Well Im glad it made you smile. But....its a chicken and egg question. Have the viewers drifted away because of the scheduling or have the viewers decided that there are far better things available to do at Easter and the tv companies have reacted accordingly? Good Friday is virtually a ordinary day on BBC1 when it was once like Christmas Eve-question is what has lead the change? Chances are a regular schedule does better than an altered one.

At the end of the day there are programmes that should be pulling the viewers - TVUK/SNT arguably should be going up with more people available to view-holidays etc. Highly likely they are treating Easter as the gateway to Summer and stretching their legs away from the tv which would be a sign of the times. (Iirc even BGT has suffered dips if Easter Saturday has been in its scheduling).

With a plethora of shows launching within the next week it's high time for a Blind Week on the DSRPG so why not really test your skills against the rest? Britain's Got Talent is making it's return but how will it impact on surrounding shows Ninja Warrior UK and Play to the Whistle? Will Code of a Killer crack the code for viewers on Monday? Will The Hotel Inspector cut the mustard whilst Torvil and Dean return to British television... but to fanfare or a damp squib? Could The Slow Train Through Africa take the fast lane compared to the returning Have I Got News For You? Will Benefits & Bypasses claim viewers or turn them away? And, for sports fans, will you predict par for the Masters?

Just click HERE and follow the instructions on the post.

Best of luck and thank you in advance to everyone who takes part!

It's on at 8pm - the same time it started last year. A drop of a few hundred thousand when it's at the heights it is is hardly going to be seen as a disaster. And it'll wipe the floor with everything else anyway so it doesn't really matter.
Plus 2013 was the show's biggest launch before that, and there wasn't football lead-in there.

Great stuff for the Voice there.

I'm pretty sure The Daily Mail (and some on here) will manage to make it seem like one!

2007: 4.9m
2008: 8.8m
2009: 10.5m
2010: 10.6m
2011: 10.4m
2012: 10.0m
2013: 10.6m
2014: 11.0m

Unless it massively bucks the ITV trend then it's going to be in the mid 9's I'd have thought. The year on year losses should settle after the launch though, there was a sharp week 2 drop last year which shouldn't happen this time around.

I'm starting to wonder if the next series of Takeaway will be the last before it goes on another hiatus. To go below 5m (with a declining share) is a concern and whilst ITV may not have many other options I have the feeling Ant and Dec will.

I honestly don't know why people are thinking it's gonna drop by well over a million and be so massively down from previous years. The reason ITV's been struggling is because of its shows, not because of some sudden resistance to the brand.
But I agree with you that the episode 2 dip will probably be less, the football boost almost made the ratings look bad in that sense. But I honestly think if they keep it at 8pm it'll be matching or up YOY, especially if the talent's better and there's more variety.

Great for The Voice overall. A bit of an underwhelming final figure, but the overall numbers this year were very healthy - they should try their best to keep the panel the same for next year, it seems to be strong at the moment.

It's scary that we are heading into BGT ratings - once that's finished we'll be launching into the SCD/ TXF before we know it!

It didn't until fairly recently (post Christmas I think). But it does now on Sky. Not sure that extends to other catch up services. Just checked our Virgin Tivo and that only seems to have ITV in SD. So maybe it is just on Sky (where last night's Thunderbirds, like most of the main shows, has HD versions)?

I mentioned on here the other day that it even has This Morning in SD and HD on ITV Catch up even though it is not transmitted live in HD.

Only ITV Player on Sky has HD downloads. ITV doesn't stream anything in HD.

Just checked the ITV catch up on Sky and pretty much all of the main stuff on ITV last week is in HD. Including all the This Morning episodes in SD and HD. Also some things from ITV 2 like Scorpion.

Thankyou for these.

After the novelty inflated 1st series and subsequent dip, a couple of years of solid growth and the prospect of the same next year. The BBC had a hornets nest in TVUK, issues around the cost and the need for it as well as rollercoaster performance. However they have ridden it out, tweaked it, moved it to the extent that it has pretty much established itself in the slot and now dominates Saturdays in this quarter. Its a success and there is very little to suggest anything will change next year.

I think it has been the highest rated show on Saturday night on ITV so far this year. Bgt will over take it next week

Those figures are a huge sustained achievement for a show going out in quarter 2.

The fact it hasn't launched below 10m since 2009 is exceptionally impressive and shows it probably is the top show when comes to rating consistently- However, a combination of everything being down and a little staleness potentially, which was one criticism levelled at last year's series could be creeping in this year- The one thing they need to do is not over pack it with Singers, we've had XF and TVUK on for the best part of 6 months, the strength of BGT is its variety so it needs to play that up)

oops all that promotion was for naught then, and viewers simply interested in nostalgia, I mean come on ITV flooded Thunderbird 4 down the River Thames, that alone should have gotten it 3 million viewers.

True and, as I said, ITV won't want to drop it in a hurry but Ant and Dec may look at the ratings and think it needs another rest. It's funny how the 5m is psychological but that dip below it (and the share also falling) should be a slight concern IMO.

This. Singing shows are dying in terms of ratings and influence whilst BGT & Strictly are still top-raters - they should pick up on that. I spoke to a load of people last year who went to filming and they said there was so much brilliant variety/fun which was just edited out.
If they actually show all the amazing stuff that happens rather than just singers & audience reaction shots then I think it'll stay consistent!

My fear is Simon sees Britain's Got Talent as another way of making money from singers as The X Factor is in decline so the singers will become more prevalent as the autumn show dips.

Just thought I'd add to C14E's post and expand on the BGT launches. Included exc/inc +1 and shares

Britain's Got Talent Series Launches
2007 - 4.90m (22.9%)
2008 - 8.82m (37.0%)
2009 - 10.52m (45.1%)
2010 - 10.63m (44.0%)
2011 - 10.44m (42.8%), exc. +1 - 9.94m (40.6%)
2012 - 10.00m (41.7%), exc. +1 - 9.43m (39.2%)
2013 - 10.61m (40.4%), exc. +1 - 9.35m (36.9%)
2014 - 11.07m (47.4%), exc. +1 - 10.54m (45.0%)

Didn't realise the 2013 launch added over 1m on +1. Can't call this year's launch, for ITV's sake they'll probably be hoping it does the same as last year (something I can't see happening to be honest).

Neither can I. I hope it does well, but I'm expecting it to be quite down, by going on other shows this past year.

Be interesting when they have the 9pm CS week again this year - it didn't do too well last year did it? Not compared to previous years anyway.

Of course, BGT this year finds itself up against the abysmal Atlantis which is being burned off by the Beeb, so no amount of expectation lowering is going to convince me that it shouldn't launch with 10m+ as usual and that a less desirable result isn't worth raising one's eyebrows over. I know some take exception to the performances of the Syco shows being criticised, with even minor criticisms blown out of all proportion to make those who made them look like idiots who don't know what they're talking about, but if we're really going to look at them from the point-of-view that "they're bigger than pretty much everything else so whatever happens is okay" then we might as well not talk about them at all because in BGT's case that will remain the case for an awful long time.

I will as ever compare with previous years and perform any analysis based on that. If people don't like that, so be it, but it is the proper and correct approach. Nobody is going to predict imminent cancellation if it comes in lower than expected next week, but at the same time let's not pretend it's a total non story if that is the case. The show is after all a huge money spinner for ITV and if all their other established entertainment brands are falling with none of the new formats making an impact either then as far as I'm concerned there's even more pressure on it than usual to deliver, and deliver to a similar extent to normal.

Ratings are dropping across the board, ITV in particular they will get a boost from BGT, but how will their new shows Ninja Warrior UK & Play to the Whistle fare?

WillHill offering a very strange 1/6 on The voice returning next year and 7/2 for it not returning.

There is Poldark on BBC One tonight too which has been hugely enjoyable so far.

Mission Survive has been a really great series on ITV. I really hope it comes back, I found it more exciting and interesting than the other celebrity reality type shows. I think it's got a good chance of coming back, as 3 million + isn't too bad and I imagine it had a pretty decent young and male skew.

ITV is looking strong over the next two nights, with original drama. Why on earth has Jeremy Kyle been stinking out ITV mornings this weekend though? Couldn't ITV have put on a film as it's the Easter weekend, instead of that horrible programme.