The Channel 5 announcers could tell people to watch Spike TV instead to avoid the CSI triple bill alongside the trailers

Not posted for a few days so here are some of my thoughts...

The soaps held up well given the clock change with hardly any fluctuation week-on-week - which is a positive given how they've been so far in 2015.

The Walking Dead ended strongly, albeit, with a somewhat underwhelming season finale - although looking at the numbers in The States is finished stronger than ever before whilst this season (5th) is the most watched season in the UK to date. The switch to Monday's helped (something they started when Season 4b returned last February). The success of TWD is simply phenomenal and seems to get bigger every year.

The scheduling for BGT is much better this year. The 7PM start last year was too early especially with the lighter nights approaching. 8PM is a much better slot and it seems to be surrounded by a few potential ratings successors. I hope Thunderbirds starts well on Saturday - I'm looking forward to it.

As for Gotham. The mid-season break has done it no favours whatsoever and I could have told them that right from the start. There's so many of these shows that suffer the same fate - the same thing happened to The Flash on Sky1. One continuous stretch is much better overall I think but this 'fast-tracking' seems to be way things are now. UK viewers are not used to these midseason breaks like the American audience are.

It would be better if the UK broadcasters made it so that they could fast track the second half of the season but aired the first half delayed so that shows could air in one go

Wonder if anyone can help any idea what the Daily politics show ratings are on BBC2?
Neil has just thrown them in my face in regards to his current interview style
and said they are getting "record ratings"

I see Victoria Derbyshires's new 9.15 am show starts on Two and Bews channel post Easter. Will be interesting to see the ratings. Up against the daytime mix of homes and auctions and ITVs bondage reports.

hehe

Nowadays of course its double or Triple various NCIS's heh

ITV's football coverage averaged 5.4m - don't have figures for the match itself.

BBC1

TOS - 4.3m
EE - 6.4m
Holby - 4.3m
Ordinary Lives - 4.5m

If that's correct EE held up pretty well although it was only a ''friendly'' match

Channel 4's Burger Bar to Gourmet Star fell to 0.67m (exc. +1) at 8pm, coming in behind C5's Costa Del Casualty (0.91m exc. +1) and thrashed by BBC Two hit Back in Time for Dinner (2.5m).

I wonder if there's a chance Back In Time For Dinner could return? In other news iPlayer stats for February are out and EastEnders live week isn't at the top. Top Gear is! Good luck making the next version of the show this popular again BBC.


http://t.co/u8PyZHmAj0

EE held up a lot better then I thought there.

From DS

BBC One's Ordinary Lies fell below 5 million viewers for its third episode, according to overnight figures for Tuesday (March 31).

The Jason Manford-led drama averaged 4.51m (20.1%) at 9pm when up against ITV's coverage of England's international fixture. Costa Del Sol: Last Brits Standing was seen by 2.41m (22.7%) at 10.45pm.

On ITV, England's draw with Italy was the night's most-watched programme outside of soaps, with an audience of 5.43m (24.8%) between 7.30pm and 10pm. A further 72,000 (0.4%) tuned in on ITV+1.

On BBC Two, Alex Polizzi: The Fixer interested 1.16m (5.9%) at 7pm, before Back in Time for Dinner entertained 2.50m (11.2%) at 8pm, and Dara and Ed's Great Big Adventure averaged 1.51m (6.7%) at 9pm. Nurse followed with 740k (4.4%) at 10pm.

Channel 4's Burger Bar to Gourmet Star continued with 670k (3.0%) at 8pm (75k/0.3%), while One Born Every Minute brought in 1.29m (5.8%) at 9pm (296k/1.9%). The latest episode of Teens gathered 420k (2.7%) at 10pm (69k/0.8%).

Over on Channel 5, Costa Del Casualty: Benidorm ER appealed to 910k (4.1%) at 8pm. 40 Kids By 20 Women intrigued 715k (3.2%) at 9pm, while Nanna Love: 50 Shades of Granny aired to 850k (5.4%) at 10pm.

BBC Three's World's Toughest Jobs was seen by 428k (1.9%) at 9pm, while E4's The 100 played to 626k (2.8%) in the same timeslot.

Indeed. Hopefully that bodes well for the Emmerdale clash on Thursday.

So Waterloo Road pretty much doubled its audience through iplayer requests (it was getting about 1.2-1.4m with the bbc3 and bbc1 showings i think). Having now watched all of the last series, although it wasnt great, it was certainly far better than the 2 series preceeding it.

They will probably do a 10 min school like program on the BBC3 part of the iPlayer when the channel is axed in Autumn

That "documentary" was just like.....

From DS

EastEnders topped the soap ratings on Tuesday evening (March 31) with more drama from the Mitchells following Phil's return to the Square, overnight figures show.

The latest visit to Walford was the most-watched programme of the day, claiming 6.45m (31.3%) at 7.30pm on BBC One as Phil was furious to learn that Ben was to blame for the loss of The Arches. BBC Three's repeat screening secured 397k (2.8%) at 10.30pm.

Emmerdale attracted 6.02m (32.9%) at 7pm on ITV and 114k (0.5%) on +1 with the surprise passion between Adam and Vanessa as they both went on the rebound.

Holby City interested 4.33m (19.5%) at 8pm on BBC One with the continued attempts to clear Jonny's name.

Neighbours entertained 677k (9.5%) at 1.45pm and 775k (5.7%) at 5.30pm on Channel 5 as original character Des Clarke arrived back in Erinsborough.

Hollyoaks appealed to 710k (4.2%) at 6.30pm on Channel 4 as the baby swap storyline continued, while E4's first look followed with 617k (3.4%) at 7pm and 113k (0.5%) on +1.

Elsewhere, Home and Away mustered 238k (3.2%) at 1.15pm and 651k (4.2%) at 6pm on Channel 5, while 5*'s first look had 382k (2.2%) at 6.30pm.

Sky always used to do that, starting shows in January as new post Christmas seasons and by about March being pretty well caught up with the US schedule.

But there were too many protests and internet campaigns saying they would watch 'by other means' unless they were shown within 30 seconds of the US airing.

Some of these were probably run by people who would never be paying Sky in the first place but just wanted to 'watch Sky by other means' for free and thereby get these shows quicker for free.

The US seems to be moving more to shorter seasons to some extent. As with The X Files return as just a 6 episode run in very UK TV Fashion. That should help. But there will always be 23 episode series (or whatever) to fit into the US 36 week schedule - meaning unless UK channels return to the old ways the problem will keep happening.

Sky do show the older less 'desired' shows this way - airing from January in one long run. I wonder if anyone has analysed the drop off rate for viewing figures of the series that Sky do show in one post Christmas to May run and the ones they show in stops and starts from soon after US airing.

Might be illuminating.

Thunderbirds Are Go must be on at 5pm on April 11th. Has anybody checked that?

0.2 were bumped off whilst or after watching it, by Mafia new recruit Triggerhappy Trev?

I agree with you - it does not seem to make much sense even for ITV !!

I suspect England ''friendlies'' do not attract big audiences in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland (and of course Scotland opt out of Holby in any case).

It was not in the provisionals which is why it was discussed on here but it could have changed and many of us expect it to.

Monthly average overnight ratings for March are in, with Eastenders recording 6.51m (30.8%), which is down 330k year-on-year. The highest rating of the month came on Monday 2nd with 7.77m (33.6%), whilst the lowest came on Wednesday 18th with 4.94m (22.6%) - this was a late scheduled episode not shown in some TV guides. There have been 3 rescheduled episodes during March due to football/Comic Relief but no Emmerdale clashes. For comparison, March 2014 saw one rescheduled episode, one full Emmerdale clash and one 15min Emmerdale clash.


2015
Jan - 7.26m (32.1%)
Feb - 8.11m (35.9%)
Mar - 6.51m (30.8%)

2014
Jan - 7.33m (31.8%)
Feb - 7.26m (31.8%)
Mar - 6.84m (31.4%)
* W/O Emm clash - 6.99m (32.0%)
Apr - 6.97m (33.3%)
May - 6.52m (31.9%)
Jun - 5.45m (28.1%)
Jul - 5.19m (27.8%)
Aug - 5.71m (29.5%)
Sep - 6.10m (30.5%)
Oct - 6.62m (31.6%)
Nov - 6.68m (31.0%)
Dec - 6.73m (30.5%)

Previous March average overnights
2015 - 6.51m (30.8%)
2014 - 6.84m (31.4%)
2013 - 7.40m (31.5%)
2012 -
2011 - 8.68m (37.0%)
2010 - 9.23m (38.6%)
2009 - 8.27m (36.3%)


Last EE ratings update