Law and Order is a very weak show ratings wise, any sign of competition and it crumbles.

Very good for Mrs Brown's Boys, improving again on its previous week's number.


Pretty good for Twenty Tweleve. It should really have been advertised more but thats a good figure for BBC4 standards.

MG is reporting a slightly higher audience of 3.9m for BGTT.

They also have the numbers for Bedlam's series finale, check it out: http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011...e-bbc4-ratings

Do you mean Saturday 2nd or Sunday 3rd?

the BBC might want to keep it quiet for this reason

http://www.tvtonight.com.au/2011/03/...f-rip-off.html

Yup, won't be much different to last week.

I wonder how much of an impact the hour long Countrywise episodes are going to have on Tuesdays at 8pm ?

lol, sorry Saturday 2nd.

http://www.lostintv.com/tv_show.cfm?...nt_type_id=246

I wonder what the future holds for Midsomer Murders after the racism storm that has blown-up today in what looks like a backfiring publicity exercise?

With ITV HQ saying they are "shocked and appalled" and that "an immediate investigation" has been launched, will they be under some pressure to pull the revamped show, which is still a decent ratings puller, now it has been exposed by its own creator as pandering to a constituency of viewers who enjoy watching shows without black people in them?

Not saying I think they should, I kind of think he has a valid point actually in terms of making realistic shows rather than PC-driven, "fixed quotas of blacks and lesbians" programmes (eg, Emmerdale, supposedly set in a Dales farming community - or at least it used to be) - he just hasn't expressed it very well!

how has it been pandering? I'd say 99.999999% of the viewers werent even aware or care

I dont think it will be pulled. I think this story will blow over pretty quickly.

That link states that the show has been investigated and cleared by the BBC. As long as the show doesnt have inidividul episodes or characters that are clearly copies from The Games then there is no problem. There is no patent on making shows about Olympics organisers.



I suppose it depends on who has the rights to make the show. Can the show go on without the creator involved?

I agree that he hasnt said anything too wrong. Small villages like the ones featured in Midsomer dont have many, if any, ethnic minorities living in them so to have a nearly an all caucasian cast isn't an issue in my eyes. He just worded it VERY badly.

Shame for Law and Order UK as this was one of its best ever episodes.

ITV really should have aired that last week as first in the series (as I believe was true in the US).

It would have retained an audience better.

They need to move it away from Mondays immediately as they already have given it a long term committment with two further runs being filmed.

It was always foolish putting it head to head with such a similar show as WTD.

Problem for viewers is that it has no ongoing story or developing characterisation so easily dispensible for a week if there is a clash as nothing will be missed but a self contained story. Then one week can so easily become two.

It simply HAS to air in a slot without competition for the target audience for that reason.

TV scheduling 101 I would have thought.

I do wonder if ITV has made it more of a story with their "shocked and appalled" instant reaction. Can they continue to promote and air a show which has so "shocked and appalled" them?

And if they can, were they really "shocked and appalled" in the first place?

Yeah, I wonder what they'll do. He rated well on Fridays at 10.35pm, but they might be tempted to try Saturdays instead.

Its not the show that has "shocked and appalled" them. Its the comments by the creator.

Are you suggesting that ITV are managing the story!! I'm shocked

The axe for MM is long overdue anyway. While still a ratings puller, sometimes shows should be rested for their creative good. Getting the ratings didn't stop them axing The Royal and Heartbeat and I can't imagine the demos are that different.

Where else could it go? It didn't do well on Thursdays. The repeats rated terribly on Tuesdays, and new episodes probably wouldn't do much better. There's no room on Wednesdays or Sundays, and it doesn't strike me as a Saturday night show. And ITV seem to want to put light ent or comedy on Fridays.

I think it's just one of those shows which only rates well when there's very little else on the other channels.

Much bigger dent in Law and Order than I was expecting - thats bad news considering the episode commitment ITV have made to it. Waking the Dead did well to hold steady - I wonder whether last nights premiere caught some of its fans out - we'll have to see whether it can grow any.


I think the subject matter would have helped BGTT last night. They actually managed to compile together a whole show with reports on earthquakes and tsunami's with links from the presenters discussing what happened in Japan. They were lucky in that they had the ready made reports, but they still did well to draw it all together in just a couple of days.

Still, it does seem safe above 3m in its 7.30 slot which is probably enough to secure it a future. In that slot, it sort of acts as an extension of TOS with a scientific theme and the viewers seem happy to stick with it. The 8pm specials don't work.

Re the shake-up at ITV News: pretty obvious Daybreak is being brought under the direct control of ITV News which suggests a newsier programme to compete with BBC Breakfast. It clearly needs the input of more heavyweight ITN reporters and producers as the situation in Japan has so effectively demonstrated.I think in the end we're also talking of more heavyweight presenters.

I expect iPlayer figures will be hugely impressive, Episode 1 hasn't dropped out of the "most popular" section for 3 weeks!

All 4 episodes are currently in there!

That dubious honour goes to Flashboreward surely? How quickly they forget......Mercifully in the case of that rubbish.

A pathetic rating for The Event - The most ironically named television programme ever.

Even better when you add the 8,000 who watched it on BBC HD!!

Why they continue with the BBC3 EE repeat simulcast and push back new programmes is beyond me.

FlashForward never fell as low as The Event or The Prisoner which both recorded audiences below 700k in the overnights. FlashForward's lowest overnight rating was 1.2m. So purely in ratings terms, FlashForward was not as big a flop as everyone makes out. In the officials I think most if not all episodes came in at 2m+ which is good for Channel 5, although given how much it fell from its stellar launch I doubt they shed many tears when it was axed in the States.

Yes, I think Midsomer Murders should be rested, until John Nettles agrees to return for a few specials.

That's what should've happened - would've saved the integrity of the shows - personally I think Nettles is the only star they can't replace.

They could rest it - and show repeats in the meantime - and when it returns we might see 7m+ audiences again (perhaps a winter/spring/autumn/christmas run - 4 in a year).

I've been recommended this, and having watched last night's episode, I have to say even if it was 'not great', it is still greater than 90% of comedy on nowadays.

Normally I'd suggest moving it to 9pm, but I think in Mrs Brown's Boys case, that would harm it because it'd have to be toned down language and content wise I think. Nevertheless, the overnights on DS so far are promising:

21/02 - 2.64m (16.4%)
28/02 - 2.63m (18.2%)
07/03 - 2.68m (19.5%)
14/03 - 2.99m (22.4%)

It's already been recommissioned

Daybreak isn't being brought under the control of ITV News. It's just that the news-bulletins within the programme are being supplied ITN/ITV News. They used to be supplied by Reuters.