It's worth noting though that DA's series 1 officials didn't include STV as it wasn't shown there. If it had been fully networked, that first episode of DA would've officially had c10.0/10.1m.

Depends, but 2013 is the anniversary year for DW, am of the opinion we'll get 7 episodes this winter, then Christmas day AND a New Years day episode to launch the year, running into the main series.

Doctor Who fits perfectly into Saturdays Jan/Feb as it will pull in ratings and do very well in a slot otherwise weak. So I think theres a danger for DOI that the Beeb might just have some major competition across both Saturdays and Sundays next year.


It'll be good fun I suspect. Its RTD so likely the alien stuff will be an on-going threat but it'll be more about the magicians trying to get used to life kind of thing. I suspect it'll be a LOT of fun.

Obviously. That's another reason why Graham Norton has the edge, with all the guests on at once - on Friday I wouldn't have been bothered sticking around for an interview with Kenneth Branagh but because Frank Skinner was there throughout I watched the whole show. I know all chat shows can't be like that but I think it makes Ross look a bit old hat, they even stuck around on Parkinson. Mind you, I'm amazed Alan Carr does so well as that's a boringly produced show with guests coming on and going straight off.


I dunno if Dangerfield was ever a huge hit but the Beeb carried on with it for a long time, probably because it was about the only thing they had in the way of popular ITV-esque drama for ages. The Nine O'Clock News did get in the way a lot, and it seems odd now to think of it being there, mostly because the current pre-watershed line-up is so mundane so these days it would be massively restricting.

I remember in early 2001 reading a piece in Media Guardian about Saturday night telly with The Premiership coming up and it saying that ITV were planning on moving some of the regular Saturday night shows to Friday to make way for it, I don't know if they would have done that with Blind Date. The only one I can remember them moving was The Brian Conley Show, but of course that wouldn't have worked out because the Friday 'stEnders started at the same time. I remember that piece also saying that they were devastated Slap Bang had flopped because they'd planned for it to be a real long runner.

Of course for a bit in 1993 they moved The Bill from Friday to Saturday which didn't work out for The Bill, or indeed for Fridays, as the Beeb moved the Generation Game to Fridays and the ratings went up (far higher than it had got on Saturdays the previous year), thrashing You Bet, even though You Bet had a Corrie lead-in. So six months later they moved The Bill back.


We always say it but I still think moving the soaps to Sunday would be the most obvious solution, because that would automatically free up an hour on weeknights and make the schedules look far less mundane, just by moving that one hour. And it'd be more logical scheduling of the soaps, natch. One problem with having two episodes of Emmerdale and Corrie on the same night every week is that it's impossible for it to be in any way special, whereas when there's a double or hour-long 'stEnders you know it's important and there's a buzz about it. I mean, Becky leaving Corrie is big news but the scheduling makes it look like some bog-standard normal episodes.

In other "proper ratings" news:

Hustle 6.51m (up 1.41m)
Casualty 6.81m
Mrs Brown 6.29m (up about 1.6m again - seems fairly consistent)
MOTD Live 6.81m

Brilliant figures all of them. Can we officially now declare overnight ratings dead?

L&O got 4.8m SD - whatever the HD figure was, it will have been around a million or more behind Hustle.

The Magicians fails to make the BBC1 Top 30.

Not sure where that's come from. All they've done is stuck with a previously successful Sunday night line-up. The problem is the BBC have really outdone themselves this year with a quality alternative and viewers have voted with their buttons.

ITV is still holding up okay. It's not a disaster by any means. But it has exposed weaknesses in the schedule that they'd be daft to ignore.

Yeah, it seemed to suffer slightly with a 9pm start. 8:30pm was pretty perfect for it. I'm sure they'll fix it there for series 3.

I think it started with 12m and quickly fell to 9m where it remained for a few series, generally beating whatever ITV put against it. I think it finished with about 6-7m, which was pretty poor for that era.

I was actually talking BBC drama. My apologies.

I agree. I actually think the double episodes have had a negative impact on the way Corrie is produced as well. It's not as bad as it used to be, but you can still tell that they sometimes struggle to span a day's worth of story across two episodes, and they often have to contrive cliffhangers at the 8pm junction so that viewers will come back after EastEnders.

The Monday double was initially introduced temporarily for the Richard Hillman story IIRC and at the time were very effective because they were seen as 'special'. Now you can't differentiate between a special set of episodes and a normal set of episodes because the scheduling of the doubles is so entrenched.

I do think moving the soaps away from Sunday was a fundamental mistake. A previously strong night for ITV now usually suffers through the spring and summer when there's no DOI or X Factor (and now even the former doesn't seem to be enough).

Reason they did this was for Series 1 it was the opposite.
They launched at 9, went back to 8:30 and dropped heavily, then back to 9 where they were higher than episode 1!

Also @Rob tbf you'v said it would do less than 10 since episode one, can't give your brownie points here am afraid

No sign of The Royal Bodyguard either

its nice to see viewers actually make that choice.

Also it would be nice to see the BBC achievements being celebrated by the wider media,, rather than ignore until someone tells a slightly blue joke, and the onslaught of complaints starts again.

Some superb BBC timeshifts there, Hustle and MBB in particular really benefitting. Worth noting that LAO was another victim of STV's inept scheduling, so the c5.2/5.3m it will have got including HD (but without +1) would actually have been c5.7m had STV aired it in Scotland. Nearly 0.5m on +1 would take it to c6.2m, so whilst Hustle pipped it (as it did in the overnights) it still did very well.


Ah fair enough then.


I think that was more because of the inconsistency - as the first episode started at 9pm shifting it earlier caught people out and they missed the beginning. I think episode 3 of this series would have managed over 10m had it started at 8:30pm (Midwife could have started a week later).

When you stop and think about it it really is rather amazing that we don't really know anything about the BBC's plans for Doctor Who in 2012 and 2013. At this stage all we really know is that they plan to air some episodes in the Autumn this year. You would hope, given that this is one of their big flagship dramas, that things are quite as chaotic as they appear. I'm not however quite as convinced as you that we'll see a full series or even a mini-series in the first quarter of 2013 although that is certainly an option.

I wonder if what we might see is the 6 or 7 episodes and a Christmas Special air in 2012 and the remaining episodes that would have been ordered as part of the 2012 series packaged as 6 specials that air throughout the first half of 2013 and then a full 13 episode series during the second half of the year. Alternatively I suppose they could opt to air three blocks of 6-7 episodes throughout the year in 2013. Maybe the first in January, the second alongside a second series of The Voice and then the third in the Autumn. There's a ridiculous number of options open to them at the moment which does indeed make ITV's scheduling for the first quarter next year very difficult indeed.

Although unless the BBC lucks upon a big Saturday night format or brings The Voice forward to January/February in 2013 their Saturday night schedule would essentially consist of nothing but Doctor Who and in theory ITV should be able to schedule around that with a Dancing on Ice performance show although it might put them in a difficult spot with Take Me Out.

Well, it would have needed a timeshift similar to its overnight rating to make the chart!


Think we might start having to factor a CTM Xmas Special into our Christmas schedules postulations...

I wonder if the success of CTM might impact on Miranda's availability for other projects/further series of her own show? I hope not.

But I can also see a positive impact for her own series if she wins new fans as a result of being in a 10m rated Sunday night drama.

Surprising figure for Call the Midwife - though from the comments I get the feeling nobody here actually watches it. Has to be the first hit pre-watershed Sunday night drama though to launch in quite some time - possibly since Wild at Heart and Lark Rise to Candleford.

And the decision not to split Dancing in Ice is looking more baffling with every weekend. The Talent Show Story is actually a decent show for nostalgia/TV fans but not only is it hurting Saturday night but it's probably hurting itself by being in completely the wrong slot. I agree too Jonathan Ross would probably fair better in the Sunday 10pm slot - just seems a more natural time for a chat show IMO.

it looks like a womans show, being able midwives, and babies, and setting it in the past suggests its going to get an older demo, its hardly a natural bloke show.

Us blokes have football and car shows to watch

In Pictures: Tears, fights and thongs on tonight's Celebrity Big Brother

http://tellymix.co.uk/gallery/70570-...#ixzz1kIEnhRSw

holymoly Jamie East
Watched tonight's show. you do NOT want to miss it. NOTHING has been left out of the edit. It's the best bb show since fight night. #CBB
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Recipe for big ratings? Watch out Royal Bodyguard.

I think you would be surprised with the crossover. I have surprised myself by really getting into CTM and am also a huge Top Gear fan, although I will be watching Top Gear "live" probably. With such big numbers there is bound to a natural crossover anyway.


What! No 2m timeshift! I guess it must have just missed out with 4.5m and then a probable 4m official for the Sunday repeat..... probabaly.


I did think that maybe this would mean yet another delay for her sitcom. Although, I suspect its not too hard logistically to do 6/8 episodes of a drama and then write/record 6/8 episodes in a sitcom within 12 months. Agree that CTM should boost her sown show when it comes back too, she is sort of playing her sitcom character but a 1950's version instead.

Did any of us expect it to timeshift that much? Seriously?

And unsurprisingly BBC1 have recommissioned Call The Midwife for a second series.

No surprise - BBC commissions second series of Call The Midwife (8 episodes): http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/lat...2/midwife.html

That was fast! No point hanging about I suppose. And just like that, a new ratings powerhouse is born.

What do we think Corrie's going to get tonight? It's a very big episode - for those who don't watch it or follow it, Becky McDonald is leaving tonight, one of the biggest characters in the show. And there's also the wedding of two other huge characters. I think it's going to be the biggest rating since last year's Valentine's Day episode, or maybe even bigger!

in the prediction game I guess 8.2, but I suspect I should have gone higher.

Considering it was above 9m on friday I wouuld definitely say so.

Remember that big fuss last year about the BBC axing Lark Rise and people saying it would be bad for BBC ratings at this time next year, now in fact, looks like it was actually the act of a tactical genius.