Overnights: Final Occupation secures the top spot

BBC One’s three-part war drama ended on a high last night with 3.4 million peak viewers during the all-important 9pm to 10pm slot.

Occupation, starring James Nesbitt and Warren Brown, attracted 3.3 million average viewers and a 15.4% share over the course of the hour, a slight increase on its ratings from Wednesday night.

Elsewhere, BBC’s rival terrestrial channels battled it out for the second highest ratings of the evening, with ITV1’s May Contain Nuts just managing to pip Channel 4 and Five.

The final episode of the two-part comedy drama pulled in more than 2.8 million average viewers and a 13.2% share for ITV1 between 9pm and 10pm.

However, Channel 4’s new real-life Undercover Boss didn’t come far behind with over 2.6 average viewers and a 12.3% share, while Five’s The Mentalist picked up 2.4 million viewers and a 11.2% share.

Earlier on in the evening, BBC One’s flagship soap Eastenders secured the overall highest ratings with more than 7.5 million peak viewers and an impressive 38.9% average audience share.

BBC One’s Celebrity Masterchef with judges John Torode and Gregg Wallace followed with a significant 4.7 million peak viewers, which pushed it ahead of ITV1’s long-running The Bill during the 8pm to 9pm slot.

Both programmes pulled in more than 4.3 million average viewers, but Celebrity Masterchef had a slightly higher audience share of 21% compared to The Bill‘s 20.9%.

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.