It's an absolutely horrendous rating, but not quite the lowest. I believe that record is held by What The Green Movement Got Wrong's astonshingly low 330k late last year.

Campus joins a whole host of turkeys for C4 in the 10pm slot in recent months. All of the following have rated below 800k in the slot, most multiple times:

- Seven Days
- The Model Agency
- 10 O'Clock Live
- The Event
- True Blood
- What The Green Movement Got Wrong (10.20)
- The Morgana Show (10.30)
- Robert's Web (10.30)

And that is only since September, excluding Christmas. I may have missed a few.

Now contrast that to Big Brother which consistently brought in 3 times that audience in the 10pm slot during the summer, not finishing until around 11:15pm most nights, and suddenly you realise the extent of C4's plight.

OK, so it's well in advance but the issue comes up every now and again so here are some numbers...

Highest Rated Premieres (Adults 18-49):
2010: 3.9 (Mike & Molly, Hawaii Five-O, Sh*t My Dad Says)
2009: 5.2 (V)*
2008: 4.1 (Fringe)
2007: 5.5 (Bionic Woman)
2006: 6.2 (Brothers & Sisters)

*V premiered in November. And technically the highest would be Undercover Boss but that's because of The Superbowl lead-in. In September, the highest rated was Cougar Town (4.4).

Most Watched Premieres:
2010: 14.2m (Hawaii Five-O)
2009: 18.7m (NCIS:LA)
2008: 15.9m (The Mentalist)
2007: 14.4m (Private Practice)
2006: 16.1m (Brothers & Sisters)

Lead-ins have been key and being a remake or a spin-off helps a lot as well.

If X Factor matched the highest audience (NCIS:LA), it's A18-49 rating would likely be a 6.something depending on how the audience breaks down. In line with last years #1 premiere (the lowest), X Factor would probably start somewhere in the high 4's.

Working in reverse, if X Factor matched the highest A18-49 rating (6.2), it's total audience would be around 18m (assuming 45% are A18-49). If it matched the highest in recent years (V's 5.2) it would have about 15m. If it was at the lower end with this years premieres, it would be looking at an audience most likely under 12m.

What qualifies as a success and what doesn't is hard to say. I think it could safely be said that a 3.9 would be very disappointing for FOX - especially as drops in the weeks that follow are likely. Of course, more important will be the numbers that follow - particularly in November sweeps. But how far above 4 it needs to go to be a success, I have no idea.

To be pretty much guaranteed the #1 spot in A18-49 each week (football aside), it probably needs a 5.0 (though with erosion for Modern Family & Glee likely, a 4.5 should do it). Taking that 5.0, that might mean just under 15m viewers. With the 4.5, that would be just over 13m.

Yeah, although 'What The Green Movement Got Wrong' was shown between 22:20-23:00. So it's possible that last night, the 22:00-23:00 was C4's lowest ever because on that other night, C4 had ~740k between 22:00-22:20 which would've pulled up their entire hour average to over 400k.


That certainly looks bad. Apart from The Million Pound Drop, I can't remember the last time a new show on C4 at 10pm had over 2m (excluding movies). As you say, a lot are even struggling to get 1.0-1.5m. Ratings-wise BB will certainly be a big loss to them: last month C4 were down 12% year-on-year in the monthly shares and that comparison was to a non-BB month. In July/August, they could be looking at almost 20% y-o-y drops!

Ratings sucked in the US as well last night

ABC:
8pm - Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution - 4.68m (1.1)
9pm - Dancing With The Stars - 15.84m (2.9)
10pm - Body of Proof - 11.51m (2.4)

FOX:
8pm - Glee - 9.66m (3.7)
9pm - Raising Hope - 5.66m (2.2)
9.30pm - Traffic Light - 3.27m (1.4)

NBC:
8pm - The Biggest Loser - 6.60m (2.3)
10pm - Parenthood - 6.31m (2.5)

CW:
8pm - One Tree Hill - 1.43m (0.7)
9pm - Hellcats - 1.14m (0.5)

Season lows for Glee, The Biggest Loser and Dancing With The Stars. Series low for Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution and I'd have thought Hellcats (and maybe One Tree Hill?) as well.

Parenthood was the season finale, it's best numbers since September.

Tvbythenumbers

Must be the easiest job in TV basically rejigging HBO's schedule.


And we haven't even touched on the Big Brother effect yet. The current ratings are a reflection more of the loss of big dramas in the 10pm slot - it used to be pretty much full outside of Big Brother too with UK drama (other than Shameless) on Tuesdays, Desperate Housewives on Wednesdays, Without a Trace on Thursdays and usually the latest hit from the US axed after a series on Mondays, generally all quite comfortably over 2m too.

Now they just seem to have nothing - and what they do have is burned off in slots opposite TV powerhouses where it's got no chance of finding an audience. I think Pillars of the Earth would have done better in a weeknight 10pm slot, and whilst Any Human Heart and The Promise may never have been dramas to appeal to the masses, they'd have been better in a weeknight slot and saved C4 commissioning up to 16 hours of programming as they can put a film on Sundays at 9pm and viewers welcome it, rather than question it.

It may be more expensive, but C4 need to spend money to make money and start rebuilding their drama portfolio, both UK and US. And from the US pilots in the offering at the moment, I think they'd be better off sticking closer to home.

here was me thinking Ross had left the BBC.


I hate when DVD boxsets are made incomplete by new series, or additonal films.

Quite a poor night overall. The BBC declined since 9.00pm. EastEnders was brilliant last night, and I'm not suprised the ratings were the highest of the day. A massive multichannel rating too.

Or, “how to fit an hour of new HBO content in amongst 23 hours of ancient repeats?”

It was a repeat although one without much rationale behind it - Taking up 3 hours of the night’s schedule over the two airings.

Could someone explain the USA ratings for me please?

Is the small number in the brackets (the demo?) more important than the total amount of viewers?

Yeah, the small number is the one the commercially-minded US networks really care about. I think it's calculated out of the % of 18-49 year olds in the whole country who watched a particular broadcast.

All the networks have slightly different expectations - and obviously cost comes into play too. For the top 4 (excluding the CW) anything pulling less than 2.0 is basically toast (unless its on NBC which sucks so badly they might be forced to renew worse performing shows). I'd say about 2.5 secures renewal on any other network.

The CW's 18-49's matter less than other networks. They judge success by a different demographic - and accept much lower figures anyway. In fact, a lot of their shows only really survive because of strong international sales. The US advertising could never cover the expense.

Anyone think we could see Candy Cabs recommissioned, but as a 6 x 30 show instead of 3 x 60? One show that has been commissioned: http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pre.../19/joke.shtml


Not sure its deserving of primetime, though.

Yeah, it's a tricky one due to the awkward slot and it's difficult to know which was lower without breakdowns for both. I suspect that between the times of 10:20pm and 11:05pm, WTGMGW rated lower, but if we take the 10pm hour as a whole then you're probably right about Campus.


I reckon so. Especially in August when BB starts on C5 and C4's usual summer audience is occupied elsewhere for an hour or more a night! Replacing these with new viewers won't be easy.

I expect them to schedule aggressively against it at first, but they can only put up so much of a fight when it's going to be occupying so much of C5's schedule from August to January. Do C4 have enough weapons in their arsenal to prevent the likely onslaught? I'm betting not.

They can't even bring back The Million Pound Drop in that month as Davina has made a point of saying she'll be on a summer break with her family whilst BB is on.

Any van damme behind closed doors ratings welcome please?

What does CW stand for (sorry if being thick!)

CBS/Warner Bros. Each own 50%.

I think only EastEnders and Emmerdale came through the night with any respect. Dreadful figures elsewhere; I'm surprised The Reckoning dropped so much yet no show really took advantage.

Meanwhile, despite the weak figuress of late, ITV have renewed The Cube:

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/news/...es-by-itv.html

Good news IMO, but it needs a better slot.

I wonder iof the sad passing of Elisabeth Sladen may see a slight boost for Doctor Who. The production team have confirmed there will be a tribute on Saturday:

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/s7/do...n-tribute.html

The writers may have not put some jokes into it then.

I agree. Only EastEnders and Emmerdale seemed to have rated well. And, then again, 6.4m for Emmerdale is hardly anything to dance about.

If this weather continues nobody will be watching tv (apart from event tv such as BGT). And who would blame them? If we had weather like this for 6 months of the year, people would throw out their tv sets.

Better than 7 o'clock on a Sunday night?

And I say that Holby City also came through the night with respect.

Expect good numbers for the football tonight. Five goals so far and it's not even half time!!

It has now been confirmed that a 15-minute tribute titled My Sarah Jane: A Tribute to Elisabeth Sladen will be broadcast on Saturday at 6.45pm on the CBBC channel, directly after Doctor Who on BBC One.


A boost for CBBC?

Just seen my first trailer for ITV1's new Sunday night crime drama Vera.

It looks crap.

It looks a bit similar to Num3ers on Channel 5, only the maths whiz is some old duffer and not a maths whiz.