While ITV took a rather laid back approach to the big declines at the back end of X Factor last year, FOX aren't being so calm with American Idol. They've now cleared out the entire judging panel and will go from 3 judges back to 4. All of them major stars in the US and all of them likely on multi million dollar salaries. It will mean the show, which went 7 years with the original panel, will have had 10 judges since 2008.

It's a massive gamble, IMO. They spent $15m for Britney on X Factor - but they don't yet know how that's going to work out. It's going to be a long few months at FOX if they discover that spending big on star names doesn't always deliver the big audience they want. The only name confirmed for Idol is Mariah Carey. Offers for Katy Perry ($20m per season), Kanye West, P Diddy and Brad Paisley have been knocked back. But it's expected that Nicki Minaj (touted as Mariah's nemesis) will join the panel as the "urban" representative. Keith Urban will be the country guy. And Enrique Iglesias will be the male eye candy.

Sounds awful like The Voice, tbh. It's good that they're being ambitious and changing things. But they've overlooked their "comparative advantage" - some of the Idols are bigger than the new judges. If they put Kelly Clarkson, Carrie Underwood, Adam Lambert and maybe Chris Daughtry on the panel not only would it emphasise the shows credibility in finding stars but it would maybe, just maybe, lure back some of the viewers that watched the show back when Carrie or Kelly won. Plus, I reckon that's a far more interesting story than hiring the fourth "diva" for a talent show after J'Lo, Christina and Britney. There's just an air of throwing everything at it and hoping it all sticks together.

But it's really difficult to underestimate the importance of talent shows this season - the hours they generate and the ratings they pull make them key determinants of the networks overall ratings performance. NBC are betting on The Voice and that the extra hours won't do too much damage to the ratings. ABC are hoping an all stars season of Dancing With The Stars halts the decline there. And if X Factor and Idol show big declines this year, FOX are going to find themselves in a very very difficult position. The whole network schedule is built around those two shows.

I don't see any problem with 'gritty' dramas. I feel like you'd have a point if Accused was getting 2m+ audiences, but it's getting 4m+ audiences suggesting that the audience are enjoying it. Personally I think Accused is one of the best dramas the BBC have commissioned in recent years and I wouldn't like to see it go. Top quality drama is what we need! Who cares if the critics like or dislike it?

304 was an HD simulcast of the BBC's 301 during the Olympics, so how come C4 are using it now?

That stream is basically nobody's. It's been allocated to C5HD previously, who didn't launch in time. I think there's a process underway to have a permanent user of that stream, but the powers that be have kindly allowed BBC/C4 to use it for London 2012. Surprised is going out advert free though!

Ah, thanks. I was wondering how it had changed from BBC to C4 without my box having been retuned.

Sounds like Enrique Iglesias has said no, which has knocked them back even further, as they thought they were all set to go. Keith Urban and Nicki Minaj are apparently close to signing though. I like the idea of a completely new panel as the panel they had this year was awful, and it's about time Randy went. I'd have considered bringing Jimmy Iovine over as one of the judges for a bit of stability though. They say they want male eye candy for the fourth seat, but I don't think there are many candidates for it now that Iglesias has turned them down. The other name that seemed to come up a lot was Nick Jonas but he'd be beyond bland. Nobody else seems to have been mentioned and it seems that they're in a bit of a mess. Not sure a whole panel of ex-contestants would have been the way forward but bringing one into that fourth seat seems their best option now (probably Adam Lambert). Clarkson's or Underwood would have been good but it seems that the two female spots are taken already.

The whole debacle doesn't exactly fill me with confidence. They're bringing Nigel Lythgoe back as executive producer which is another bad idea as both Idol and SYTYCD have felt bland and out of date with him at the helm - they need some fresh blood. In a post-X Factor and Voice world the slow and bland Idol production isn't going to wash anymore. It'll probably premiere reasonably due to a bit of curiosity surrounding the new judges but I can see it running into more trouble throughout the season. I think X Factor has a better shot - the panel is strong, the production is new and different and they genuinely seem to have stepped it up from last year (as they did with BGT but seemingly forgot to do with XF UK). Even if Britney proves to be as dull as I expect she will, Demi is apparently really good and will probably be the star of the show. Plus they have Cowell and LA Reid was really good last year too.

I think The Voice will suffer from overexposure. 2 seasons per year is too much and it lost a lot of momentum towards the end of last season. The blind auditions will probably be down quite a bit, but they'll be hoping that the twists and changes implemented later on will help slow the declines in the second half of the run, and I think their best hope is for the final few weeks to be broadly flat or perhaps slightly up on season 2. This idea of using different coaches for season 4 and then alternating seems ridiculous too - what if the new ones are shit? Overexposure biting NBC in the ass again. DWTS is looking more and more like a lost cause. All star seasons have a mixed track record to say the least and competition from The Voice on both nights from the off won't help (remember last Autumn's run didn't face The Voice). I think it could struggle, and the numbers could actually end up making ABC as a network look pretty vulnerable unless one or two of their new shows take off as I'm not sure how much longer DWTS has left.

The sad thing is that The X Factor story isn't implausible.

The X Factor is in a 60 minute slot this week but around 15 minutes of that will likely be adverts so the run time is closer to 45 minutes. The usual opening hype/nonsense will take a couple of minutes out of that and when you factor in the 'still to come' bumps before each ad break, the 'still to come' promo at the end of the episode and the competition the actual content of the show is probably a lot closer to 40 minutes as a maximum. Personally (particular this year) I don't find it hard to believe that around 30 minutes of the show will be taken up with judges comments, judges chat, scripted reality 'meet the contestant' bits and pre and post performance interviews.


It should be noted that this isn't entirely a like-for-like comparison. The drops for Idol this past season were huge and for a lot of people at Fox came from nowhere. Its worth remembering that the panel was exactly the same as it had been the previous year where the declines were more or less in line with previous year-on-year drops. Fox (unlike ITV) were put under pressure with Idol's panel because of The X Factor, The Voice and the (admittedly unsuccessful) singing shows that launched on ABC and The CW this summer that had a decent amount of star power. On top of that the fact that neither one of Jennifer Lopez or Steven Tyler wanted to come back forced their hand as well.


It should also be noted at this point that American Idol is already spending $20+ million on Mariah Carey.

On the subject of Britney on The X Factor I think its already worked. Her signing has created more buzz and interest for season two of The X Factor US than there ever was for the first season and equally as important is that a not unsubstantial part of her pay can be covered by the dramatically reduced promotional budget for season two compared to season one. Truth be told I suspect that The X Factor season two is probably costing Fox around the same level as the first season which isn't bad at all. Especially not when you consider the spiralling costs of American Idol this year.


The line-up that's currently being rumbled about is Mariah Carey, Nicki Minaj, Keith Urban and Adam Lambert (which is a pretty good line-up actually). Randy Jackson is being kept on as a 'mentor' which in reality means if we can't get all three new deals done he'll rejoin the judging panel I suspect. The belief is Fox want to get the deals done and start announcing next week. Although I have no idea why they'd do that since it'll just detract from the premier of The X Factor...


Lythgoe is there because they're going to can So You Think You Can Dance and don't want him to go somewhere else. You're right though he shouldn't be and they desperately need some fresh blood and fresh ideas.


Undoubtedly.

I still think their best option would have been to delay America's Got Talent this year because of the Olympics and run it into the Fall. So the auditions start after the Olympics and get a ton of promotion during the Olympics and that then runs through to October/November where NBC can bring in a limited run reality series as they have previously with things like The Sing-Off and the return of Fear Factor. The Voice then runs from late-January. If that had worked out they could have then kept Talent on that kind of schedule as well and tried to find a new summer series – maybe bringing back The Sing-Off which did well against limited competition so would potentially be suited to a summer run.

They can't possibly hope to sustain The Voice with two cycles a year though. As an emergency measure this season it might just be acceptable but that's all. It has to go back to one cycle a year next season if they want it to last.


An All-Star series are the surest sign that a reality series is dead in the water.

What's important to remember about Dancing with the Stars though is that whilst going up against The Voice for its second cycle last season didn't help the rot had already set in before that. It tumbled in the Fall last year and then just kept falling opposite The Voice. The US audience just genuinely seem to be tired of the format and looking at So You Think You Can Dance may just be tired of dance shows in general. I think ABC have to be brave and not give Dancing a Spring cycle this year. God knows what they'd fill the slot with but they should find something, anything else.

But in the grand scheme of things ABC have been very lucky the past few seasons because their terrible performance hasn't been quite as bad as NBC's terrible performance so no one has really noticed they're sinking into an abyss and have become the Modern Family network in the same way that a few years ago NBC became The Office network.

Accused has lost around 1.5 million viewers from episode 1 to 3 its rare that people describe a show that loses that many viewers that quickly as obviously being enjoyed by audiences. And I'd point out that Accused's numbers on Tuesday night were eerily similar to Good Cop's on Thursday. And I agree that good drama is what BBC1 should be commissioning but I also think that they should be making a diverse mix of drama because what person a believes to be a good drama won't always be what person b thinks a good drama is.

So far this week on BBC1 we've had London set soap opera EastEnders, hospital set soap opera Holby City, school set soap opera Waterloo Road, police drama New Tricks, 'gritty' legal drama Accused and 'gritty' police drama Good Cop. Saturday night will deliver fantasy drama Doctor Who and another hospital set soap in Casualty and on Sunday it'll be police drama George Gently. Can anyone honestly look at that drama line-up and tell me that's a diverse mix of genres and tones?

Also just to be clear that my point regarding critical response is that the BBC (just like any other broadcaster) should care more about the response of the its audience than of critics. Commissioning shows because they'll get good reviews is not the way television should be done. Far too many (read almost all) of these 'gritty dramas' have the air of being commissioned to get good reviews rather than because anyone thinks the audience will respond to them.

I don't think FOX will axe Idol just yet but I imagine they'll want to cut some costs as it's pretty expensive for a talent show even with product placements and ads. To get rid of Randy is surprising as he's been there since day 1. To me, if they want viewers to come back, they need to bring back Cowell and Paula which isn't going to happen.

ABC have been lucky that they've had some solid performers like Grey's Anatomy, Modern Family along with good performers like Revenge and Once Upon a Dance but they've yet to have a breakout hit and I think that is what both NBC and ABC need at the moment. CBS seem to be chugging along nicely but I'm not too confident about their new shows like Vegas and Elementary.

Just because I'm not sure people realise just how expensive Idol is.

For this coming season of American Idol the cost of the judging panel will easily exceed $30 million and could potentially pass $40 million with relative ease. Add in the cost of Ryan Seacrest and for one season the on air talent will cost American Idol $45-55+ million. That's one season and only covers on air talent. And just to put that into context as a ball park average a 22 episode hour long drama costs the big four networks $30-40 million per season so even without factoring in the huge pay checks of Idol's producers plus production costs, song rights and promotion American Idol already costs Fox considerably more than an hour long drama.

Of course the flipside to that equation is that American Idol delivers considerably more hours than your average hour long drama. With at least 3 hours a week for 19 weeks it delivers 57+ hours per season. Plus I doubt Fox is paying all of those costs itself. Although at this stage there's probably a compelling argument to be made that it would actually cost Fox less to air scripted drama than American Idol. Which is weird for a show that got its break by providing huge chunks of content at a knock down price.


I'll be very surprised if Elementary isn't at least a decent performer and it has the potential to be much more than that. Vegas is an interesting prospect for CBS. I hope it does really well if only so CBS is more confident with breaking away from the straight procedural model its clung to for so long now.

On the subject of ABC there biggest problem for some time has been and remains their scheduling which is just abysmal. That after all these years they still don't appear to have found a coherent way to schedule their shows is amazing. Everything just seems to switch from originals to repeats and back again with no rhyme or reason and even more bizarrely often at completely different times. They desperately need to start scheduling in blocks. Equally they do things like having Castle run Monday at 10PM for 5 seasons or letting Grey's Anatomy prop up Private Practice for years until it loses all its power as a lead-in which is made even more frustrating by the fact that they did exactly the same thing with Desperate Housewives and Brothers & Sisters. It also doesn't help that they've made a lot of really bad shows since their 'super season' back in 04/05.

Generally speaking ABC is going down the exact same path that NBC has gone down. A bunch of big hits are fading and ending and they've so far been unable to find replacements. ABC at least caught a break last year with a slate of shows that were bizarrely well received. And I say bizarrely because I thought they were awful.

Any ratings for the three Paralympic channels? They are becoming my choice to watch the coverage. No adverts and no dreadful C4 coverage cutting from live coverage of a sport to either an ad break or just chat.

The reaction from Fox to Idol's struggles was eye-popping - it seemed bizarre to me that no-one was prepared for it, believing that surviving Cowell's departure had secured the show for the future. In reality, the big test would always be not 2011, but 2012 after audiences had been offered several big alternatives.

The terminal problem Idol has isn't the faces on it - it's the fact the format and production has been completely antiquated by The Voice and The X Factor. They are finely-tuned twists on the formula and Idol, by comparison, looks what it is: over a decade old and looking for a safe place to land. Was it not always obvious to Fox execs that buying TXF was hastening Idol's own decline? And that the breakout of The Voice was only going to add to that attrition?

It doesn't mean that Fox are wrong to push on with TXF, but they had to be anticipating the knock-on effects and working to cut out costs from Idol (a winners panel, as suggested, perhaps) and bring it down safely. Instead, it seems they're raging against the inevitable fall. I can't see the point in any expensive 'stunt' castings on the judging panel. Fox have already stolen their own thunder on that score by landing Britney. That's the big one - nothing Idol does is going to top it. So stop trying.


I guess their issues might become more apparent in the wider media this year. With The Voice running 2 cycles plus the irrepressible Sunday Night Football, it seems pretty likely that NBC will beat ABC to #3 spot again (this time, without the Superbowl), doesn't it?

The odd thing is I actually felt ABC had a decent season (by their recent standards) last time around. They certainly lacked a big new hit on a Modern Family scale (so did everybody), but the likes of Revenge and Once Upon A Time felt like a step forward. Problem is, concentrating on the odd drama series rating in the mid-2's while DWTS continues to fall feels like patching up the plastering while the foundations crumble. I agree that ABC need to try something bold to reinvent themselves on Mondays (and Tuesdays, for that matter) but I can't for the life of me see it happening. Not with the shows they've picked up.

Any overnights for CBBC yesterday at 10am for 'Alesha's Street Dance Stars'? I'm interested to know how well that rated.

Celebrity Big Brother improved to 2.08m (9.6%) for Channel 5 from 9pm until 10.30pm, then 1.11m (7.5%) stayed for Emma Willis's Bit on the Side

Doesn't state whether it includes +1 when it usually displays it, so I am unsure if it does.

What are we predicting for Doctor Who tonight? I haven't watched it for a couple of years after feeling it had become a bit overwrought, but I'm actually really looking forward to tonight (especially as there's meant to be some kind of big surprise early on in the episode).

Good figures for both shows!

ABC was very lucky last season with Revenge and Once Upon a Time. Revenge broke the Wednesday 10pm curse since Lost moved timeslots and Once Upon a Time was presumed DOA, long before the premiere (critics having skepticism that a scripted show would even have viewers on Sunday 8pm). Both performing above expectations, their sophomore run this season should be promising. Having said that, even when these two shows did well last season, it's not like they had super numbers such as Modern Family. I have a feeling Suburbgatory will be like According to Jim, perform "average and acceptable" numbers and eventually making it to 88/100 syndication status.

Other than that, like you said, ABC is notorious for scheduling badly. I cannot stress enough how much ABC killed their marvel, Desperate Housewives by placing them against award shows and Winter Olympics mid-season, affecting their season averages. Brothers & Sisters was just simply not promoted well enough after season 2. Most trailers for B&S would be just a brief mention with DH's promo or just a simple "followed by B&S" shout-out on the DH promo. ABC thought the lightning would strike twice for DH-B&S pair, just like DH and Grey's did from 2004-06. Then again, when B&S had their two-hour episode, in the absence of DH, they proved themselves to rate solidly. If anything, B&S should have moved to a new timeslot after season 3. The very short 6-episode offer for season 6 was just a slap in the face. At least, they got to go out in some sort of an ending.

This is one of the many examples of lead-in reliant shows that you have mentioned earlier. Private Practice should have been cancelled instead of a stupid 13-episode order. Since ABC is going the similar path as NBC, I would pretty much scrap the Tuesday sitcom block and place them on Wednesday 10pm/10:30pm (Happy Endings and Don't Trust the B---- has cult fan numbers anyways). Move DWTS result show to 8pm and have Castle at 9pm, followed by Body of Proof at 10pm. Castle has a growing, larger fan base season-by-season and judging by last season's finale, Castle has a potential to debut higher than last September.

So, yet more ratings trauma for ITV1 - 2m for its football coverage of a match featuring Chelsea is appalling, but par for the course for them these days. 2m seems to be the new 10m!

Hoped Miranda would have had more of a lift with no Corrie, but 4m is ok I suppose for an August repeat.

Alarm bells must be ringing over Parade's End losing a third of it's audience, and losing out to C4's Para coverage.

Well it's been away for just over 9 months, so the hype and want for a new series has been building, and its been trailed rather well, I think with the new DW vs TXF angle some of the press have gone for will add more viewers across the whole night... I think about 6/7 million would be about right, with 8 million as a surprise.. It should time shift to well over that though, especially as the episode has great reviews, so those fans that have recorded it, would most definitely watch...

Should slaughter Red or Black, and boost X Factor slightly, if there are more viewers around... If there aren't I don't expect it to rise much at all...

I heard Glee is moving to a new timeslot again. I don't know much about US TV but is that a wise decision - it really didn't rate all that well last season

"Back to school weekend", and the official start of telly autumn. We should see ratings lift for everything across the board from today, every day, and keep doing so till Christmas, barring an autumn scorcher (which we all deserve frankly!)

Absolutely no excuses now for anyone. The well hath runneth dry.

Glee moved to Thursday at 9pm, which is after TXF and Idol's result shows. It really depends on how you look at it I guess. TXF rated well below expectations last year and their results shows didn't do that impressively. However, with Britney and Demi Lovato as new judges, it might change things. The first two weeks would be the curiosity factor, then the real test begins afterwards. Glee will benefit (or not) tremendously from TXF lead-in. As for Idol, again, with Mariah Carey as one of the new judges, it can go either way. Making a comeback like Lopez/Tyler freshman year, or sink further down. Again, Glee will get advantages from an aging, but still durable Idol lead-in midseason.

So, with TXF and/or Idol, Glee has potential to improve this season. That being said, moving Glee from being a lead-in show to being a lead-out, shows how much Glee has fallen and they are given a lifeline by FOX by putting them there (hopefully Glee has been taught a lesson about overexposure ie. The Glee Project, 3D film (which flopped), and they have paid the price severely. Declining quality of storyline didn't help either, especially season 2). They could have had any new shows (or even Bones) there.

Glee's competition for this season are (Thursday 9pm): Grey's Anatomy (ABC), Person of Interest (CBS), The Office (final season)/Parks and Recreation (NBC) and Beauty and the Beast (The CW).

So excited for Doctor Who tonight. I'm praying it does well in the ratings! Such an underrated show I feel, even by its own standards.

Blimey, a virtual dead heat between the three big commercial channels at 9pm. Haven't seen that before.

That rise for CBB caps off a strong week for C5. Even The Bachelor did alright for its finale considering it didn't finish until gone midnight. Might be worth another shot with someone more well known and interesting in the role.

ITV's woes continued to deepen meanwhile with the football performing poorly, but you sense they must be due a change in fortunes soon and their schedule for next week looks stronger.

As for the BBC's comedy block, it's rather absurd that the sole new episode in the lineup was less popular to the tune of at least a million than the repeats either side of it, but it also speaks volumes about In with the Flynns. It shouldn't have come back and this deserves to be the last series.

I watched the Flynns last night for the first time since episode 1. Can't see the problem with it - fairly bland, but reasonably amusing. There have been far worse sitcoms.

It has been sunk by the August wasteland and Friday post watershed slot. It's the sort of thing they should be airing on autumn/winter Sunday evenings (I long for the return of the legendary 7.15pm Sunday night comedy slot BBC1 used as a breeding ground for so many of the biggest hits in history), or perhaps in the vacated soap-free Thursday 8.30pm slot that has been strong in the past (Keeping up Appearances, Brittas Empire, 2point4 Children, On the Up, Waiting for God and so on).