TV Overnights: ITV1 secures 4.3m with creepy homecoming drama The Town
Wednesday night saw the debut of new acclaimed mystery drama The Town (9pm) on ITV1.
The impressive cast was led by Andrew Scott (the creepy Irish Moriarty in Steven Moffat’s Sherlock), a man returning to his home town after ten years in the big smoke. Naturally family and friends had changed but to what extent? When Miss Marple is playing your granny, the smart move would be to expect a few surprises.
It wasn’t all fun and games though as there was the little matter of dealing with his parent’s double suicide, as well as a whole host of dodgy characters. The atmospheric and shocking opening episode managed to wrangle 4.3 million people into the tale of covert suburban scandals, netting a 19% share.
Meanwhile on BBC One was The War on Britain’s Roads (9pm), a documentary detailing the everyday crusade to get to work safely. Special helmet mounted cameras showed us the daily chaos caused by 34 million motorists pitched against 12 million cyclists for a place on the road. 3.5 million viewers (a 15% share) watched the harrowing cautionary stories, ensuring you’ll never feel safe on the road again.
The second series of The Hour (9pm) over on BBC Two and viewers were still lingering around that 1 million mark. Womanising drunk Hector faced a conflict of interest as he protected an old friend from an investigation, giving him more problems to ruminate about over a glass of whiskey. Last night saw the audience fall to 965,000 viewers, resulting in a 4% share.
Over on Channel 4 at the same time was the final episode in the 12th series of Grand Designs (9pm). This series has seen some shockingly audacious builds, sticking two fingers up to the general financial misery the rest of the country is feeling, but last night’s Revisited special focused on unusually likeable and relatable builders, which made a refreshing change from the norm.
Ten years ago, a distressingly young looking Kevin McCloud visited a 10 family cooperative that would build their own and each other’s subsidised council houses over two years. Not exactly ‘grand’ in the commercial sense but the project was an unusually progressive idea. 1.4 million (a 6% share) tuned in to see Kevin return to Brighton to see if the pop up community was the way of the future or would resemble the last day at Glastonbury.
Speaking of progressive new age communities, after five long empty days ITV1 finally returned to the jungle for the handsomely titled I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here! Coming Out (8pm). The catch up show followed the contestants from their exit from the jungle to their tearful breakdowns in the privacy of their hotel room.
The follow-up programme came with added intrusiveness for those of you that needed to feel really close to the action, with no moment being too sacred. As Helen Flanagan pressed her teary face into her dad’s chest in order to hide, the clever camera men knew when to push in for extreme close ups.
Which would have been extremely distasteful if they all hadn’t traded in their souls a long, long time ago. 6.2 million viewers watched as Nadine Dorries embraced her new life as an ungodly celebrity/politician hybrid with cold precision and focus, resulting in a 26% share.
Dallas Campbell brought us the final episode of his loose “look at what humans did” odyssey across the globe. Supersized Earth (BBC One, 8pm)seems to be on a one-man mission to break the BBC’s factual programming budget in one swift go by visiting as many places as humanly possible.
Last night, Dallas focused on our dangerous consumption of water, food and energy…by paragliding in Spain and backpacking in Brazil. Always shifting the blame to those greedy 7 billion hungry humans, Dallas then headed to the bright lights of Vegas just to inform us what a desert can be turned into by those clever human engineers.
3.5 million viewers (a 15% share) watched the final travelogue slice of pure eye opening education, a 9% drop on the opening episode.
Wednesday’s premium soap action belonged exclusively to ITV1, starting with Emmerdale at 7pm. The mid-week visit to the Dale’s most dangerous community saw Laurel freak out slightly due to a backlog of unprocessed feelings jamming up the production line. 7.1 million viewers (a 34% share) saw the demure former vicar’s wife sort out her feelings for village rogue Marlon.
But in the end it was Weatherfield where the biggest audience of the night gathered. Coronation Street (ITV1, 7:30pm) saw Tommy and Tina’s relationship finally implode after, what seems like many many months of bickering.
A series of extremely stupid decisions led Tina to sign up for surrogacy, slightly alienating her boyf in the process. 8.4 million viewers tuned in to see the latest rowdy slagging match on the cobbles, netting a 38% share. Appropriately enough, 666,000 viewers watched Tina’s hateful eruption in glorious HD. Never a quiet day up North.
Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations.