BBC One’s dotty Midwives trounce ITV’s dapper Mr Selfridge
The past weekend’s prime time TV kicked off on Friday evening as ITV took the top two spots of the day with an unstoppable double bill of Coronation Street (7:30pm and 8:30pm).
Friday’s Weatherfield action got its massive audience in the mood for two days of freedom by having Hayley Cropper deteriorate in front of their eyes, resulting in a badly timed downer.
The day’s biggest audience of 8.2 million (a 39% share) tuned in to see Hayley reach the conclusion that she’s had enough of this life thing, making sure she wouldn’t have to live through another weekend again.
An hour later and the audience had fallen to 7.5 million as Hayley, with the aid of Roy, said her final goodbyes around the Street, securing a 32% share and foreshadowing the fact that the next helping of the Weatherfield drama will probably send viewers over the edge.
Sandwiched in-between over on BBC One was EastEnders (8pm), with Friday night’s action focused on – OMG! – the discovery of the Queen Vic’s damp problem. 7.4 million viewers watched as the old Queen struggled with some downstairs moisture concerns (we’ve all been there), resulting in BBC One’s biggest audience of the day and a 33% share.
Earlier at 7pm, Emmerdale (ITV) performed admirably with the week’s final episode securing 6.8 million viewers and a 34% share.
Later at 9pm, the Silent Witness (BBC One) team were still trapped in the same country as a crazed serial killer – with no way to get out – as the special two-part Scottish adventure continued. The conclusion to the latest charming tale about yet another mad man who slashed up ladies for entertainment improved on the first part’s audience (5.5 million) with 5.7 million viewers tuning in to find which jobbing Scottish actor was the culprit, securing a 24% share.
Even more horrifying, however, was the repeat of Miranda on BBC One at 8:30pm and the Celebrity Big Brother Live Eviction at 9pm on Channel 5, which managed to secure 3.7 and 2.3 million brave souls, respectively.
As a new day arrived, wiping the slate clean and purging the schedules of the soaps, BBC One BBC One walked away with the top five shows of the day.
7pm brought the sparkles, overwrought drama and general inane loud noises of The Voice UK (BBC One) as Kylie, Tom and all your other favourites tried their best to look enthused, all the while dreaming of paying off their 15th mortgage and an early retirement. The latest round of blind auditions (bleeding each drop of ephemeral drama from every nanosecond) entertained 7.5 million viewers and a 33% share.
Straight up afterwards was the personable Nick Knowles and The National Lottery: Who Dares Wins (BBC One, 8:20pm) which somehow was the day’s second biggest hit. 5.1 million viewers watched as Nick patronised normal folk who dreamed of living all fancy like, resulting in a 23% share.
Up against The Voice UK over on ITV was Splash! – the tale of a young boy with special falling-into-water powers and his z-list celebrity friends – which struggled to capture the audience of the first series. Only 3.7 million viewers watched as a few seconds of Paul Young, Patrick Monahan, a TOWIE and a glamour model falling head first into water was stretched into a thrilling hour of television.
If Saturday’s showy content was a bit hollow, Sunday evening provided a barrage of scripted drama with the return of feverishly anticipated Call the Midwife (BBC One, 9pm) leading the way.
After the Christmas special brought in over 7 million viewers, the third series of the inconceivably popular period drama was as close to a sure thing as it gets. Nearly a whole year after the last full series ended, last night saw Chummy, Trixie and La La move to a brand spanking new convent, discovering cystic fibrosis along the way, apparently.
The whole electrifying endeavour snapped Sunday evening audiences out of their slumber, as a massive 9.6 million viewers welcomed back the East End midwives, securing the weekend’s biggest audience and a 36% share.
Over on ITV, the poor distant cousin of Strictly, Dancing on Ice, continued its last ever series at 6:15pm. Perma-smiling duo, Phillip Schofield and Christine Bleakley (the presenting equivalent of valium), were on hand to make the whole thing pass by quickly, and make it as painless as possible.
5.6 million viewers tuned in for the main event, while 4.3 million came back for The Results at 8:30pm.
The big battle of the day played out in the 9pm slot as the dapper Mr. Selfridge (ITV) returned for a second series, only to be rained on by fellow historical figures, The Musketeers (BBC One).
The opening episode of the retail drama saw the department store owner turn his ‘dashing’ and ‘charming’ dials all the way up to maximum power as Selfridges celebrated its fifth anniversary. As per usual, amongst all the glamorous sets there were personal problems to be dealt with, last night represented by women sobbing in giant corsets.
4.9 million viewers tuned in for the entrepreneur’s return, resulting in a 19% share – significantly lower than the 6.8 million viewers the first episode pulled in last January. But then again, it didn’t have to compete with The Musketeers.
The shiny new BBC drama seems to have hit the right spot with fatigued Sunday night viewers, with 7.4 million viewers tuning in for the retelling of the classic tale. d’Artagnan’s journey to Paris and his fateful encounter with the three Kings’ guards netted an impressive 29% share, ensuring that BBC One dominated both Saturday and Sunday night’s viewing.
At the same time, Channel 4 were documenting a young man in the good need of a slap in Don’t Look Down (9pm), the nauseatingly intriguing story of an urban free climber who was redetermined to shred your nerves with his nocturnal adventures on cranes and skyscrapers, all without the use of any safety equipment.
Featuring startling footage from high above and interviews with his long-suffering mother, the documentary attracted the attention of the Twitter folk, with over 29,000 related tweets generated during the broadcast. With 1.5 million viewers tuning in, that figure represents an impressive 20 tweets for every 1,00 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.