A real shame that a big Match of the Day tonight wont be on until 10.45 which is going to be late for to many on a Sunday Night. Obviously not much that can be done with the snooker on BBC2 and BBC1 running a 90 minute drama at 9pm but it wont rate as highly as if the games were on a Saturday or if it was starting at its usual 10pm tonight.

I think the key for Dancing On Ice will be how much of an audience it built up between 6.10 and 8pm. If it managed mid 8s then the final half hour may not drag it down too far. Wild At Heart could be really hurt though, along with The Skate Off.

cant fault ITV 3.

ITV 1 on the other hand, wow its starting to rival Tuesday for the "flop zone" title, im sure ITV wanted more than 2.4m from Ross at 9pm. Talent Show Story continues to flop.

Still the new series of TV Burp isnt far off, so thats good news for ITV.

Watching CTM for Miranda, and I suspect many others might be too. Not my thing at all, but I can see why this could become a big hitting hit. Wouldn't be surprised if it goes up in the ratings - looking forward tomorrow to the overnights but more particularly the official for ep 1. Will it have made 9m?


If we progress to the SF, then that. Otherwise, I still think people are seriously underestimating what a massive event the Olympics Opening Ceremony will be.

I still don't quite understand ITV's thinking with this. Did they honestly expect The Talent Show Story to do particularly well in a prime time Saturday night slot? It just seems like the most bizarre piece of scheduling and you can only assume that someone at ITV thought 'people like to watch The X Factor on Saturday night so obviously they'll also want to watch a talking heads clip show about talent shows on Saturday night as well'. It just defies logic.

I fear that you are correct.


i think I would have put it in the Flop Zone, its certainly rating like its in it. I long ago gave up on ITV.

ITV should consider themselves lucky I will bother to watch Whitechapel.

On the subject of CSI: UK, the "cost" of it is the key issue, Channel 5 will never be able to afford it, the US CSIs have set a very high standard, and I dont think C5 can even hope to match it, or get half way to matching it.

No it isn't.
The Flop Zone title refers to a slot where a wide variety of programmes have aired and pretty much every one has rated low, this taking place over a period of many years, not just one programme getting low ratings.

sorry I was not aware of the "official" definition of "Flop Zone"

I lost ITV3 and 4 when Freeview was rearranged 3 years ago in west Cumbria and got ITV2+1 and Rabbit as compensation. Like I really want to watch a repeat of a repeat of Jeremy Kyle and some men who look like serial killers trying to pull some 21 year old nymphette. We are royally stuffed here as the ITV 3 and 4 channels were vastly better than the other two.

It really all depends on whether or not they can strike a favourable production deal. I'd agree that if Five had to shoulder the majority (or the entire) cost of production the show would be too expensive however we shouldn't forget how big a money spinner the CSI franchise is in international markets. Its not impossible that CBS Television (who I assume own the rights) can be convinced to shoulder a bigger share of production cost if they believe there's enough back end reward from syndication into international markets. It could also be argued that finding the money to do it might be in Five's best interest if they can strike a deal that would allow them to share in the proceeds from selling the show internationally.

Of course the other route forward for Five when it comes to original drama is co-production with other broadcasters. That allows them to reduce the cost whilst dipping their toe in the water. In that instance you'd think buying the rights to a crime novel of some description would serve them best and maybe pitching it as a two-parter that could potentially expand into a series if successful. In fact that's probably their best path forward regardless of whether its a co-production or not.

Isn't that the raison d'etre of Freesat?

They might as well have started showing repeats of Pop Idol. Actually this did happen in America during the screenwriters strike and ratings bombed massively as no one is interested in these shows once they are finished.

In other news ITV may have a bit of a problem brewing with Superstar – Tim Rice isn't a fan. He's apparently said that he asked Lloyd Webber not to cast Jesus Christ Superstar in this way and has described the whole thing as tasteless, tacky and relentlessly down market and open to ridicule. He's also questioned whether a public phone vote to decide who should be Jesus is a good idea. More worryingly though it would appear that the revival can't be cast without his approval and he's threatening to veto the casting of the potential winner.

A case of all publicity is good publicity? Or just a bad omen?

EDIT - Also according to an online article in the Telegraph at least ITV plans to strip Superstar across three weeks in June and July - The programme, which may also include a public vote to find a Judas character, will air every night for three weeks on ITV1 during June and July. (Link)

That can't be right surely...

One of the reports for Superstar says that it's airing every night for 3 consecutive weeks during June and July. Surely that's a bit over-the-top?! What if it bombs - that would be 3 whole weeks of low ratings!

Yeah I just saw that and added it to my post. It does indeed seem like a disaster waiting to happen. Surely not even ITV would be crazy enough to try that.

Confirmed: Superstar begins on Monday 2nd July, finishing on Friday 20th July. You heard it here first.

I could understand it if they'd stripped it over 2 weeks against the Olympic Games, as counter programming. But 3 weeks over June/July, if true, would be too big a commitment for viewers of a new untested show. As you say, sounds like a disaster if it happens that way.

But the football doesn't finish until 1st July? Are they planning to line it up as football opposition over semi final week? I guess they'll want it finished by the 27th for the Olympics.

EDIT: Just seen D.M.N's post. Um, ok, has George Dixon taken over ITV's scheduling department?

I agree, a weekly run would be much, much better. For a start the contestants only having one day to learn and perfect their performances isn't going to work well, and won't leave time for them to do anything else in the competition (ie. acting classes, choreography etc). Seems a very poor way to do it.

Having said that, I guess it can't do any worse than ITV's Summer 9pm shows last year! I can see why they aren't running it against the Olympics as it would be severely dented and is probably too expensive to be dented like that. I think they should strip a repeat run of both series of Downton across the 2 weeks of the Olympics as it'd be cost effective and would draw in a decent counter-audience.

How would stripping it nightly over 3 weeks even work? I get that you can easily achieve that for the pre-record auditions and boot camp stage but surely a nightly performance show is a step too far? Are people really going to stick with that and vote? Although I suppose it would help make sense of the Jesus and Judas casting rumours – you could alternate between the two. One night the potential Jesus' perform the following night the potential Judas' with a Jesus being eliminated and then the following night Jesus' perform with a Judas being eliminated... And now I've just written that sentence it strikes me just how terrible an idea this casting show is and just how potentially offensive it is to quite a lot of people.

Also presumably this would be running in at least 90 minute slots (for the live shows anyway) so that would be 8:30-10 or 9-10:30 during the week? Unless they adopt a BGT finals schedule for the live shows I suppose not that, that seems any better.

If they wanted something to run nightly for a couple of weeks it would've been better to bring back Hell's Kitchen or Soapstar Superstar where the overall performances don't really matter.

I just wrote a big thing about how their overreacting to the olympics, and how ITV are misunderstanding that their in a great position to offer an alternative...but the olympics isn't till 267th!!

What the hell are ITV doing? I thought it was cost-minimisation, eg. 'right lads we can either fight for some, but risk losing a lot - or stick a single show as the main primetime position for it, and hope we can get out of this with at least breaking even on our overheads'. But NO - this is just ****ing insanity.

I know ITV had a bad summer last year, but they showed **** all. They are now investing in a show to run across 3 weeks...and most of us expected it to flop anyway...but christ it'll fall after the first day significantly I'd suspect...then just die a long death...

Expect ITV to get worse ratings than last summer, also expect them to make a loss on this show as killing yourself in primetime in mid-summer (Summer actually offers half decent ad money I suspect, as people spend a lot during it) with a new show means your likely going to find it difficult to recoperate all the costs of just being the main advert ran channel in the UK!


Surely this is a joke? Some positivies though, BBC get a great slot to stick some shows and get high ratings, so I suspect they'll show some Sherlock repeats like last summer

I can't really be arsed with thinking up ITV's logic, as they've obviously used little and this was a plan put together at a dinner table in a restaurant.

So - "Let's all laugh at ITV?" - major bomba this summer, and then their going into the fricking olympics.

Maybe they should become a season broadcaster?

PS, my post was tongue in cheek after seeing what ITV were planning, I have zero insider info on that matter.

I sincerely hope ITV aren't going back to their noughties ways of nightly reality shows as, apart from IAC, they have had some stinkers and pulled away from this approach after the last series of Hell's Kitchen. Should this show fail, they have another dustbin show to join all the other reality crud that has bombed over the last 7 years or so. Could Superstar be this year's Born To Shine, but on a nightly basis?
I really think ITV need to look at ways to avoid falling back to their noughties bad habits of showing disposable crap. Surely a new drama or some film premieres would be better than show which might struggle to get 2 million viewers.