Bake Off sets Twitter alight with #BakedAlaskaGate on BBC1
Wednesday night saw a storm of controversy descend upon a quaint little field in Berkshire as the fifth series of The Great British Bake Off (8pm) finally got a little bit nasty.
Well, as nasty as a show about nice people baking in a lovely white tent can get.
The fourth episode in the latest run saw construction engineer Iain throw a bit of a wobbly when another contestant ‘sabotaged’ his Baked Alaska. Filmed on the hottest day of the year, the drama unfolded as dotty Diana took Iain’s ice cream prematurely out of the freezer leading to a very sticky mess for the mega-bearded hipster.
The show’s biggest audience yet watched as Iain had a bit of a fret, binning his dessert and presenting an empty tray to judges Mary and Paul. 8.1 million viewers watched as a vexed Mary banished Iain from the tent of dreams, securing a 32% share and the day’s biggest audience.
Not only that, the controversy saw 15% of those watching take to Twitter to vent their outrage, making it the most tweeted about show of the day.
At the same time on BBC Two, the latest ‘wacky’ work place documentary kicked off as the Taj Mahal Palace in Mumbai got the quirky observational treatment. 2 million viewers tuned in to see Hotel India (8pm), netting a 9% share and the channel’s biggest hit of the day.
Meanwhile ITV continued its summer love affair with repeats and offered up another chance to see The Secret Life of Cats (8pm), narrated by the lovely tones of Martin Clunes. The show – returning all the way back from June 2014 – went to great pains to explain how lovely, fluffy and loyal cats really are.
1.9 million viewers tuned in to watch the feline propaganda – mostly made up of clips of cute kittens rolling about – resulting in a 9% share for ITV.
By pure coincident, 9pm saw BBC Two explore the alarming and sudden rise in allergies in Horizon. Allergies – Modern Life and Me looked at why 30% of the UK suffers from allergies (probably cats) bringing in 1.6 million viewers and an 8% share.
Over on BBC One, the channel was attempting to calm viewers down from the tumultuous events of Bakedalaskagate with a sobering episode of Panorama (9pm). 2.5 million viewers tuned in for Last Chance Academy which detailed an school in Birmingham which refused to give up on disruptive children, resulting in the biggest 9pm audience with a 12% share.
At the same time Channel 4 was busy filling the 9pm cute pet quota with a show about ambitious animals with their eyes set on the dizzying heights of stardom. Featuring the internet’s most famous cats such as Grumpy Cat and Bronte, the cute-fest Star Paws: The Rise of the Superstar Pet brought in 964,000 viewers and a 5% share.
Having truly exhausted the workhouse and the clink, 9pm saw ITV delve into the second part of Secrets from the Asylum, with comedian Al Murray on man tear-shedding duties. 1.8 million viewers watched as Al, Lesley Joseph, Sue Johnston and Christopher Biggins were all given quick-fire horror stories from their gene pool, resulting in a 9% share.
Over on Channel 5, 1.7 million viewers watched as Hollywood’s finest mixed with her off Benefits Street, with Celebrity Big Brother securing the channel’s biggest hit of the day with an 8% share.
With The Great British Bake Off confidently walking away with Wednesday’s top spot, it was up to ITV’s two soaps to battle it out for silver and bronze.
Emmerdale (ITV, 7pm) continued to focus on the newly returned fugitive Aaron Livesy and his best friend Adam, who tried to talk Aaron out of handing himself in to the police. 5.6 million viewers tuned in for their helping of manure-scented crime, resulting in a 31% share.
Coronation Street came in at second place with 6.6 million viewers, as the residents dealt with the aftermath of Tyrone’s unfortunate fall through the attic space. The latest action from the cobbles secured a 33% share.
The Social TV Analytics report is a daily leaderboard displaying the latest social TV analytics Twitter data from SecondSync. The table shows the top UK TV shows as they are mentioned on Twitter, which MediaTel has correlated with the BARB overnight programme ratings for those shows (only viewable to BARB subscribers).
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. Overnight data supplied by TRP are based on 15 minute slot averages. This may differ from tape checked figures, which are based on a programme’s actual start and end time.
To get all the latest MediaTel Newsline updates follow us on Twitter.