Splash broke down a few weeks ago I think. Around about the same time it came back against half decent opposition.

Do you think Rising Star would be able to generate mass hype pre-launch on a similar level to when the Voice was first introduced to UK audiences? When the Voice first came in, there was a clear creative and on-screen hook which is was the blind auditions which looks spectacular on-screen. Do you think that Rising Star's gimmick of live voting could be hyped as much and cause similar kind of buzz? Also what kind of judges do you think Rising Star should go for - as in current music stars, older music stars or people who are in the management/A&R industry?

Now secondly, dont you think it's very likely after the first episode that it may lose steam? It's not like the Voice where the spinning chairs surprised viewers and fantastic word of mouth caused ratings to go up. The live voting aspect may seem fun for the first episode but surely it's not something which will get causal viewers watching the show on the same kind of level as the Voice did? Also, up against Call The Midwife, surely it will lose in the ratings quite significantly? CTM is ratings dynamite among OAPs, I cant see Rising star touching CTM as RS wont have appeal to the OAPs. I can also see R.S. getting criticism from the press and viewers with them saying "it's basically TXF/The Voice but with real-time voting".

And thirdly, if Mr Selfridge settles at 4.5million in the overnights, do you really see it coming back once again next year in the Sunday 9pm slot? Sunday 9pm in January is one of the best slots of the year. Dedicating 10 weeks to Selfridge's 4.5m just would be very underwhelming, and that slot could instead be used to launch another major drama with potential to get significantly more viewers.

Good rating for the football considering it was a fairly dull match. Outrated what ITV stuck on at 9:30pm!!

ITV did right to cancel DOI. It had lost about 40 pc of its audience, was expensive to produce and was being beaten by far superior opposition on BBC One. Nothing could have been worse than to recommision it and see it fall to about 3 million viewers. Also eight series is usually enough for most shows, unless like IAC and SCD, they just keep going with huge audiences.

Casualty has seemed a lot pacier and engaging over the past couple of weeks,. although it's still not hitting the heights it once hit quality-wise.

Yes, and even aside from ratings, there is a compulsion to go with series 4 simply because ITV have Rising Star.

Much will depend on hype and the gimmick (the "new toy" effect). If RS launches looking fresh and alive The Voice could start to look jaded quite quickly. Assuming RS launches in January no doubt ITV will be hyping it up long before Christmas.

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What dramas are coming up in February/March/April on ITV?

Viewers love to watch Liverpool and who can blame them. Compares very favourably with Man City's primetime clash with Blackburn Rovers a couple of weeks ago. And they are really pushing the boat out lately with hugely entertaining displays but Liverpool still seem to be a bigger draw in terms of TV audience.

Lol naughty

I doubt they'd overturn the cancellation had that happened, purely because a ratings rise would have been down to it being All-Stars, something you can't replicate again. It would have been a nice send-off, and for fans, it still is.

The problems with the show have been discussed elsewhere but I have to say the next two weeks - tonight, where each pair is given a particular dance style, and next week where they choreograph their own routines - look a lot better than usual, so a small rise would be nice.

It hasn't fallen below 5 for the main show has it, yet? Hopefully it won't, though it has gone downhill steeply this year. DOI's ratings were considered disappointing in 2012 when it fell sharply, and then it was around 7 million. Rising Star, in the same slot, simply has to match that to make it worthwhile.


It's the whole package. Hosts can damage things. The feeling towards Schofield has gone right downhill, then Holly left and was replaced by Christine on DOI, again a backwards step. That was the year the ratings fell quick. I don't believe for one second it's down solely to that, but I do believe it contributed.

A typical autocue person will be "fine", but I think they need more to give it a fighting chance. Obviously if the show is a hit because of the format itself it won't matter entirely, but no one can say this for sure yet so personally I'd give it that extra leg up. There's also nothing to suggest it won't collapse when the gimmick wears off, if it even takes off to begin with.

As for the judges, we don't know yet how important they will be, but as we've seen with X Factor, look how much more popular the Cowell-Cole-Minogue-Walsh line-up was than the one than followed it. It plays a big part, though I'm sure they can't have as much relevance as on X Factor...


It wouldn't surprise me and it did make him a LOT more tolerable when they were together on DOI, unlike Christine who he has no chemistry with.


Very very risky colliding with midwife even if it is with a headstart and aiming for younger viewers. This is a new show they will want to be 7m+. But in a way I would like them to try it, as you either back down from it or put up a fight. I suppose it could work without damaging Midwife at all, but I don't know if ITV dare. It's a quandary. It's hard to imagine them moving Family Fortunes which puts up a surprisingly good fight for a gameshow against Midwife with the 15 minute headstart, but likewise I doubt they'd want Rising Star on air before 7pm.

Not sure about the Saturday battle - huge press coverage no doubt, but the result of that is the loser coming off bad, which could be RS. I don't really like the idea of two singing shows on at the same time either. But it's one idea.


No reason it can't generate buzz certainly. The gimmick is different enough for people to tune in initially at least.

ITV will go for all of the above in terms of judges probably, no doubt a huge current star or two, an older one known still to the public, probably a management type. It doesn't matter, what matters is they somehow strike "accidental gold" like the X Factor panel from 2008-10. But you just can't create that, it simply happens or it doesn't. And basically it usually doesn't! They'll do their best for big, mixed personalities. The public have seen it all before though, so it could never have the same impact, a bit like the entire show.

It's a worrying time for light entertainment. Most of the big ones will wane or already are, and we are seeing stuff too similar to all of it yielding average results. Really hard to imagine a new entertainment hit getting 9-10m unless it's a brand new premise away from the current popular stuff, a new "trend" of sorts..

I don't think anyone is disagreeing with this. My main point is that it is not in the usual ratings territory of axed shows. It still gets above 5m. So for the replacement, ITV will be wanting 7m as that's when DOI's ratings became a worry for them.

That's why I think there's more pressure on Rising Star than any entertainment show in recent memory launching (including The Voice) because it isn't simply arriving and doing its own thing, its acting as a replacement.

Maybe By Any Means is/was in the same vein as New Tricks (whicj always did well on a Monday). Ripper Street was far darker and much more violent, so any comparison with NT and its audience is lost. Can't comment on Whitechapel as I have never watched it, but from what I have seen in terms of trailers again it might not have appealed to the NT audience.

And this after Liverpool have just spent four seasons in the doldrums, you fancy the opportunity for anyone to overtake them has come and gone now rather!! Looks like ITV might well end up with Fulham v Sheffield United in primetime in 10 days or so, bet they can hardly wait.

Good although somewhat unspectacular for The Voice. Celebrity Big Brother continues to do the business for Channel 5 this time around as well. Beyond that not much of great excitement or interest happening last night.


Such as?


Because as is said at least once every week they're two different shows with two different sets of expectations.


Or alternatively they're a commercial organisation that have decided to keep making a show that's turning a profit.


Didn't you just spend Q4 bemoaning Atlantis which not only stayed in prime time (and got a second series) but kept its prime Strictly lead-in or are we now admitting that its performance wasn't so bad? What about The White Queen? It wasn't that long ago that you referenced it as a low rating niche drama yet I can't remember the BBC banishing it from its timeslot. Citizen Khan also ran in prime time for the duration of its run last year despite less than stellar ratings. In fact there's a couple of BBC1 comedies for which that statement can be made. And of course there's ratings thread favourite Waterloo Road which is not only still in prime time but still being made.

I'm sure if I were to really stop and think about it for more than a few seconds I could come up with a long list of low rating shows that the BBC have kept in prime time slots. And frankly I don't think booting stuff out of prime time is really anything to be that proud of.


Some might say that's a good thing.

In fairness its not like we saw a whole lot of Jonathan Ross outside of his chat show when he was at the BBC either. I think they made a point of giving Norton some high profile Saturday night gigs when he first arrived because there was a fair bit of press about how much they were paying him. That's died down now and he's always seemed much more comfortable doing the chat show than the Saturday night light entertainment stuff. I always found it odd that they gave Norton those jobs anyway. He was never really a natural fit.


I see you didn't mention the BBC's own army of bland autocue readers led by Nick Knowles.

Personally I can't think of much worse than Jack Whitehall fronting a big BBC1 light entertainment format but perhaps that's just me. And its not that I dislike the guy (I've really enjoyed Bad Education) I just can't imagine it being a good fit at all. Personally I quite liked Darren McMullen who the BBC drafted in for the second series of The Magicians and wouldn't object to seeing him given another shot at something although I think he's presenting The Voice in Australia these days.

On the subject of new presenting talent I'll say what I've said before – all broadcasters are feeling the effects of cutting down and neglecting development in children's television. You look at the current list of big presenting talent in the UK and a fair amount got started in children's television (or T4). There isn't that system of development in place any more and everyone is now feeling the effects.


Presumably her career resurgence is driven in large part by a lack of other options. If you want a female presenter who are you going to turn to? Holly Willoughby, Davina McCall and now Emma Willis are basically the only options at this point.


Although Hostages was still their highest rated offering.

Usually ITV wield the axe if a show loses over half its ratings( Red or Black was a classic example in recent years), or falls below 3 million. I think the main reason for DOI being cancelled was it was expensive and ITV were being far outrated by better opposition on BBC One.
I think Rising Star could either be a hit, or it could be a case of viewers saying not another talent contest and switching off. However, with TXF in decline and probably going in 2016 if its ratings continue to fall, ITV are keen to get a similar hit going. If Rising Star works, then they can probably get several series out of it.

I'm not sure if it'd have the same buzz as The Voice when it first started, no, but I think it could get sampled well and whilst it would probably drop off a bit I think it could ultimately still settle at a solid to strong level. They'd need to hype up the ratings battle with The Voice quite a bit and get the tabloids on side. Some big name judges would help. There will be 4 judges and I think I'd have 1 A&R/management judge, an older popstar, a younger popstar and someone from the radio (Chris Evans could possibly judge rather than host, or even someone like Chris Moyles who is still well known). The competition would undoubtedly be really tough although I guess they wouldn't need a straight up clash with The Voice. The CTM clash could be interesting as I think both shows could do well there as they appeal to very different audiences. Don't forget that the year before CTM started Dancing on Ice was overnighting at 8.5m and Wild At Heart at 7.5m, making that slot very tough for BBC1. Yet they put CTM there and it flew, appealing to a different audience. RS would appeal to a very different audience to CTM and would also have a headstart of 15-30 mins on it. I think it could get a solid audience and maybe dent CTM. Countryfile would also be dented as that show's rating is heavily inflated by the 7.45-8pm period where people sdwitch over from DOI and switch on early for CTM. By appealing to a different audience they could do well. Also, DOI is currently rating around 5.5m, and based on the demos around 0.7m of those will be agerd 16-34. RS will almost certainly skew younger. A 1m 16-34 audience would be a solid improvement on DOI and yet would only mean a total audience of 4-5m. Huge total audiences aren't necessarily needed for it to be a much more worthwhile option for them for DOI and to make a nice profit for them. A 5-6m total audience (similar to DOI now and perfectly achievable IMO) would mean a 16-34 audience of 1.2-1.5m which is quite a bit more than DOI is currently getting.

As for Mr Selfridge, apparently they've already renewed it. Last week it launched at 5.3m. If it can hold at 5m it'll probably stay there (bearing in mind the lead-in is only around 4.5-4.7m). It's Sunday show through and through, and for ITV in January the Monday slot is probably a better one for launching a new drama anyway. And if RS were to rate better than 4.5m Selfridge would get a better lead-in too. I think unless it sinks below 4.5m (inc +1) it'll stay in that slot next year. It's a fairly tricky slot for them and it does a decent job.


DCI Banks, Prey, Endeavour, Law & Order: UK, Tommy, Lost Honour and Undeniable are all due fairly soon I think. Another series of Vera has finished filming too but I don't know when that's due, nor do I know when The Great War is airing. There's also a comedy drama Edge of Heaven coming soon.

It all seems a bit thin to be honest. Lots of lower tier returners like Bletchley and Banks all seem to have come along with nothing really big alongside them. Think Scott & Bailey is in the Autumn this year. Things do look better going into Autumn and early 2015 though. Autumn has Downton, S&B, The Great Fire, The Widower and Grantchester (which I think could be a big hit). Then in early 2015 there will be new series of Broadchurch and Lewis amongst others. There's nothing wrong with stuff like DCI Banks and Law & Order but they're definitely second tier dramas, and when there's no top tier titles airing it looks a bit underwhelming.

CTM came from nowhere and conquered a once unbeatable format. Pre CTM, DOI was attracting over 9 million viewers and a series about midwives in the fifties seemed destined to be a sideshow for older viewers. Yet it proved that a quality drama with a popular star like Miranda Hart could beat a rather predictable zeleb show.

I really like Graham, but think the chat show and R2 show are enough for him, I wouldn't be overly keen on watching him doing anything else. And I'm sure he's more than happy to only have two regular gigs and still be getting paid big money, where as ITV make Ant and Dec work their backsides off for their money.

Meet My Folks! In the summer of 2003, but it really didn't do very well at all, it was dropped before the end of its run with the remaining episodes being flung out at 11pm on Fridays a few months later. Though in fact I remember reading that they did surprsingly well late on Fridays, with decent shares, and Lorraine Heggessey asked for more ideas that could work in that slot, not that anything came out of it.

Oddly UKGameshows doesn't feature Meet My Folks but, because it was an American format, it's got a Wikipedia page...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meet_My_Folks

It really wasn't very good, though, and the thing that really did for it is that they decided not to have a presenter or voice-over, so the contestants themselves had to constantly talk about what they were doing, which made it come across as totally contrived. It's hard enough for Nick Knowles to try and make the format of Break The Safe hang together, imagine the contestants having to explain it! That really sunk it, I'd say. Also it had the worst theme tune I can ever remember, some horrible Nickleback-esque soft rock affair with someone hollering "Meeet Myyyy Foooolks!!!" over it. Dreadful.


I assume this was a bit of confusion on your behalf over who was doing this new version. In fact I don't believe Police 5 was ever networked and some regions never showed it, while others did their own versions. I don't think there was an ATV connection because the London version was actually on LWT well into the early eighties, and LWT and ATV really hated each other. The Midlands version stayed on Central until 1992, where I remember they showed it on Thursdays at 6.50, because despite being in Granadaland we could pick up Central and I remember watching it before Top of the Pops.



Don't know if it's online but it is in the printed Broadcast. I'm afraid I can't be bothered typing out the whole thing but I can tell you number 100 is In It To Win It on 5th January with 5.90 million viewers. However, Wimbledon is inclued twice, once for the final and one for the semi-final, so technically that should be at number 99.

Highest rated football is Man U vs Real Madrid on 5th March with 9.39m, at number 22. Highest rated news bulletin was on BBC1 at 6pm on 18th January with 6.73 million, number 64 in the chart.

We've also got the multichannel top ten, minus sports channels, which I don't think has appeared here before. So that's...
1) The Big Bang Theory (5th December, E4) 2.78m
2) Celebrity Juice (28th February, ITV2) 2.45m
3) Revolution (29th March, Sky 1) 2.15m
4) Red (1st August, Film 4) 2.11m
5) Match of the Day Live (26th June, BBC3) 2.07m
6) Family Guy (21st July, BBC3) 1.94m
7) I'm A Celenrity (8th December, ITV2) 1.89m
8) Foyle's War (23rd March, ITV3) 1.81m
9) Return of the Jedi (30th June, ITV2) 1.73m
10) The Only Way Is Essex (2nd June, ITV2) 1.65m


I think that's an over-reaction, BBC1 have always had comedy shows that get good repeat figures. I've got a load of seventies Radio Times where The Good Life is being repeated on umpteen occasions. In the nineties Men Behaving Badly used to be flung out wherever there was a gap, and I used to watch it every time it was on as well. And the same is true of other channels, ITV would always aim to spoil big shows on BBC1 with Alright on the Night repeats, they showed number six so often I could recite Denis' script along with him. Because I always watched it.


It's in the Radio Times at 8pm so it's clearly not a last minute thing. But as you say, it's a terrible slot, not just tonight but throughout the week. People don't look at C4 at 8pm for entertainment shows like that and it'll get overshadowed by everything else. If it was going to be anywhere it should be at 10pm where there's far less competition and people are more willing to commit to a stripped show.


I seriously doubt this, ITV Studios didn't buy So TV to poach Graham Norton, if they did then no other broadcaster would commission anything from So because they would assume anything of any value would be poached by ITV. The point of buying it is to diversify ITV Studios, into new genres and on other channels.

And that's before you ponder the point of Norton moving to ITV when they've given up on any original content after 10.30. It's got nothing to do with McIntrye, Norton and Ross were both on BBC1 together a few years ago. They can co-exist.


I really like this post. I find it totally infuriating when people slag off The Voice because it's not what it's "supposed" to be. The only people who can say what The Voice is "supposed" to be is the producers of The Voice, and if they think it works on screen, they'll do it. Like when people slag off Shrlock because it's "supposed to be" a mystery show and there isn't enough crime solving. It's entirely the business of Moffatt and Gatiss as to what it's "supposed to be", it's their show.

The point of TV entertainment is to surprise, not simply work to a specific formula that can't be deviated from. It's very much like Top of the Pops at the turn of the century, they got rid of the exclusives and only featured records for the chart, which is apparently what it was "supposed to be". Of course, it ended up looking totally out of date and boring, while CDUK just featured the bands they wanted and made up their own chart, and everyone watched that instead.

BBC is currently filming Susanna Clark's fantasy best seller ''Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell'' in Wakefield for Christmas screening.Set in the era of the Napoleonic Wars it tells the story of how magic once existed in England. Stars include Eddie Marsan,Charlotte Riley and Alice Englert - Sunday Express

Yes, the press have decided it's for Christmas. However, commissioned as a 7 part serial, I'm not sure where it would fit in over the Christmas period. Esio Trot is the main fantasy drama for Christmas this starring Dustin Hoffman and Dame Judi Dench.

Makes a lot of sense. I didn't know the exact demos of DOI except they weren't bad, but yes RS wouldn't have to go far to better than especially against older skewing drama.

That said, they'll still need some older viewers as well to make the overall figures decent which could prove tricky. When things rate as high as Midwife they can often swallow things up, like Downton does (though I know that skews a bit younger overall).

But I agree with you. I think it's worth a punt as what else do you do?



It was more than Midwife though - in 2012, while they did clash for the full hour (I think?) I don't recall DOI's ratings holding up that much better before 8pm (I may be wrong!). They were generally down anyway, and had fallen a bit gradually since the beginning. The changes made in 2012 (not good ones) along with the staleness of the show meant people realized they were bored and didn't like it. Midwife just cemented this, but they certainly didn't come back last year or this year even when the main show had no Midwife clash - although starting at 6.15 does not help!

The reason Norton did these things on the Beeb is because it was a specific decision on his part to try and do new things and see if he could work to a different audience. On C4 in 2004 he'd done his chat show for five years and for the last two he was doing it every day. There wasn't really anywhere else he could go on C4, just doing more of the same, and he said that one of the reasons why he went to the Beeb was because they offered him more opportunities to try new ideas and work to a different audience.

Obviously as it turns out, not much came out of that idea, and there were some rotten shows, though the Lloyd Webber shows did alright for him and of course there's Eurovision which I think he does a really good job at. Obviously now he's doing the same kind of thing he did at C4 but he was refreshed after a few years away from it and on BBC1 he's getting a wider audience. If you were to compare the BBC1 show now with So Graham Norton I think it would look suitably different, and you could argue his target audience now is older than C4 would be interested in targeting.


I will say again that I think is totally wrong. The broadcasters are not neglecting development in children's television, the BBC have ring-fenced children's TV in the latest cuts and there's broadcasting twelve hours a day. This means they've covering genres they never had time to do before, as I mentioned the other day they're doing their first panel show on CBBC and in terms of comedy they're light years ahead of anything they've ever done in the past. Horrible Histories is the obvious success, and that's led to primetime and also Yonderland on Sky 1 which was even sold as "from the makers of Horrible Histories". No way is that the result of a sector that's being marginalised and destroyed.

The same is true of other genres. There used to be one episode of Newsround a day, now there are several and with that comes a requirement for more presenters and the time to do different things. They've got a sports programme on CBBC 52 weeks a year, that never happened before when there wasn't time for it on BBC1.

And there are loads of kids presenters still making strides into adult programming. Helen Skelton's an obvious one, she's now starting to appear on adult TV, Steve Backshall is another. They're not massively famous yet but they're getting there. Then you've also got people like Sonali Shah and Ore Oduba who are presenting on BBC Sport (Shah did the Olympics, Oduba I see was on Breakfast this morning) from Newsround, just like Helen Rollason did.

There's loads of kids TV, more than ever before, and with that comes plenty of opportunities that never existed ten or twenty years ago.

There are plenty of potential presenters to go at, and not just on kids' TV. Jack Whitehall probably wouldn't be that good but there are other comedians like Russell Kane who seem happy enough to get involved in TV presenting, which is something that would have been anathema to the previous generation of stand-ups.

Thanks Steve! I was hoping you'd know! I may have a distorted memory, but I seem to remember "Meet My Folks" as being OK television. Can't remember what was on ITV1 at the same time but I didn't watch it!

Was it 2003 that "The Murder Game" aired too? That scared the life out of me! My sister was convinced that the contestants were depressed people who volunteered to be murdered in reality! I really liked the show. It was different.