Episode 1 of CTM gained 1.88m in timeshift. Episode 2 needs to gain 1.36m to reach 10m and 2.03m to beat Sherlock's 10.66m.

Glad you enjoyed it Sam! We were glued to our screens in this house. We learnt more about some of the housemates tonight than we did in the previous 17 days put together.

I must say I thought the editors did a really good job tonight. All killer no filler, which really got people talking. 7 Worldwide trends is one thing but it doesn't mean much as of course existing viewers would talk about an episode like tonight's more than any other. We can't deduce from that that there was that many more viewers overall, just that there was a lot more to be said about it as it was the most revealing episode.

I think the biggest mistake 5 made was not capturing some of that drama in tonight's pre-broadcast trails and getting them to air a lot sooner. There should have been one during Neighbours and Home and Away at least. Instead they had clips from the spelling bee task, i.e. the most insignificant part of the day's show, during 5 News at 6:30 which has about 10 viewers?

So I'm not expecting much ratings wise. I think it will be a little up on last Monday but not by much. Bit on the Side could be the main beneficiary, even if Celeb Wedding Planner is as limp as I'm expecting it to be. In the next few days we might see more of a lift as the finale approaches. It's been a classic series, for sure.

It ended in 2007. And you're correct - it was getting around 6m, so not bad at all.

On another note, @AlexiR, I agree with most of what you've said but I'm not sure foreign imports will work on ITV - you only have to look at Pushing Daisies to see how that fared. I think what ITV need to do seriously, is try and stabilise Tuesday nights; whether that means moving Corrie there, I don't know, but something needs to be done. It's losing its strangehold on Sundays, Saturdays outside of BGT and TXF are not good at all, and Tuesdays are a shambles. So Tuesdays, Saturdays and Sundays are the days I'd focus on - as well as making less niche dramas or less 'crime' dramas which seems to be a safe genre for ITV; their dramas linger too much in the 3m range, like Eternal Law. Foreign imports in recent years don't seem to work on the bigger channels, but traditionally work better on channels like BBC2, C4 and C5/

ITV used to do very well with their imports, particularly to fill afternoons and to prop up summer schedules and gaps between series. I am sure they can find something that can rate between 2-3 million from America that is reasonably cheap and entertaining. Also these sort of shows can be repeated in the afternoons or on ITV2.
The whole problem is ITV has is its talent shows are coming to the end of their shelf lives, new variants have stiffed terribly and none of their reality shows launched since the mid noughties have done much, Maybe some American imports, relatively new but popular films and some Audience With shows would see ITV1 through the summer/

Will be interesting to see how that does after last year. I did think the opener was better than most episodes last year, but the damage may already be done. Either way though E4 and Company won't be too worried - if it's successful they recast and plough on with series 7 & 8, and if not they can essentially create a new teen drama which would be Skins but just under a different name.

A couple of big shows back for BBC3 this week too - Young Doctors and Sun, Sex and Suspicious Parents - though surely the latter will suffer in the same way Secret Millionaire did.

Call The Midwife to timeshift over 2m for episode 2 and end up higher than Sherlock. That's my outrageous prediction for this week.

I think Lovejoy series one went out on Fridays at 9.30pm from January 1986. It was repeated on Wednesdays at 8pm in summer 1990, though.

Yeah, I think it went always went out on weeknights. Wednesdays for series one, Fridays for series two and three, and I'm not sure about series four: possibly Thursdays in summer.

And, someone posted about Hetty starting in 1994. I think it started in January 1996, about six weeks before Ballykissangel.

Fascinating move by NBC who have stuck the Smash pilot on YouTube - but with no region restrictions.

Its probably the way of the future but I wonder what international rights holders who have already bought the show will make of this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uu4oY...ature=youtu.be

I'd agree. It really shouldn't be too hard for them to find an import or two that's relatively cheap which they can air over the summer as original content and bank a solid 2-3 million (which is basically all anything else they air is going to do anyway). And unlike the cheap unscripted fodder that would otherwise dominate the summer schedule they'll be able to repeat these across the digital channels or as part of daytime which can give a nice little boost to their profit margins.

I dare say I enjoyed The Royal Bodyguard tonight. Its just so stupid its funny.

Dunno about TRB, but MBB was certainly a corker tonight.

It's so refreshing to see a genuinely funny, old fashioned, studio set, filmed before an audience, proper sitcom.

MBB proves that it can still be done, and viewers will lap it up.

Just make it a bit daft, zany, off the wall - rather than bland, middle class, family-set sitcoms that tend to dominate the "traditional sitcom" model these days.

I didn't realise they'd put it on YouTube although I knew they'd released it on iTunes and Hulu (or were planning a Hulu run at any rate) and they certainly aren't the first broadcaster to do that this season. I'm not sure if international broadcasters have that much to complain about. Smash is a (very) rare beast in that the pilot is fantastic and giving as many people as possible the chance to see it should drive audiences to the show. I'd highly recommend people check it out along with Awake (also at NBC) it is by far and away the best pilot of this season and in fact for a good few years.

Its kind of ironic that for all their woes NBC do at least have two of the most beloved new shows from a critical perspective this season.

I watched the Smash pilot and was disappointed after all the hype. I bet its ratings go down throughout the season. It's too niche, in terms of it having only original songs and the storyline about a new musical being set up. The critics and musical-loving viewers will adore it, it's a show very much for them and good on the producers for doing something a bit different, but I doubt the average Joe living in America will be into this kind of thing. It'll be one of those kind of shows which starts high but audiences shrink throughout the season. Awake looks much better but sadly it will be too confusing to be a ratings hit.

It is no exaggeration to say that I think Awake might be the best pilot I have ever seen. It is an astonishingly good piece of television although much like the rest of the world I'm not entirely sure how they'll sustain it as a weekly series and I hold out no hope of it becoming a major success although not I should stress because its 'too complicated'. I'm pinning my hopes on a small ray of light in an otherwise terrible NBC schedule (which seems achievable all things considered).

I tend to disagree with your assessment of Smash. I like it although I still cling to the hope that quality and some sense of originality or difference will attract an audience so I'm maybe not the best judge of how successful something will or won't be. And whatever else you might be able to say about Smash I think its hard to deny that its one of the few new dramas of recent times that has its own identity and confidence from the get go. Its not a pilot desperately in search of a show so hopefully that'll work for it as well.

Merlin was up again in the US, both week-on-week and year-on-year:

s4ep1: 1.602m / 0.4
s4ep2: 1.755m / 0.6
s4ep3: 1.825m / 0.5

I may be wrong about this but I'm sure I remember ITV broadcasting a pilot for Hetty Wainthropp in the early 90s before the BBC picked the show up.

Edit: Seems I was right http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hetty_W...p_Investigates

1990! I'm surprised I can remember that. I would've only been about six.

I thought Smash was good but I do wonder how much mileage they can out of it, as a musical theatre fan it's great but will it be about the same show season after season or a new show. It would have worked on premium cable better but I think NBC should be applauded for taking on a drama that is quite unique but I think it should be only 13-16 episodes rather than 22.

Thanks for posting this, something to watch when I go to bed tonight!


There's a lot wrong with it. The BBC shouldn't want to dent their commercial rivals - they should only care about providing a public service*. They've got an insanely privileged existence for a broadcaster with a big guaranteed budget every year and an empire which was simply handed to them. If you've got a channel which just aims to produce ratings winners and beat its rivals, you've just got another commercial broadcaster (without the adverts) and media empire.

That being said, I don't see any real issue with Sunday nights just now. If they'd dropped in some kind of reality competition series opposite DOI then there might be an issue. But they're getting great ratings with scripted content.

* In practice, that's impossible. Nobody is there for the public good, and that's fair enough. Which is why they have to be, and are, scrutinised.

DOI might be down and obviously ITV would rather it wasn't. But it's not the end of the world. Sure, ITV rely on their big hitters but so do all broadcasters (and indeed, most businesses).

As a format, I'd agree with the idea that it's limited by how hard it is. With intensive lessons, you can get to a decent standard of ball room dancing over a couple of months. Especially if you've got some kind of dancing experience. Far fewer celebrities have experience of being on ice. And dancing experience is worth little if you're not comfortable on the ice. Most people have only ever gone round in circles while holding onto their friends! On the other hand, when done right, it's pretty impressive looking (hence why Torvill & Dean became such a big deal). But could the format work with normal people? (amateurs who do it as a hobby, perhaps). I'm not sure. It might be worth a try if the numbers fall much further. But they're not going to cancel an in-house show, even if it's getting 6m.

Yes, Superstar sounds like a flop waiting to happen. These shows did OK on BBC1. But this is a channel where 6m people watch Casualty and Who Dares Wins with Nick Knowles on a Saturday night. Take the show into the summer. Put it on ITV1 - potentially stipped over a couple of weeks. And you've got yourself a flop. So it'll fit right in with the rest of ITV's summer programming.

I'm not going to do all the work for them, but I'd just say that not everything has to be a live entertainment show with a phone-in. The Apprentice does well being recorded months in advance. Last week Jersey Shore was the #2 show of Thursday night and any network would kill for its ratings. Hell's Kitchen isn't "live" in the US, although I could be wrong on that one.

There's not an issue with being reliant on your big hits. But they could be doing more to bring through new ones. I've said it a million times now, but Saturday nights this month could have been a great place to launch a new show.

I have no problem with being reliant on big hits I do however question the logic of being so reliant on a series of big hits that essentially all use the same format. It seems to me that if audiences reject the talent show format any time soon then ITV would be in an incredible mess because they're so reliant on Britain's Got Talent, The X Factor and to a much lesser extent Dancing on Ice.

What I find really concerning about ITV though is that they're still developing new talent show formats and still showing interest in picking up more of them. It just seems to me that the last thing they need is another show in this genre and it would seem audiences agree given how poorly all attempts to launch these new shows has worked out.

I also find it very strange that nobody at ITV seems to have taken much note of the fact that the closest thing to a successful entertainment launch they've had for 2-3 years has been Take Me Out. Obviously they've noticed its doing well but it doesn't seem to have impacted on their development all that much.

Indeed! Lets call it a draw. Drama wins the day and you are James (ITV) Macleod and I claim my £5 pounds!


Why would you laugh Andy? To get one up on the BBC fan boys?

It's like being back at School reading this thread these days. Grow up and rise above it!

The biggest gripe from certain License Fee payers is that BBC1 does not have enough ratings winners, they see the successes on 'free' ITV1 and wonder why they pay a 'fee' to fund the making of BBC programmes. I think the majority of us on this thread are strong BBC supporters and we applaud them getting 8m/9m/10m ratings with much glee. I don't want to see any programmes in BBC1 primetime getting 2.5m/3m as has happened recently. Shows like Frozen Planet/Sherlock totally deserve 8m+ ratings - BBC2 is the place for 'cult' viewing figures of c. 2m-3m - In an ideal world BBC1 would be getting a minimum 25% share all evening. May BBC1 long dominate primetime and offer amazing value for money. Inform, Educate and Entertain.

It's Elaine Bedell. She's obsessed. She launched loads of third rate talent shows at BBC1. ITV had stopped mining that genre after BGT and settled on it, DOI and XF for maybe a couple of years. But when she came in they started up again (Popstar to Operastar, Born To Shine and now Superstar).

I thought the genre was done in terms of new development. I said loads of times on here that there was no sign of the next big thing in weekend TV - neither from the BBC nor ITV or anywhere else in the world. We were stuck on talent shows with no sign of a new talent show coming through. Then The Voice popped up as the biggest international hit for a while, so maybe I was wrong?!

They could probably be looking more at the kind of comedy-entertainment genre which is basically what TMO is. Of course it would have made sense to air something like that alongside TMO. But I think more reality series out of the studio would be good as well - especially as those can also be played during the week at 8pm/9pm like The Apprentice.

ITV's commissioning structure is a bit weird, IMO. They've got Elaine Bedell doing "entertainment and comedy" but floundering with the first part so much that she probably has no time to look at the second. Allison Sharman is doing everything from Daybreak to current affairs docs and The Biggest Loser. It might make more sense to have 2 key primetime executives - one for primetime reality & entertainment formats. One for scripted content (drama and comedy). Then other execs further down the chain to do one off documentaries and daytime stuff.