Presumably there won't be an EE on Friday March 15 because of Comic Relief

Oh, come off it. Last night was a clear (and, to me at least, unexpectedly clear) win for ITV. The final 15 minutes of Broadchurch were barely 10% down on the first quarter hour, which compares favourably with Mayday on Sunday - a new drama which also launched with a very strong lead-in. To get 6 million (or near 7 million with plus 1) is a big success for a Monday night drama on ITV these days, and to do so against a very similar BBC drama which had a head start is even more impressive.

As it happens, I think most of ITV's output is unwatchable. But when they do make a big commitment to a drama (and 8 episodes is a big commitment these days) I am happy to praise them when it comes off. Of course there are 7 long, and (in theory) increasingly warm weeks to go, so we shall see if they can hold consistently above 5/6 million, but it's a strong start.

By contrast, you have to wonder whether Mayday can stay above even 4 million for its remaining episodes.

Over 4m is a disaster . Let's wait until the ratings are in for part 2 of Food Glorious Food before we label anything a disaster .

Bang Goes the Theory had its biggest ever audience last night - 4m/16.9% at 7.30 on BBC1.

Disaster in the sense it lost 2m viewers after one day.

The measure of a TV programme is not whether it "beats the other side".

That's 1970s thinking.


I know it's the ratings thread but the battle between BBC1 and ITV is over

I'm not sure if the BBC and ITV know however. They still seem to be fighting, like some in this thread.

I can confidently predict that FGF wont lose 2m viewers between Ep 1 and Ep 2.

Also Silk returns very soon and The Syndicate returns for a second series.

Does anyone know the figures for Beat The Pack, 3pm BBC1 yesterday?

967k/14.8%. Won the slot.

It's the only angle that interests most of the regulars, though.

But down on the 1.1m who watched Perfection on Friday. I think pointing out that it was up on the slot average on your Twitter account, whilst technically correct, is a bit misleading. We're not all that far into the post-CBBC era yet and so we're still trying to establish what is good or not for that kind of slot now they are finally competitive in that hour again. I wouldn't say 15% is a particularly great share for BBC1 at any time of day. It's okay, but we'll see where it goes from here as feedback on the programme has not been great.

Well it's proving to be the weakest time of day for BBC1 at the moment (except late night), but it won its slot, so I'm sure they're happy. Think the share was broadly simililar or a bit above Friday.

Fantastic for BGTT: it did better against Corrie than Richard Curtis's drama, which shows the value of complementary scheduling. And as Dancc pointed out, very good also for AQOS, even given the hook of being the 1000th episode. To have two 4m raters against the Corries on a Monday in their current form is very rare. Panorama has had a small cut in episode order (while keeping the same budget to increase quality) so we may see more experimentation at 20:30 on Mondays now and then.

What did Broadchurch average including +1 and HD?

Good rating for Broadchurch. Mayday mustve been too difficult to understand for a big audience, the critics liked it.

Some critics liked it, others not so much.

It barely had 2m to begin with, didn't it? The real question is, do ITV have the cojones to pull Cowell's cooks from the schedules after 2 episodes?

I think they'd wait to see how it does first. I'd expect it could move slot to Tuesdays if needed.

You can tell the weather is getting warmer and the evenings lighter from the fact BBC1 has a wealth of great new shows about to start.

Why waste them in winter when folk are stuck indoors all week in front of the telly.....

I noticed on Sunday that the Mirror had a special 8 page Food Glorious Food supplement to tie in with this big new smash hit show. In true tabloid fashion, it would have been splashed across the front page banner "Exclusive food from Cowell's hit new show". The tabloids always call a tied-in show "a hit" whether it is or not.

Instead, they squashed it in a little box and the words read "from TV's new show".

Even the Mirror wasn't shame-faced enough to pretend it was "a hit"



Either way, it seems a pretty Glorious show to me....

Let's not forget that millions of folk are far more casual in their viewing habits.

They watch what's on at the time.

In short, 2/3rds of those who watched Mayday on Sunday tuned in for episiode 2. Others will have taped it.

That's not bad, really.

This warm spell will be shortlived. Cold and snow return early next week so the TV networks may be able to capitalise.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/21659549


Mayday! Mayday!

You need another one its the third mayday.

Apparently they are making 3x1 hour episodes of Jonathon Crrek for the autumn in addition to the feature length addition coming soon.