The themed nights have done well first with the Bruce Forsyth Night on New Years Eve and ABBA night last Sunday and I'm sure more are in the pipeline. I wouldn't be surprised if CSI night is on the cards either for the 200th episode or more likely, the tenth season in 2010.

The Stv schedule for Sunday is :

3:15 - Scotland at the Movies Shorts - Heavenly Pursuits.
3:30 - FILM - Heavenly Pursuits
5.20 - The Cosby Mystries
6:15 - AS ITV

As you can see STV isn't showing the football but if it goes to penalties then it will cause havoc to the STV schedule as well. I thnk it will as I don't think ITV like showing thing in Scotland if they wont broadcast on ITV the same night. Am I right in thinking that.

U Be Dead hasn't been shown yet, but they haven't put a press release up about it, so I don't know whether it's due yet.

I think that the HK final will air on that Monday (27th), and on the Tuesday and Thursday we'll probably be 'treated' to another one of ITV's wide selection of shitty slimming shows, who's only viewers are the people who are too fat to change the channel.

Very poor all round on Sunday night, really. Corrie and No.1 Ladies Detective Agency did particularly badly. Only Lewis really comes out with any credit - and even that is significantly down on where it used to be.

A good start on Monday for Hells Kitchen - it will be interesting to see if its able to pick up any momentum as it goes on. A sterner test for it coming up on Wednesday with The Apprentice, but the initial signs are good.

Ratings for previous Hell's Kitchen launches are:

Sun 23/05/04- 7.37m [official rating]
Mon 18/04/05- 5.97m [official rating]

Mon 03/09/07- 3.67m [overnight rating, official rating: 3.81m]
Mon 13/04/09- 5.03m [overnight rating]

It's difficult to make accurate comparisons until last night's figure is consolidated.

Some low shares for BBC One and ITV1, due to the Easter weekend, although Saturday was good for BBC One.

Very low for Coronation St on Sunday night.

And BBC One will be glad they reduced their Ladies' Detective Agency commission to six episodes rather than the original plan of thirteen!

I have a feeling the other 7 are still on their way.

The first 2 series launch overnight ratings are also available:

Sun 23/05/04- 7.0m (30%)
* peak: 7.4m
Mon 18/04/05- 5.7m (25%)
* peak: 6.5m in first 15 mins

Last night's launch is down on the first 2 series openers. But at least it's well up on the 2007 one. I can't see it doing too well against The Apprentice, but it should have a strong showing on Saturday due to the Britain's Got Talent inheritance.

Monday 13th April
USA Overnight Ratings

8.00pm:
ABC - Dancing With The Stars.....18.39m.....4.2/11.....3.0/9
FOX - House................................11.84m.....4.5/12.....4.1/12
CBS - The Big Bang Theory..........10.13m.....3.8/11.....2.8/9
NBC - Chuck..................................6.22m......2.3/6......1.8/5
8.30pm:
CBS - How I Met Your Mother........9.56m......4.0/11....3.4/10

9.00pm:
ABC - Dancing With The Stars.....20.56m......5.0/12....3.7/10
CBS - Two and a Half Men...........14.78m......5.2/13....3.7/10
FOX - 24......................................10.83m......3.7/9......3.0/8
NBC - Heroes................................6.80m.......3.2/8......3.2/9
9.30pm:
CBS - Rules of Engagement........11.57m.......4.0/10....2.5/7
ABC - Surviving Suburbia............10.69m.......2.8/7......2.0/6

10.00pm:
CBS - CSI: Miami.........................13.33m.......3.8/10....2.9/8
NBC - Medium...............................7.58m........2.7/7.....1.9/5
ABC - Castle.................................7.61m........2.0/6.....1.6/5

NETWORKS:
ABC - 13.88m & 3.4/9 & 2.5/7
CBS - 12.12m & 4.1/11 & 3.1/9
FOX - 11.33m & 4.1/10 & 3.5/10
NBC - 6.87m & 2.8/7 & 2.3/7

SOURCE:
Tvbythenumbers

NOTES:[LIST][*]CW aired repeats of Gossip Girl and One Tree Hill. [*]ABC won in total viewers but finished 3rd in the key demographic.[*]Chuck and Heroes were both up quite a bit in the 18-49's.[*]House looked to be a bit low, but very good for all 4 CBS comedies.[/LIST]

Supposedly there is no HK episode confirmed for Monday 27th yet so the final may be on the Sunday, against the British Academy Television Awards. In recent years the awards have rated solidly: 5.67m (2008) and 5.08m (2007) (consolidated figures).

I can see Hell's Kitchen only being dented by The Apprentice, Ashes to Ashes and Have I Got News For You throughout its 2 week run.

Series 3 launch had much tougher competition than last night's show. It was up against Silent Witness which is a very strong ratings winner for the BBC. (It had 6.44m overnight, 6.85m consolidated.)

Last night's HK was on against a so-so film who's biggest claim to fame was Keira Knightley being airbrushed a bigger bosom in the publicity poster.

I'm amazed how well Two and a Half Men does in both viewers and demos considering it's in its sixth season and it's not exactly a young persons show compared to The other CBS comedies.

Castle looks doomed at the moment but with none of the ABC midseason dramas doing well, I think it has a small chance of coming back and same with Survivng Surbubia.

Looks like The Biggest loser has been assigned the task of taking on Deal Or No Deal.

Looks like ITV have decided that Friday at 9 is to be the comedy hour. I agree that's daft. I would have thought complimentary scheduling is the way forward - like Merlin vs X Factor or Whitechapel vs Who Do You Think You Are. I reckon Benidorm will be back on Friday in the autumn, though in that case comedy vs comedy worked.

Talking of complimentary scheduling, it looks as if BBC1 and ITV1 might finally be working on Primeval and Robin Hood not overlapping. BBC1 clearly think Primeval against Tonight's The Night is a good move, though RH may be slightly disadvantaged by its earlier slot.

And themed nights are bound to work well when you base them round much-loved showbiz icons like Brucie and Abba. (Well, they work for the sort of audience sizes Five are aiming for.)

...it's also god awful so it's really quite astonishing how it can still bring in these kinds of audiences.

The No1 Ladies Detective Agency is very good imo, funny, quirky, largely made up of the kind of stories that would have been seen on Hetty Wainthrop Investigates-just transported to a different culture.
It would seem there is no place for this kind of show anymore-people prefer blood and guts or whodunnits like Midsomer Murders.

Two and a Half Men rates extremely well in Aus also. Bit of a mystery. I've caught a few episodes and found it to be painfully unfunny.

Brilliant match here on ITV1. Can see it getting high ratings now, as viewers come flooding in to see the tense finale.

10m+ peak? (especially if it goes to extra time)

Epic footie match developing on ITV1 this evening. Should be good for ratings.

I think it'll start low (though the last match should have cast away fears of these 2 being unable to produce a good game)

But with the signifigant date of Hillsborough and the coverage around it and the competition being rather weak (CSI and the Hospital aside) I think it'll shoot up

Certainly a chance of that. On a footballing slant, its amazing the psychological effect of trying to defend a lead-Chelsea should just treat it as a normal game.

I've read lots of good things about it, although I haven't been watching it.

Still, it's doing better than The Last Enemy did in that slot for BBC One last year! Or was it the year before?

Agreed - though that is partly due to the ridiculous BBC decision to schedule it against Lewis. Very similar audiences, IMO, and given the choice most would go for the more familiar series set in the country where they live. Sad, but true. Put into one of the BBC's dead 9 pm weekday slots, where they have not tried much at all since the New Year, Detective Agency might have got 5 million or so.

Its future, of course, is not entirely (or even mainly) up to the BBC of course. The bulk of the cash, and therefore the decision on whether it is renewed, comes from HBO in the US, AIUI.

I would agree about complementary scheduling on the whole, but I'm not sure the Saturday schedule will work for the BBC. Its been pretty apparent over the last couple of weeks early start times have been deadly for the family dramas. And the BBC Press Office still has them listed the other way round for the week after next, putting RH straight up against Primeval.

Also, I can't remember if anyone has mentioned another three-part thriller commission from ITV starring Robbie Coltrane. It's called 'Murderland'. Hmm...I wonder what that might be about.

The football should get a huge amount of viewers about 9.20 onwards.

It was a terrific match, and there was always a twist. It should get superb ratings.