BBC One’s WDYTYA? wraps up with a -44% fall year on year
Last night saw BBC One bring an end to yet another series of emotional genealogy show Who Do You Think You Are? (9pm) as stage legend and Vicious-enabler Frances de la Tour took her spin on the world’s gloomiest roller-coaster.
The final episode of the 12th was the perfect mix of aristocratic connections and tragic surprises as Frances learned of her direct connections to some very noble folk indeed but, as ever, the investigation offered up gut-punching misfortune for dramatic balance.
The current run opened up with 4.1 million viewers back in August as Paul Hollywood fought back tears on the trenches, following on from the 2014 finale which saw Twiggy’s sad-faced odyssey net 4.6 million viewers.
A noticeably lower audience watched last night’s finale, down a whopping -44% year on year, indicating perhaps that it is time to retire the well-worn format to the TV schedules of yesteryear.
A 16% share tuned in last night to see a rather vexed Frances driving onto the grounds of increasingly impressive stately homes (“why don’t I live here then?”) for more answers, netting a 16% share.
A particularly sad tale of ye olden single parenting and opium addiction helped secure an average audience of 3.2 million viewers, which wasn’t enough for BBC One to fend off its commercial rival.
So it was the third episode of ITV’s well-received slow burning crime drama, Unforgotten, that secured the 9pm slot as sombre detectives Cassie and Sunny continued to dig into the past.
The cold case drama debuted to 4.5 million viewers and won its time slot but fell to 3.8 million viewers on its second outing, losing out to the popularity of BBC One’s The Apprentice.
Yesterday saw the understated mystery focused on Bernard Hill’s highly suspicious Father Greaves, with the investigation into the cold case murder making some slow headway.
The third episode didn’t bounce back to the popularity of the first, bringing in another 3.8 million viewers, which was enough to secure the 9pm slot with a 19% audience share.
At the same time, BBC Two launched a new eight part violent epic The Last Kingdom (9pm), unfairly billed as a historically accurate Game of Thrones, which of course it isn’t and was never going to be, but provided Medieval fans with their fix of bloody rampages regardless.
An audience of 2.2 million viewers tuned in to see the impressive cast (Matthew Macfadyen, Rutger Hauer, Ian Hart) get their ‘red wedding’ moment in the very first episode, resulting in a 10% share and the channel’s biggest hit of the day.
At the same time Channel 4 offered up a hefty portion of difficult viewing with the impressive documentary My Son the Jihadi (9pm) which followed a heartbroken mother throughout a difficult nine month period. The shocking and sad tale brought in 1.3 million viewers and a 6% share.
Existing in a completely different spectrum of reality was Chris Tarrant: Extreme Railway Journeys (9pm) which brought in 913,000 viewers and a 5% share.
At 8pm, the revamped (Anne Robinson-less) Watchdog was watched by 3.6 million viewers on BBC One, while World’s Weirdest Weather secured 1.6 million on BBC Two
Channel 4 had George Clarke’s Amazing Spaces at 8pm which saw the architect ooh-ing and ahh-ing at shed conversions as if he were on Grand Designs, bringing in a 1.3 million viewers and a 6% share.
Earlier in the day it was all about the soaps, with Emmerdale doing the decent thing for the first time in a while by managing to make some room for EastEnders somewhere in its hour and a half running time.
7pm brought a standard episode of the rural murder drama, with Emmerdale securing a little under 6 million viewers and a 31% share for ITV.
At 8pm there was another outing to the Yorkshire Dales, this time in an hour-long flashback episode in which fans finally got to find out who shot Robert Sugden (still not a patch on this though).
The day’s biggest audience tuned in to see the culprit’s reveal (one of those slow-looking original village lads), resulting in 6.2 million viewers and a 29% share.
Slotted in-between at 7:30pm over on BBC One was EastEnders, with the latest Beale family fun securing 5.9 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. 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.