I like Upstairs Downstairs and would be pleased enough to see it return, but to be cold-headed about it, it's really not viable if they have to prop it up behind Call the Midwife. UD has a big budget, good name recognition and would be going into a third series. If it's renewed, it'll have to be because the BBC are happy with it standing on it's own two feet.

Besides, there'll likely be lots of other worthwhile new drama that could benefit from the Call the Midwife lead-in, just like Birdsong did this year. Off the top of my head, other period pieces like The Ladies Paradise or The Village might be ready to go in January next year and make the most of the slot.


There's also the other point which people seem to have overlooked - namely, that the last ALW series really didn't rate so well. Only one edition of the entire run of Over the Rainbow broke 6m in the officials. It wasn't a SYTYCD style flop, but with high 4 / low 5 overnights, it wasn't a lot different to your standard lottery filler, either. Makes the ITV pick-up all the more mystifying, in my opinion.

On the subject of EastEnders.

As I've said before I think Bryan Kirkwood has gotten an unfairly rough ride during his tenure on the show. He inherited almost every problem that currently exists on the show from his predecessor who inherited more than a handful of those problems from his predecessor. The problems at EastEnders are incredibly deeply rooted at this point and outside of trying to continue Santer's ridiculous never ending roll of nonsensical big sensationalist storylines there's really nothing Kirkwood could do to hide them. At some point someone at the BBC is going to have to step up and demand that bigger much deeper rooted problems at EastEnders get addressed because until that happens all any executive producer is going to be able to do is paper over the cracks.

I think its a shame that Kirkwood has become the public scapegoat for problems and issues that aren't entirely his own but its been unavoidable for sometime now. The fact that they've announced his departure without a full time replacement lined up and that its happening pretty quickly is interesting and suggests to me that he was jumped rather than pushed (or perhaps more accurately before he was pushed). If they'd fired him then they would have had a replacement lined up to announce as well.

Why have they got rid of the EastEnders producer if the show is in perfectly fine form, like we keep hearing on here?

Maybe there is a crisis after all.

Awful rating for Upstairs Downstairs, can you imagine how many pages we would have gone through today if it had been a major ITV drama. In fact 'flop' Wild at Heart now looks like to be in good strength in comprison!

I don't believe anyone has said that its in fine form just that its not in the midst of a ratings crisis (because it isn't). In fact the vast majority of posts on EastEnders have at the very least said that creatively its all over the shop and not on the strongest footing right now.

Over The Rainbow averaged about 5.2/5.3m IIRC, and whilst that might not be astonishingly high, when compared to the 2-3m all of ITV's entertainment efforts got last Summer you can see why they went for it, although I hope these rumours of it being stripped aren't true.

Not particularly surprised about Red or Black, it was fairly obvious it would return. The rolling jackpot is an interesting idea but the main format needs a serious overhaul. Fincham hints at there being more skill involved this time, which is a real must for it to have any chance of success. The stunts and star performances are all well and good, but if people don't feel involved with the contestants then the show's buggered.

Another bit of recommissioning news that appears to have slipped under the radar is that ITV have ordered 4 new episodes of Endeavour to be filmed this Autumn and air early next year:

http://www.itv.com/presscentre/press...r/default.html

Did Birt commission many of those shows, then?

US Ratings Sunday March 11
Note – Daylights Saving Time has kicked in, in the US this week and that's resulted in a dip in television viewing for prime time. On Sunday night 36.7% of 18-49 year olds were watching television in prime time compared to 38.7% last week.

ABC claim a Sunday night victory (albeit not by much) but it was far from a night of sunshine and roses for them. Once Upon A Time dropped six tenths week-on-week to post a series low but on the brighter side was caught in a three way tie with CBS' Amazing Race and Fox's Family Guy for the biggest show of the night. Elsewhere on the alphabet network Desperate Housewives was steady vs. last week and those who wrote GCB off after a disappointing start last week might want to start hedging their bets it rose a tenth. A Republican Presidential candidate urging people not to watch it because it was anti-Christian bigotry might have helped there as well.

Over on CBS The Amazing Race and CSI: Miami were steady vs. last week but The Good Wife dropped two tenths to a series low at 9PM. This show really is testing just how much syndication and awards mean to CBS and with CBS schedulers surprisingly trialling The Mentalist on Friday at 9PM last week (where it did well) its Friday night slot for next season doesn't look quite so assured as it once did.

Fox had an up and down night. Cleveland was up, The Simpsons down, Family Guy steady and American Dad up. Bob's Burgers meanwhile started its second season down two tenths on the season one finale and below what Napoleon Dynamite was achieving in the same slot. Fox however have a lot of episodes of Bob's Burgers on the shelf...

Finally (and predictably) NBC had a terrible night. Harry's Law returned matching its series low from Wednesday night. It is I feel worth mentioning just how old Harry's Law skews – it totalled nearly 9 million viewers and only just broke a 1 in the demo. That's an insane skew. Meanwhile if there's a God Celebrity Apprentice is limping toward cancellation. It was down three tenths on last week.


ABC
7PM: America's Funniest Home Videos – 1.3 [6.49]
8PM: Once Upon A Time – 2.8 [9.12]
9PM: Desperate Housewives – 2.5 [8.29]
10PM: GCB – 2.3 [7.25]

CBS
7PM: 60 Minutes – 1.6 [10.26]
8PM: The Amazing Race – 2.8 [9.71]
9PM: The Good Wife – 1.7 [9.82]
10PM: CSI: Miami – 2.1 [10.54]

Fox
7PM: The Simpsons [r] – 1.2 [2.80]
7:30PM: The Cleveland Show – 1.6 [3.31]
8PM: The Simpsons – 2.3 [4.96]
8:30PM: Bob's Burgers – 1.9 [4.03]
9PM: Family Guy – 2.8 [5.82]
9:30PM: American Dad! - 2.2. [4.64]

NBC
7PM: Dateline – 0.9 [4.71]
8PM: Harry's Law – 1.1 [8.87]
9PM: Celebrity Apprentice – 2.0 [6.41]

Brilliant news! Really enjoyed Endeavour Any predictions on how Scott and Bailey will perform tonight? I'd say 6m (exc. +1).

To be fair he didn't say anything of the sort - indeed it could be spun as he doesn't care if BGT get more viewers, they'll concentrate on what they're doing.

For a show though trying to distance itself from The X Factor they're really pumping out the press stories and so far making it all about the judges.


Although it might be comparable to debut episodes of other shows I think anything sub-6m would be regarded as a flop by the media.


The thing is though if the BBC came up with someone they'd be slagged off for creating a rip-off format (presumably a weak one) when there was a perfect format out there for them. At the end of the day £25m over two years isn't actually that much for a flagship entertainment show - it comes in just slightly more per episode than Doctor Who - but they'll get at least 50% more airtime out of it.

I don't get the ill-informed criticism of John Yorke, on this thread. He's passionate about EastEnders and has served it very well, in various capacities, for a long time.

As for excecutive producers on a soap, some thrive and some don't. Kirkwood didn't.

I have never sensed any passion for EastEnders from him. It was just the latest in a series of not particularly long-lasting jobs on soaps.

Celebs appearing on Celebrity Millionaire Mother's Day Special announced.
And yes, once again half the money won will go to a punter

http://millionaire.itv.com/news/moth...-special-2012/

Looking at the officials Prisoners wives bowed out with 4.98. They should bring it back. That is highly respectable. Good news on Endevour as well! The more slow paced detective dramas the better I say!

Ken

the funny thing about Kirkwood is that he is not a bad soap exec prouder, he came to EE with a glowing reference from Hollyoaks fans, but over the past two years he has shown himself to be utterly out of his depth and totally unable to steer the good ship EastEnders to safe harbour.

Whatever the difference is between a good Hollyoaks exec producer, and a good EastEnders exec producer, he doesn't have it.

I honestly dont know what makes someone qualified for the job of EE exec producer.

Maybe Kirkwood just couldn't polish a turd.

Some commissioning news - Red or Black confirmed to return for seven weekly episodes. The prize in each episode is slashed to £500,000 - but will rollover if not won.

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/news/...on-winner.html

C4 confirmed Friday Night Dinner will be back in the autumn with six episodes and a Christmas special.
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/news/...s-special.html

Unfortunately also confirmed yet another panel show, A Short History of Everything with Griff Rhys Jones.
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/tv/news/...anel-show.html

Seriously these endless panel shows are doing more harm to sitcom than reality TV ever did.

I would think he probably had far greater freedom and control over Hollyoaks then he ever had at EastEnders. Perhaps he was just unable to thrive in a system where he's going to be answerable to a lot of people high above, John Yorke included.

And I think people have been quite unfair on Kirkwood. People like to pretend the show was perfect before he arrived. The fact is the show had been getting by on big headline-grabbing stories such as Who Killed Archie which helped to paper over a lot of the issues that existed then and still exist today. The EastEnders critics may have been a lot more vocal on the soaps forum recently but they were still there when Diedrick Santer was running the show - the day to day episodes of the show have long been a problem with EastEnders, and it's going to take more than one executive producer to sort that out.

Well, if Bryan Kirkwood had as little input as is being suggested on this thread, we won't see any recent decisions, such as the casting of Jamie Foreman, being reversed in the next couple of months.

we cant expect any changes to be announced until we have a new producer.

I suspect Jamie Foreman will stay longer than some of the other characters destined for the axe, whoever takes over.

Then again the new producer will automatically develop this notion, that no decision should be reported for at least 2 months after its been made.

I'd argue the day to day episodes are actually stronger under Kirkwood than under Santer. As already said on the thread; Santer relied on a lot of over the top plot lines to paper over the ever-growing cracks in EastEnders' structure. Kirkwood's first over the top storyline was a disaster and he's never really been able to recover from it.

Back to last night...Dancing On Ice has at least stabilised and on the face of it it's a decent night for ITV1 - just not as good as it once was. Tiem Team struggled slightly on Channel 4 but Homeland did well once again. BBC One had a reasonable night but that's poor for Upstairs, Downstairs considering the lead in. The two films did well for Channel 5 but Body Squad lost momemtum in the 8pm hour.. BBC Two had a brilliant night with three supervery good ratings for the broadcaster.

I'd love to know what these mysterious long-standing "cracks" are in EastEnders. Whatever they are, they've gone completely unnoticed by the BBC, yet are apparently abundantly clear to a group of people on the Ratings Thread.

The problems are clearly, then, nothing to do with bad casting and storylining decisions made in the last 18 months.

I don't think they have gone completely unnoticed by everyone (or indeed anyone) at the BBC but by the same token I don't think they know how to fix them either. They didn't throw money at Jessie Wallace and Shane Ritchie to return because they felt Santer was leaving the show in great shape nor did Santer need to continue to pump out over the top sensationalist storylines during his time on the show because it was in fantastic shape.

Just as a point of reference take a look at how many big returning characters EastEnders has rolled out in recent history compared to the same device being used in Coronation Street or Emmerdale. EastEnders has had Bianca, Ricky, Kat, Alfie and now Sharon (plus I'm sure I'm missing/forgetting some) compared to who with Coronation Street? Peter Barlow is the only one I can think of but I confess I'm not overly familiar with Coronation Street. The problem's with EastEnders have been there for a long time and everyone involved knows it they just can't work out how to fix it. The irony being that at the start of his tenure Kirkwood did actually make some attempts to try and start fixing these problems by re-establishing basic character interactions and family units but then it all fell apart with the baby swap disaster.

I really hope they bring Prisoners Wives back. As a rating, I'd say bowing out with 4.98 is pretty mediocre but it was a quality drama which deserved better figures.

I was reading through the Prisoners Wives thread on here and the reaction towards the entire series has been overwhelmingly positive. That's very unusual for a thread on DS. There's usually some negative posts amongst the positive ones. I'm hoping the positive reaction means a second series is commissioned. I swear someone posted a link on here the other day which stated a second series is currently being written? I'll try and find it.

They all appeared during his reign. While obviously he didn't commission these shows directly, there was a distinct drop in standards at the BBC under Birt, who seemed more interested in management structures than programmes. As has been pointed out earlier, BBC1 had a record low audience of 1.7 million one night in 1999.

Saw the Titanic advert and you know what. I take back what I said. It looks pretty good actually.

EastEnders "Phil On Remand" was better than much of the dross served up by the soap over recent years. (BBC red button, just over 10 minutes long).

Didn't Luther rate quite poorly in it's first series (and got panned too), so Prisoners Wives has a chance. I guess how Syndicate does will also be a factor - but that looks bloody awful to be honest.