Brilliant final tonight. Should peak well as it's now cleared the big competition.

Rita Ora should shut up until she sees whether The Voice audience accept her first.

You'd think she'd have learnt from Jessie J appearing to have backtracked on her own similar anti-Syco comments to recently appear on X Factor in an attempt to revive her collapsing popularity but obviously not.

It is. I noticed its on both 1 and 3 for some reason.

Great night of tv tonight, and it's only going to get better when Call the Midwife joins the party. Grand Hotel on Sky Arts followed by Last Tango in Halifax, the rating for one will barely register and the other will no doubt be dented by Foyle's War but the quality of both speaks for itself.


What do dancing girls have to with darts? Sky's coverage sounds rather sleazy to me. (Although I suppose that makes me "PC".)

Its a much better word imo.

Yes it will be an interesting figure tomorrow given the final went to the wire tonight-and the comparison next Sunday.

Love it. The ad free version is already downloading from Catch Up for tomorrow night.

We're enjoying Danish drama The Legacy too.

We had nine here at Christmas from five households, and four of us from three households are watching it. Not a BARB type family!!

I think that is what Barry Hearn wished would be possible with Snooker too (The Masters uses the same venue I think)-but it just isn't-Snooker and noise just don't mix.

Grand Hotel is barmy but brilliant telly. Methinks a certain Mr Fellowes should watch and take note. No way would they drag out a storyline like the Bates murder mystery. They'd wrap it up in an hour, with plenty to spare (not least because the Spanish talk so quickly!)

I watched the first episode of The Legacy before Christmas and enjoyed it but didn't get around to watching the second, just checked and it's been taken off catch up. Looks like I'll have to wait until it's repeated or Sky puts the box set up in a few months.

Well thats not quite true - there is also the regional opt outs on BBC1 causing disproportionally low timeshifts as well and affecting official ratings which we have been tracking throughout this year.

Ok a few words on Saturday nights ratings , if that's what some call solid with nothing over six million on a cold January evening then I'd recomend a long summer holiday because at this rate there will be nothing rating over two million come June on Saturday nights.

New Years tv has been boring , bland and not worth the electricity to power the tv, other than a few gems it's like the executives have taken the hint from American tv and shut up shop

And US television eventually drove viewers away from Fridays and Saturdays with poor schedules. I think channels here are playing a dangerous game.

Fascinated to see how the FA Cup performs for BBC One over the next couple of days. They've certainly put plenty of promotion behind it on various platforms and the slots have a lot of potential for big numbers. Didn't get an epic game today, so they'll be hoping for something newsworthy from AFC Wimbledon tomorrow.

Last year, ITV had a stronger tie (Arsenal v Tottenham), but it was on Saturday evening. It averaged 5.17m, with a peak of 6.9m. This year, the BBC maybe has a better slot (and less build-up), but weaker tie - so we'll see how those factors play against each other.


I read the article but I'm confused. Could you point me towards the quote which even remotely suggests a "war"?

She's clearly been asked to compare the two shows by a journalist - and answered it by saying "I don't know how X Factor works", then spoken about why she likes The Voice. That sounds incredibly diplomatic to me. What would you prefer her to say exactly?

That's exactly what worries me, I make my living freelancing in the tv industry and I see first hand exactly how poor the channel controllers and heads of department really are, the BBC in my opinion should program and not worry about ratings but sadly there are those within the corporation who feel ratings are the only thing that matters.

In the US the executives are way too quick to kill a show and that is partly the reason why audiences have drifted as there is literally no point in investing time into a production especially if there is a good chance it will be cancelled, the demographic angle over there really irritates me as well as it means they are practically saying we don't want to appeal to you as you are not what we want.

UK TV is driving the audience away as recent ratings suggest.

To be fair she was asked about X Factor and gave an answer. The thing I found most interesting about the interview was this:

"You now have the ability in 2015 to not only be a musician but also a movement and a brand.

"That's what the winner's record deal is. It is exposure, branding, being smart with your next move and working out where you want to be in 10 years' time.

In other words, it's not about "the voice" and you have to have the whole package. So basically the whole format of The Voice is flawed and either they continue on the current path and fail to produce a successful recording artist, or turn the show into an X Factor clone.

Latest EE 30th news:

There is to be a flashback episode showing viewers the exact events that lead up to Lucy's death once the murderer is revealed. Sounds exciting. Should draw in the casual viewers too with that and the live episodes and segments.

The biggest criticism of The Voice is it's a clone of The X Factor. Continually bringing in The X Factor when talking about it is hardly helping with that image. The X Factor's cast and crew didn't go on about Pop Idol when it first arrived on the screen (other than where necessary due to the court case) because they wanted people to ignore the similarities.

Broadchurch, Death in Paradise, Stars in Their Eyes, Silent Witness, the FA Cup, Celebrity Big Brother, The Undateables, 24 Hours in A&E... There are a lot of returning shows next week so why not take a punt at predicting them on the DS Ratings Prediction Game? If you've played recently, taken a break for a while or would be a DSRPG virgin, all are welcome! Just click HERE, hit reply, delete the quote marks and get predicting.

Thank you to everyone in advance who takes part.

I wouldn't say it's a clone of The X Factor. It doesn't hunt out controversy and doesn't produce any stars. However, the irony is that it's supposed to be about "The Voice" but is more about the coaches, who are even more full of their own self importance than The X Factor judges. It takes one of The X Factor's flaws (judges competitiveness and general self-importance over the acts) and uses it as a vital component of the format. It's hilarious how it takes the moral high ground over TXF. They should just leave TXF out of it and get people interested in The Voice.

Well all the stuff about how she chose TV over XF because "it's a format really respected by the industry" insinuates negativity about XF. If she wanted not to speak about the latter her people would've asked for no questions about it, or at least for her response to them not to be published. As Fudd says, in its early years XF didn't go around saying how much better they were than the Idol format despite far more similarities between those two than between TV and XF, so it's far from impossible to do. I look forward to Cowell and co bragging about BGT coming out on top again, if this goes any further :yawn:

This is Zac Quinn who thinks that Frozen and Miranda have a worrying feminist agenda. . He is clearly on another wavelength.

Channel 4 commission a comedy called Hungry set during the time of the Irish Potato Famine. It might be one to watch ratings-wise (for the first episode at least), if it receives a Benefits Street type publicity boost.

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-en...4-9954913.html

That does sound good actually. But I still get the feeling that all the soaps have a general ratings level which they will all go back to after so called 'special events'.