A few ratings from the ITV Media multichannel top 10 that I don't think we've mentioned:

1 Sky Sports1 07:00 PM Live Ford Monday Night Football 951 4.8%
5 Flm4 09:00 PM The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers 633 4.4%
9 BBC Four 09:00 PM Dreaming the Impossible: Unbuilt Britain 576 2.6%

The film went on until 24:35.


Hot and sunny in the south east; more mixed in the rest of the country.

London: 21-30C, average 26C, clear
Birmingham: 14-24C, average 19C, unsettled with some rain
Manchester: 17-24C, average 20C, dry, sunny periods
Cardiff: 17-22C, average 19C, unsettled with some rain
Edinburgh : 14-22C, average 19C, unsetlled with some rain
Belfast : 16-22C, average 18C, dry with sunny intervals

According to the text of the article it's a one-minute peak recorded at 9:59pm. Possible, but obviously inflated by viewers tuning in early for Under the Dome, which will have attracted viewers tuning in especially as well as people killing time between the two instalments of BB.

The averages they are using also look different. I'm guessing those are full slot averages. Either way it's yet more positive media coverage for the show to cap off a good day.

The music doesn't work at all, its not all that impressive tbh.

Film4's strong run continues.

LOTR films always rate well. On a related note I wonder how close The Hobbit is to breaking Netflix UK records? I've seen a lot of advertising for it in recent days. I trust they booked ad space during The Two Towers last night as well.

I am interested to see the ratings between the weakening Holby City and Bake Off tonight! I think Bake Off might send it down below 4million, perhaps not tonight but in the next few weeks. With each passing year HC and Casualty seem to loose some of their audience.

Timings according to Overnights.tv:

21:03-22:01 - Big Brother
22:01-22:55 - Under the Dome
22:58-23:30 - Big Brother
23:36-24:29 - BOTS

It was canny of Channel 5 to run straight into UTD without a break. This practice is standard in America but not used as much here, as we have restrictions on the frequency of internal breaks (and length thereof, for PSBs). I wonder why such a long break was used before BOTS? Perhaps BB finished a bit earlier than planned.


That seems likely. They give an average for the first show of 1.97m (9.0%) exc +1, which would sound right for the scheduled 21:00-22:00 slot (as opposed to the tape-checked 1.99m/9.1% for 21:05-22:00).

For the second half, their 1.53m (13.9%) figure must be from 22:55 to 23:30 (including the ad break after UTD), compared with 1.67m (15.2%) tape-checked from 23:00-23:30.

I disagree. Surely if the Corrie lead in had an effect, it would have held onto more of its audience and got something like 3 or 4 million even. Instead it got something in the 1ms... which isn't much different to what you are suggesting it would have got without a Corrie lead in.

I think Bake Off will begin to regularly beat Holby City this year. I don't think Bake Off has reached it's peak yet, people were still discovering it for the first time last year. A lot of younger people have suddenly found it who weren't watching the first two series. This should definelty be its biggest series yet.

Perhaps i'm being optimistic but i can see the final reaching 8million, knocking HC down to low 3million, if not sub-3million.

That's the least HC deserves - it's like watching paint dry now.

Funny how some drama disasters can fly under the radar when one of the major soaps is in crisis ...

Holby v Bake Off ratings last year (winner in bold):

14/08 - 4.79m (23.1%) v 3.46m (16.7%)
21/08 - 5.00m (22.6%) v 4.19m (19.0%)
28/08 - 4.69m (20.8%) v 4.17m (18.6%)
04/09 - 4.58m (20.2%) v 4.34m (19.6%)
11/09 - 4.49m (18.8%) v 3.98m (16.7%) [England match on ITV - 5.59m]
18/09 - 4.50m (18.6%) v 4.35m (18.0%)
25/09 - 4.72m (19.6%) v 4.54m (18.8%)
02/10 - 5.02m (20.6%) v 4.75m (19.4%)
09/10 - 5.07m (21.4%) v 5.61m (23.7%)
16/10 - 5.08m (19.6%) v 6.54m (25.3%)
* peak for Bake Off final: 7.2m

There's nothing here to suggest that Holby and Bake Off can't live happily side by side. They're on early enough to PVR one and catch up on the same night.

Holby had 4.75m (23.4%) last Tuesday; the week before last, 4.59m (23.2%). The soap seems in fine enough fettle going into autumn. It will be pegged back a bit by Bake Off, but the general increase in viewing over the next few weeks will offset this.

I know - it really doesn't look very inspiring!

I agree, its one of the few shows that my facebook feed goes mental for and is gradually becoming a phenomenon And we're all university age so I'd love to see the demo breakdown as I reckon it'd surprise a lot of people, genuine feel good TV

Hehe. I also located the 1989 autumn drama promo on YouTube as well - alongside the standard fare like All Creatures and Casualty (which was entering its gritty phase at that point) there was also a promo for Screen One, the standalone film series (I believe Ghostwatch and Pat and Margaret are the two best known films that fall under this banner). Screen One is the kind of thing that would probably never see the light of day in these more austere times - the expense of producing a different film every week with some big star names attached would be deemed financially unsustainable.

Hahahahaha.

Brilliant.

Any Celebrity BB predictions on Thurs? 3 million, for me...

I must have missed this, you mean Big Brother finished on Monday and now Celebrity Big Brother starts on Thursday, in the same week?!

What Celeb BB starts this thurs? Surely if that's the case we should have heard who's going on by now etc.

Some good memories there. Lots of sitcoms in autumn 1989: 'Allo 'Allo!, First of the Summer Wine, Last of the Summer Wine, Bread, Streets Apart, Birds of a Feather, In Sickness and in Health, Blackadder Goes Forth and a series of six Victoria Wood sitcom-type shows. Although, most of the new comedy and drama had run out by December, perhaps more obviously than any other year in the late 1980s or early 1990s, with December 1989 having film repeats on Saturdays after Noel and Bob's Full House, another on Sunday before Bread, Mondays having Wildlife on One repeats, Tuesdays and Wednesdays continuing with the Dad's Army (Tue) and Bergerac (Wed) repeats they'd been running for all sixteen weeks of the autumn, and Fridays having repeats of the 22 Years of The Two Ronnies compilations from the previous autumn, Some Mothers Do 'Ave 'Em reruns, and a repeat of a 1988 Charles Dance drama serial, First Born.

It looks like we are now in the age of the docusoap again, or at least the transport docusoap.

On BBC2 we've had series looking at railways, London Underground and Transport for London in general.

Channel 5 have obviously had their famous Eddie Stobart series.

I notice next week Channel 5 start a new 8 part series looking at train company First Great Western and they are currently filming a series looking at bus company East Yorkshire Motor Services.

Plus of course there are all the young slightly chavvy ones on BBC Three, The Call Centre, Shoplife etc

The docusoap never went away, Channel 4 have stuff like 24 Hours in A&E, One Born every Minute and 999 What's your Emergency. I think they're less character driven compares to old shows like Airport or Driving School.

Do either of you actually read this thread?

Channel 5 obviously think Thursday is the best slot to launch CBB - the competition on the terrestrials is incredibly weak, even more so than last night. Dull PSB documentaries on every other major channel (or in Channel 4's case, an obscure docu-drama) will hold little appeal for the coveted 16-34 age bracket, so C5 can clean up and will probably easily surpass last year's 2.7m exc +1 / 2.8m inc +1 launch. Perhaps 3-3.5m is on the cards.

As for the cast, rumours abound: Mr Motivator, Jamie Spence, Big Boi from Outkast, Abz from 5ive and Courtney Stodden (?) are just some of the names mentioned on the DS news pages.

It only lasted half of the episode. It'll be fine in terms of ratings (I hope).

It got 2.1m, the 1.7 rating was for the second show, in BOTS usual slot of 11pm, for which 1.7m is a VERY good rating.

Well put.