BBC One secures 9pm slot with Outnumbered and Mrs Brown
Wednesday evening brought viewers the second to last ever episode of contemporary family sitcom Outnumbered (well, apart from the numerous specials we’ll no doubt be subjected to over many Christmases) at 9pm on BBC One.
The penultimate episode gave last night’s TV audience yet another chaotic day in the Brockman household as dad Pete was left in charge of his worryingly grown-up children, with the usual brand of disorder and hilarity to follow.
4.3 million viewers watched as Hugh Dennis’ Pete struggled to keep his family safe, including hyperactive man-child Ben, cocky Jake (who seems to have more hair gel sponsorship than every show on E4) and surly and slightly psychotic Karen.
An 18% audience share caught up with the fictional south London family while they still could – meaning that along with Mrs Brown’s Boys‘ (9:30pm) 4.1 million viewers, BBC One easily secured Wednesday night’s 9pm slot.
If all that light-heartedness was a wee bit frothy for prime time viewers, Channel 4 offered up the perfect alternative. The final episode of the fifth series of 24 Hours in A&E (9pm) once again treated the viewing audience to scenes of elderly people fighting for their lives, all under the glamorous glare of ‘unobtrusive’ shiny wall-mounted cameras.
The final jaunt to King’s College Hospital (well, until series six is ready this time next week – the show practically writes and casts itself) focused on a 78 year old whose heart stopped working at the gym (!) and an 83 year old lady with a broken neck.
1.9 million tuned in for an entire hour of trauma (including the adverts), only to be reassured that life is in fact worth living by all that uplifting swirly music at the end, resulting in an 8% share.
Over on BBC Two, the second series of police corruption drama Line of Duty (9pm) continued as Spooks Keeley Hawes got smacked about in prison while waiting for her trial. 2.2 million viewers caught up with the latest instalment of the twisty turny drama, securing a 10% share and BBC Two’s biggest audience of the day.
An hour earlier on ITV, viewers were gifted two hours of quality crime drama as a repeat of Midsomer Murders (8pm) well and truly lived up to its desperate and barmy reputation. A word of warning – last night’s slice of rural annihilation wasn’t for the turophobic (or those looking for anything close to substance).
Last night viewers got the chance to relive one of the show’s much talked about highlights as Martine McCutcheon was killed by a giant round of cheese. Yep.
The creamery crime spree, which was originally aired in January 2013, brought in and held on to a solid 3.8 million viewers for its 120 minute running time, resulting in a 17% share. At the same time on BBC One, ‘issue’-laden school drama, Waterloo Road, was watched by 3.2 million viewers and a 15% share.
A bit later on BBC Two, two fifths of The League of Gentlemen were back for the fourth episode of just-as-mental Inside No. 9 (10pm). This week’s portion of unhinged madness saw Tamsin Greig attempt to make the wishes of a terminally ill 9 year old girl come true, with the usual standard of wrong ensuing. 873,000 viewers watched with their hands over their faces, resulting in a 5% share.
Earlier on in the evening, ITV’s soaps proved to be Tuesday’s biggest players with Emmerdale securing 6.4 million viewers at 7pm. Straight afterwards, an increasingly rare singular episode of Coronation Street saw an angry Gary Windass (probably the name) kill a man, just because it was a Wednesday night in Weatherfield and that’s what characters do nowadays.
7.6 million viewers watched as Gary took down an elderly man (who called his mum a slag, so fair enough) with a slap of wood, resulting in Wednesday’s most watched TV show and a 36% share.
Apart from the soaps, BBC One’s news programmes made up the rest of the top ten with Regional News and Weather at 6:30pm bringing in 6 million viewers, BBC News at Six securing 5.4 million and BBC News at Ten being watched by an audience of 4.9 million viewers.
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.