It's been moved due to Everton v Sunderland in the FA Cup.

It amazes me people aren't bored stiff bickering over EE's ratings. It's all this thread is anymore and it's tedious. EE will not get amazing ratings this week, we all know it. So let's discuss the hundreds of other shows that are on tv, for a change

Alcatraz seems to be doing okay ratings wise. Not amazing, but for a multi channel it's getting better than quite a few other shows on similar channels.

Unfortunately for Watch, cancellation looks likely. See here:

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/201...nceled/125137/

Yes, I saw that. It's a shame as it seems to be getting viewers for Watch.

EastEnders aired 7:27-7:56

Tape check ratings won't be effected dan. So whatever ratings they get on the DS post is what they got for the full slot.

agreed, I am looking forward to The Big Bang Theory night as well. As for the show over all, well its changed dramatically from where it started the 4 guys and Penny, the girls can sometimes be a distraction, even Sheldon has a gf now.

Tottenham vs Bolton (abandoned after the heart attack) will try again in their FA Cup quarter-final on Tuesday March 27th at 7.30pm (unusual earlier kick-off), live on ESPN.

http://www.thefa.com/TheFACup/Fixtures

If Waterloo Road cant get 5m viewers tonight sandwiched between EastEnders and The Apprentice, I dont think it will ever do it again. Its overnight ratings are always average, often lower than programmes such as DIY SOS, Rip Off Britain and Food Inspectors in similar timeslots which are made at a fraction of its budget. The storylines are unrealistic, characters who people used to love have all gone apart from the old bald teacher, they should have just axed it instead of moving it to Scotland which is a 'jump the shark' moment.

Agree, but, if it's lucky, it'll settle down once it's contrived its move and that might reverse its ratings decline.

There is no ratings decline. It's getting the same ratings as it has got since it started in 2006. It's been very consistent for them over the last few years with decent demos too. It is pretty cheap for drama too and unless the Scotland move is very poorly handled then I see no reason why it can't run for several more years yet.

It clearly isn't everyone's cup of tea but it does what it does very well (tonight's superb episode is testament to that). It is thought of quite highly by the BBC too I think.

I saw DMNs post here which has Waterloo Road averages: http://forums.digitalspy.co.uk/showp...&postcount=269

The season right now has averaged 4.4m [19.4%] so far, this is lower than every series from 2006-2011 apart from 2009.

It timeshifts better now than it did in the early days though which makes up for the slight shortfall (even taking the STV opt-outs into account).. By the time we get all the officials in this series so far will probably be around the middle of the pack. Like any long running show there are stronger and weaker patches ratings wise (it's probably in neither a particularly strong nor particularly weak one at the moment) but for it to consistently get a solid 5m or so (in the officials) for 6 years running, and continuing to do so is pretty good going in my book.

Lots of interesting stuff in the Premier League happening now, MOTD will be popular later.

Makes sense as Merlin returns with the usual 13 episodes in the Autumn. If DW comes back on August 25th, Merlin can premiere on September 29th (alongside SCD) and end on December 22nd. That fills the 18 Saturdays before Christmas.

I think last night's could get at least 8million. It would be nice for it to near 9million as it was fantastic.

If you take repeats into consideration last night's made 9.7million which is great.

What has made you anti-BBC? I'm not trying to be rude here. I'm just curious. Do your lecturers rant against the BBC, or are they completely pro-BBC and anti-commercial telly?

Or is it just years of having to put up with BBC Scotland's opt-outs?

I think Empire is just a bit of a turkey, and not only in ratings terms. It comes across as a meander, hosted by someone perhaps not at the top of very many people's lists for such a job.

The weeks/months Paxman spent filming this would have been better spent in the Newsnight studio doing what he does best.

As for the idea behind Empire, it would have executed better as a BBC One series with an engaging, charismatic host adept at mainstream documentaries, such as Michael Palin, or as a landmark ten or twelve-parter on BBC Two with an out and out expert historian.

As it is, it's fallen between two stools, which might explain why it sat on a shelf for so long.

I'm a bad influence on people.

I'm off to bed. Wonder if I'll dream about this thread again.

Dreams or nightmares?

I'm not sure the BBC has ever been mentioned in a lecture, at least not one that I was at!

And I'm not anti-BBC as such. It's difficult to express in short without going off topic. But I think there's a role for a public service broadcaster with guaranteed funding. I don't think DIY SOS or Eastenders or dare I say, The Voice, should be the beneficiaries of a privileged funding model. I don't think "being popular" alone is justification for a license fee. I think the BBC (shown mainly through BBC1) has become too preoccupied with justifying the license fee as it it were justifying a "pay per view" rate to the public or ad rates to advertisers. I think public service plays second fiddle to ensuring the future of the BBC. I think the Channel 4/BBC situation is backwards and bizzare.

But I'm also aware that this is the situation, like it or not, and tearing up BBC1 isn't an option. Successive canny operators have built the BBC into an empire too big to mess with. With 3 of 5 terrestrial slots taken by public bodies, there's little real competition for ITV nor has there ever been. And while I think the competition is immensely unfair and not at all equal, the structure of British broadcasting has meant there is a real lack of competition and only BBC1 and ITV1 have the resources to fund regular drama. Taking away BBC1 has the potential to do significant damage to the overall quality of British broadcasting.

So I'm somewhere in between. In short, I think it would be nice if BBC1 paid more than a token gesture to public service. But many on here seem to be of the opinion that the priority should be to beat everyone else to the point of deliberately damaging commercial rivals. Many seem to think that current affairs, arts or news should be pushed to the sidelines in pursuit of ratings. And that anyone who thinks otherwise is "anti-BBC" and wants to damage it. That's not necessarily true. It may just be the case that they see the role of the BBC slightly differently to that of any other media conglomerate.

EastEnders is almost always on against football on Tuesdays, and sometimes Thursdays as well. And from next season the Tuesday football will almost always be on ITV rather than Sky.

Jack Whitehall's new series didn't do very well, I think that's a lower audience than Ten O'Clock Live, which is some going. In fact the shift of Ten O'Clock Live seems to have been a good idea as I don't think it's fallen under a million yet this series, has it?

Edited.

It's not just "worthy" stuff that commercial channels avoid.

One of the main things that commercial channels tend not to do is make any kind of effort.


And it's this which I think is increasingly the problem with the BBC, they are lazy.


So they buy in a format (The Voice), they make endless variations on antique-selling/buying and so forth They have almost given up on making an effort.

This is just a symptom though.

It's a symptom of those who don't actually care for the public service concept. Nor do they really care for television.

It's just a job. A very well-paying job.

The Apprentice averaged 6.4 million viewers yesterday.

Its previous BBC One launches (overnights):

2007- 5.0m (22%)
2008- 6.4m (25%)
2009- 8.1m (33%)
2010- 6.9m (27%)
2011- 7.8m (31%)

Source: dsrealitybites