BBC Scheduling Idiots. Can't remember whom here first coined the term.

Oh thanks for that.

New schedulers (and a different range of programmes to schedule) are definetely needed though!

I think we can be fairly certain it wasnt George Dixon.

No stand ratings at all for last night. A poor Saturday for all channels. SYTYCD premiered with a much lower rating than I was expecting. Surely is should have been capable of 5m+? Harry Hill did OK. It's been a strange series this one. It's no way near as good as it used to be, but it's still good fun! PTB crashed and burned after last weeks good rating. ITV need to bring back Takeaway in 2012. PTB isn't a great show, but it's alright TV for a Saturday night. QOS did about as much as I expected. 5m (inc. +1) so by no means a disaster.


Thanks for the drama list ratings for BBC1 and ITV1 rzt. Some interesting figures there. I think it's fair to say that Silent Witness did very well due to ITV showing TBL in the 9pm slot which did not benefit at all from the 10m/11m Corrie lead in every week. Those viewers clearly jumped ship and opted for Silent Witness. WaH did very well again and as proved last week after it ended it's run, viewers don't just stick with it cos they are waiting for the DoI results. Personally it looks boring as hell, but each to their own. It's one of ITV1's best returning dramas. The success of Marchlands has been very impressive. 7.35m (inc. +1) is a great result. Thursday nights are really working for ITV at the moment along with Kidnap and Ransom and Monroe. It's odd how The Bill never worked in that slot now after all these successes.

If So You Think You Can Dance gets a third series, I'll eat my underpants.

Grilled, with a side serving of mushrooms.

I think it'll get some horrid ratings over the next few months.

I actually am amazed it got a second series! OK the first series had reasonable enough viewers but it also had a fairly short run of just 7 episodes.

One format that I think would have worked better in the SYTYCD spring slot (usually taken up by the ALW shows) would be "Last Choir Standing". I have no idea why this wasn't given a second series as I seem to recall it rated reasonably well considering the unusual style of show for a Saturday night.

I am a little pessimistic about BBC1's Saturday night offerings this summer. I think that having only a six week run for DW this spring has caused a void to appear in the summer schedules, and with there being no major sport event either!

The big BBC1 Saturday night game show for summer this year is "Don't Scare The Hare". So apart from the 6 weeks of DW, the Eurovision Song Contest and probably In It to Win It, there's not much to get excited about this year.

Is BBC1 embarking on it's worst year for new original programming ever?

I guess one problem with So You Think You Can Dance is that, in the USA, it was one of the very first of these kind of shows, whereas here, it's the umpteenth, I don't think it does anything we haven't seen before.

Also, I think it's all a bit humourless and self-important, especially in the live shows where I think Nigel especially is too prone to lapsing into technical jargon that either baffles or bores the general viewer. And I went off it big time last series when they did a dance "representing" cancer, and everyone said how "brave" it was, which is the kind of grandstanding you might be able to get away with on American telly but here it just felt tasteless and unneccessary. I like Cat, though.

They've been there, done that, got the flop, firstly with Strictly Dance Fever and then with Arlene/Bruno on the awful Dance X.

It is definitely live as it's being recorded on the day it airs and the doors don't open until 7pm. I think it's got a chance of getting 5m+ but I agree after last night my expectations are lower.

Low night all round last night. Even stuff like Secret Fortune, Total Wipeout and You've Been Framed were low. TV Burp did decently, and whilst this series has rated a bit on the low side, the potential is there for it to return to form. Push The Button on the other hand did badly for Ant and Dec and shouldn't return. Quantum did pretty well considering it ran until 11pm. Disappointing start for SYTYCD. I had a feeling it wouldn't do so well and unfortunately I can't see it rising much, if at all over the run. It'll probably be closer to 4m in the earlier slot next week, which doesn't bode well considering it's a 12 week run!

Surely there is something wrong with the quoted Primetime share for BBC1 - whichever version of primetime your using.

Using the 7-11pm definition of primetime - the one which DS uses. DS has slightly different primetime figures to the ones I posted though:

ITV1: 22.3% (+1: 0.8%)
BBC1: 21.2%

The poorly rated 10-11pm hour dragged down BBC1's primetime share.

Don't write off SYTYCD just yet. Remember in a couple of weeks it's likely to be up against Sing if You Can

Regarding BBC One Saturday nights, aren't they squeezing out another Lloyd Webber talent search this year ?

DS's Ratings page on Twitter has been taken over by humans! http://twitter.com/#!/tvratings

tvratings
Russell Howard's Good News Extra: 547k (2.4%) last night, good for BBC3 after it beat 10 O'Clock Live on Thursday
4 minutes ago

Advert just aired for new series of Britain's Got Talent on ITV1.

Fascinating article from The Express

http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/...s-in-its-veins

If the BBC have to make cuts then the frothy fare of Saturday night BBC1 is a good place to start. I'm old enough to remember when BBC1's Summer Saturdays would consist of little more than Seaside Special (yuck!) and a season of (repeated) Carry On Films. The Carry On's actually did not too bad in the ratings.

BBC1 have Lottery quizzes and Casualty to carry them through the Summer. That's about two hours of air-time. That's enough new stuff for the night. They could top and tail the evening with repeats and films.

And if that results in lower ratings then tough. The BBC's not supposed to chase ratings and are going to have to prioritise in the face of their real-term licence cuts. Saturday night light-entertainment has to be a lower priority.

Nice to see credible journalism thriving in the UK. :yawn:

Last year BGT started on 17th April. Looks like it'll probably be starting the same weekend this year (that'll be April 16th). And it'll probably adopt the same scheduling as last year with the only Sunday edition being on Champions League Final weekend.

It seems that, as with DOI staying on Sundays and not being spread across the weekend, that ITV bosses have the philosophy "If it ain't broke, don't fix it.". And quite right too.

Further to what someone else said.
From the Millionaire website

http://millionaire.itv.com/home.php
So I an see it will be Live - strange the've changed the title!

I was expecting that to be a puff peice about The Walking Dead.

Nice. I didn't see it, did it look any good?

Like iaindb, I guess it'll be starting on April 16th as surely they wouldn't be advertising it now if it was any later. But contrary to that, a DS article today said it would return on the 23rd?

They seem to be trying to generate some sort of Channel 4 v Channel 5 battle with the last comment. But I doubt any of the readers actually care!

Bit lacklustre. Only showed the judges.

i love ant and dec but i agree about push the button its crap

It's early days, I suspect we'll see a longer trailer closer to the start date.

ITV usually starts promoting programmes 2 weeks before broadcast, but I wouldn't be surprised if they're promoting BGT 3 weeks beforehand because of the new judges etc. Doctor Who is already being promoted by the BBC for 23rd April so I wouldn't rule out a 23rd April for BGT too.

Edit: Got my dates wrong. 16th April looks likely, like what iaindb said, as that's three weeks away.