Lady Mary’s tears mean ratings gold for ITV
This past weekend brought fresh hope to the television schedules as the antidote to The X Factor was finally unleashed. Whether or not you think Strictly Come Dancing belongs in the same corner of hell as ITV’s contrived singing soap opera is irrelevant – we should just be happy that there’s a new boss in town.
The opening episode of the mesmerising sparklefest just about managed to bring in the day’s biggest audience and a 35% share.
As usual, the ‘traditional’ soap operas ruled Friday night’s early evening line up with a double serving of Coronation Street taking all the glory. 7.7 million viewers were watching at 7:30pm as Nick Tilsley continued to have the easiest gig in soap land. Fewer viewers came back an hour later as his brother David went all out Inception while attempting to implant subconscious memories in to Nick’s bruised and battered head, securing 6.8 million viewers.
Early bird Emmerdale most certainly got the worm at 7pm, wrestling the coveted second most popular soap prize out of EastEnders‘ (8pm) hands. 6.3 million viewers watched the rural soap, while David Wicks’ bizarre return to Walford only pulled in 6 million viewers for BBC One.
At the same time Marvel Studio’s latest advancement in cross media synergy continued as its cinematic universe got The X Files treatment in Marvel’s Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (Channel 4, 8pm). 2.7 million viewers watched as Agent Coulson returned from the dead to gather up a crack team of American soap stars to fight S.H.I.E.L.D.’s biggest challenge yet – the modest TV show budget.
Coming off the success of Friday night, Saturday’s slice of Strictly Come Dancing (BBC One, 7pm) action saw the celebrity fuelled gaiety grown in length and size. Personality vacuum (and Bruce Forsyth’s balance stick) Tess Daly, was back to hype up an hour and a half of ex-EastEnders actors dancing around in children’s panto outfits and managed to pull in the day’s biggest audience.
9.2 million viewers tuned in to see the ‘competition’ start properly, translating to a 44% share. Although The X Factor (ITV, 8:15pm) only overlapped with the new kid on the light entertainment block for 15 minutes, ratings would indicate that viewers were slightly exhausted by the reality-hyperbole.
7.6 million viewers watched as all the novelty acts were whisked away to boot camp (the exact same format but everything is slightly more DRAMATIC), netting a 35% share.
Have you recently been missing quality BBC family show Merlin? No? Well here’s Atlantis anyway – the show is very much of the same mold and has been off to a good start. 5.8 million viewers resisted the crying crooners on ITV and settled in for the Saturday night family adventure, resulting in a 26% share.
Despite all the hoopla surrounding the main broadcasters’ prime time reality projects, it was the dour sepia-soaked melancholy of Downton Abbey on Sunday night (ITV, 9pm) that won over the weekend’s biggest audience, despite the fact that Matthew was still rotting away in the earth.
9.3 million viewers watched as Sad Lady Mary scrubbed herself of her grief, slapped on a bit of makeup and generally got over herself. The candlelit period drama had enough pizazz to overshadow an hour and a half of The X Factor (ITV, 7:30pm) and secured a 38% share.
Which didn’t mean that the tension-filled karaoke contest didn’t do well – an impressive 9.2 million viewers caught up with teary judges and contestants, crying with enough conviction to help us forget we’ve seen the same scenes play out about million times before. The manipulative flashing lights and noises brought in a 37% share.
Meanwhile on BBC One, Countryfile (BBC One, 7pm) fared fairly well as concerned citizen Tom Heap got all bothered about foreign weeds coming over to our countryside and ruining everything, securing 6.3 million viewers and a 29% share.
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.