings always beats The Killing in the officials. I bet it's the other way round for the overnights.

I thought Peter Kay would have got higher than that. I know it's only a repeat and that it clashed with QOS, but C4 have been promoting it quite heavily, it's hot on the trail of the recent Comic Relief sketch, and that kind of show is perfect for a Saturday night.

Maybe viewers just don't associate C4 with Saturday nights, whatever they may be offering?! It's always their poorest night of the week.

Speaking of Bond, all the Connery premieres from the sixties attracted at least 20 million viewers and Doctor No attracted 26 million viewers. However, this was the era before video, DVDs and internet downloads and the BBC usually waved the white flag against Bond, so ratings were usually very high.

Was that the fourth primetime showing last night?

I watched a bit last night, never fails to make me laugh. One of the best entertainment shows ever!!

However, when it was first on, I don't think the 'average' viewer realised it was a very clever satire.

Cat Deeley's "Shut the f*** up" is a classic!!

I wonder what the numbers will be like once spring/summer warmth/lighter evenings really get's going?

I thought the trailers for that - the same trailers as its previous showing - were a bloody joke, this programme has been on umpteen bloody times. C4 are quite to slag off other channels for not innovating enough, yet not only do they poach Mary Portas and Ruth Watson to do the exact same shows they did on other channels, they also repeat all of Peter Kay's shows ten million times, with endless trailers. And he hasn't written a new joke since 2002.

It must be said that the Bond franchise has been a very good earner and schedule filler for ITV.

The next Bond starts filming in November according to Judi 'M' Dench and will be released in November 2012 so ITV are presumably putting money in the piggy bank already

What were the ratings for the F1 re-run?

That is the F1 re-run.

What I dont understand is why the BBC dont use the winning formula of Strictly but adapt it so that they use ordinary people rather than so called celebs. Im sure that it would pull in at least 5 or 6 million interested viewers. Anything would be better than the god awful Louise on primetime BBC One. She can barely hold a conversation on Something for the Weekend.

My bad, I ment to say what were the live ratings?

rzt posted it on the previous page :
05:00 to 07:30 - 1.08m (45.7%)

As we're a quarter way through the year, let's take a look at the official consolidated series averages for the BBC1 and ITV1 dramas which have aired so far this year. All these figures include HD. In brackets, next to the programme name, is the change compared to the average for the show the previous year:

BBC One
1 – 7.97m – Silent Witness… (+4%)
2 – 7.30m – South Riding… (NEW)
3 – 7.15m – Lark Rise to Candleford… (+3%)
4 – 7.08m – Waking The Dead*… (-1%)
5 – 6.79m – Hustle… (+5%)
6 – 5.91m – Silk*… (NEW)
7 – 5.70m – Zen… (NEW)
8 – 3.29m – Outcasts… (NEW)

ITV1
1 – 7.92m (inc +1: 8.09m) – Wild at Heart… (+3/5%)
2 – 7.66m (8.05m) – Benidorm*… (+17/23%)
3 – 7.51m (7.71m) – Midsomer Murders*… (+26/29%)
4 – 6.98m (7.35m) – Marchlands… (NEW)
5 – 6.63m (6.63m) – Above Suspicion… (-15%)
6 – 6.05m (6.29m) – Monroe*… (NEW)
7 – 5.78m (5.98m) – Kidnap & Ransom… (NEW)
8 – 5.21m (5.43m) – Law & Order: UK*… (-0/4%)
9 – 4.93m (4.93m) – Agatha Christie’s Marple… (-9%)
10 – 4.58m (4.67m) – Primeval… (-6/8%)
11 – 3.45m (3.79m) – Taggart… (-21/28%)

All individual episode ratings: http://i52.tinypic.com/2v1875z.jpg

Notes
- * = series which are currently airing so there will be changes to the average once all episodes are broadcast.
- For the ITV dramas, I've put the ITV1+1 included figures in brackets for people who want to see the series averages including +1.
- Some of the ITV dramas did not air in Scotland so bear that in mind if directly comparing a non-STV drama with another drama as the non-STV drama would be at an -8% automatic deficit.
- A few BBC dramas may have also experienced regional outputs for some episodes that could've surpressed their figures.
- Waking The Dead and Benidorm y-o-y comparisons done to their last series which aired in 2009.

Apart from Outcasts, I think BBC1 has had a good start to the year in terms of their drama. All the returning drama series have either been steady or grown their audiences compared to the previous year. That was Lark Rise to Candleford's most watched ever series, Silent Witness's most watched series in about 10 years, Hustle's most watched series in 6-7 years. Silent Witness' ratings are extremely strong and they get 10 episodes out of it every year - I wonder how many more series the BBC will do, it's been running for 15 years already! They also had big success with South Riding which, apart from Sherlock and Upstairs Downstairs, was their most popular new drama in the last few years. Also Zen timeshifted well to end up with a respectable 5.7m average, although it didn't turn out to be enough, I suspect because its audience tailed off during its run.

Silk has been very consistent so far, rating in the high 5's since episode 2, and been BBC1's most popular new 6-part weeknight drama series since 2005/2006 (not counting Ashes to Ashes which was a follow up to Life on Mars). People have said Silk's ratings have been mediocre but to me, it's a no-brainer recommission. It'll be very difficult for the BBC to find another new drama series on weeknights getting ~5.8m week-in-week-out, even considering it's been up against easy competition. It's taken them the best part of 5 years to find a procedural-type show as successful as this in that particular slot so they should stick with it. Outcasts, of course, was a disaster - becoming BBC1's lowest rated 6+ episode drama series to originally begin at 9pm since The Invisibles (3.44m, 2008). But this has been the only weak-link so far for BBC1 drama this year.

As for ITV drama, it's been more of a mixed bag. The returning shows have had varying amounts of success: Wild at Heart, Benidorm and Midsomer Murders have experienced gains year-on-year, particularly the latter two which have risen a lot. I think ITV will be delighted that Wild at Heart managed to grow its audience as it's become a key part of their Sundays in Q1s. Other returning drama like Above Suspicion, L&O, Primeval and Taggart experienced declines. Taggart's drop was the biggest out of the lot - I think have a first-look in Scotland last year, poor slot up against Silent Witness really harmed it and it ended up with the lowest series average for an ITV weeknight drama since Monday Monday (2.9m, 2009). Out of the declining returning dramas, Primeval was probably the one which doesn't have a valid scheduling excuse - it was given a good slot, not up against particularly tough competition, but rated poorly which suggests to me it was the show rather than scheduling which was the main reason for its decline.

In terms of new drama, they've had a good start to the year. Marchlands was a big success - they haven't had a drama in that slot getting that sort of ~7m audience in a fair few years, and it not being your typical safe ITV crime drama show makes it success the more impressive. Kidnap & Ransom did solid against relatively tough competition in the form of Come Fly with Me and although there's not been any word about it returning, I think ITV will bring it back - the figures are good enough for another shot. That Monroe average only includes two episodes, so its average will go down, but it's made a promising start IMHO and although like Silk, its overnights might be a bit middling, when you compare how Monroe is doing so far to other 6-part weeknight drama series which have launched in recent years, it's doing well. This is another one which I can see returning next year if its figures hold up in the remaining 3 episodes.

Thanks.

For those wondering how last night's So You Think You Can Dance rating compares with the first series:

Series 1 (2010)
02/01 - 6.44m (27.4%)
09/01 - 6.87m (26.7%) and 5.18m (20.4%)
16/01 - 5.59m (23.9%) and 5.49m (21.3%)
23/01 - 5.81m (25.2%) and 5.38m (22.2%)
30/01 - 4.62m (20.7%) and 4.76m (20.0%)
06/02 - 4.99m (21.2%) and 4.82m (20.5%)
13/02 - 5.31m (22.2%)
Average = 5.44m (22.6%)

Series 2 (2011)
26/03 - 4.87m (22.6%)
----
BBC will have to hope this years' series doesn't decrease in viewers like last year's tended to do. The competition isn't that bad, next week the competition is the same, TV Burp is actually a 'best of', so it really should be above 5m. Coincidentally, the title for next Saturday's Millionaire has changed:


The word 'Live' is no longer mentioned in the title, suggesting that it is being pre-recorded. Based on yesterday's poor figures, I'd go about ~4.5m for it myself.

With those ratings, perhaps it was a shrewd move!


Really? I'd have tuned in if I'd known!

They should have promoted it better....


I'm sure Tomorrow Never Dies has delivered over 22m viewers for ITV - if you add up the dozens of showings it's had on ITV1 and ITV2 over the past decade.


Maybe it's because it's a load of crap, by far the worst thing Kay has done, and been endlessly repeated already?


You need to make the same caveat for some of the BBC1 dramas, which weren't given full network transmissions for some episodes. If they aired at different times in Scotland or NI, then BARB won't have included the regional showings in the consolidated official ratings.

Waking the Dead and Silent Witness for sure, don't know about the others.

So unless you have been able to source the ratings for the regional showings, the series averages are also going to slightly under-represent those shows. Granted, we're not talking very much, but an important point to add to your notes.

Interesting that you've included Benidorm with the dramas. I accept there's nothing particularly funny in it any more, but I think it is supposed to be a comedy...

I'd forgotten about the regional ouputs for BBC1 dramas. I've made a point about it under the 'notes' bit now. But it very rarely happens, isn't it? I think maybe a 2 or 3 episodes out of that list, which isn't much compared to the STV situation when entire series of dramas aren't shown in quite a major area population-wise.

As for Benidorm, Tiger Aspect who makes the show and ITV seem to call it a "comedy drama" nowadays and have done so since series 3 when it went to the one hour format. It's one of those 50/50 ones - some people might still call it a "sitcom" but I'm including it in the drama list (and have done so for the last two years) because that's what ITV tend to label it as these days.

Talking of Waking the Dead, I think it may have peaked already for this final run given that it will be blitzed tonight by the DOI Final and then by going up against the second hour of Looo-iss for the rest of its run.

Had it not been for Outcasts bumping WTD back by 3 or 4 weeks, it wouldn't have been a problem. Surely the BSI would have realised ITV would launch Lewis on Sundays right after DOI finished?

Actually, we're talking the BSI. Silly question....

Quite interesting looking at the Brosnan era of Bond film premieres figures.

Goldeneye: 13.2m (10/3/1999) Official
Tomorrow Never Dies: 11.8m (13/10/1999) Official
The World is Not Enough: 9.4m (14/11/2001) Overnight
Die Another Day: 7.9m (27/10/2004) Overnight

Out of interest and confusion, what is BSI?