BBC One’s The Outcast rules over Sunday night despite fall
With a fairly lacklustre line-up over the weekend, it was up to Sunday’s schedule to pull it all together and entice back all those viewers who had escaped their darkened living rooms for a life under the summer sun in the great outdoors.
With Saturday’s cacophony of viewing options peaking with 4.1 million people tuning in for an episode of Casualty at 9pm, you know it must be the peak of the outside activity season.
There was more of a sense of occasion about yesterday’s line-up, with a number of top quality dramas and traditional, safe Sunday institutions helping to stir up a bit more interest.
BBC One secured the 9pm slot with the second half of dark and broody post war coming of age drama The Outcast.
Adapted by Sadie Jones from her own popular novel (the author has managed to bag two credits – writer and ‘dramatiser’), the first half opened up to 4.3 million viewers last week, but yesterday’s concluding instalment saw the audience take a slight tumble.
3.6 million viewers watched last night as young Lewis Aldridge returned from prison looking even more haunted, resulting in an 18% share and the biggest 9pm audience.
At the same time on BBC Two was the latest episode of NBC’s Odyssey (9pm) starring local lass Anna Friel, a show in which the network suddenly changed to American Odyssey in the states in a desperate attempt to pull in that aggressively patriotic demographic.
The fifth episode of paranoid corporate-sponsored terrorism hokum saw Friel’s Sgt Ballard watch her own funeral on TV while holed up in an American safe house and pulled in 1.1 million viewers and a 5% share.
On ITV, a former Patsy Stone and current national treasure continued her lush adventure in the second part of Joanna Lumley’s Trans-Siberian Adventure (9pm). 3.4 million viewers hopped on board the rail car to join Lumley in marvelling at the sights of Mongolia, resulting in a 16% share.
[advert position=”left”]On Channel 4, there was plenty more human/robot bonking on Humans (9pm) as the creepy drama headed ever closer to its finale by looking at the fallout from the ungodly liaisons.
An audience of 2.1 million viewers watched as The IT Crowd‘s Katherine Parkinson explained to her kids why Daddy wasn’t allowed near the household ‘synth’ any more, netting a 10% share.
On Channel 5, Hollywood gathered together all of 2012’s most popular young men that appeal to a certain demographic and populated the remake of 1984 film Red Dawn with their nonthreatening faces.
Just 843,000 viewers tuned into the Twilight-influenced rehash of a fairly dodgy 80s tween action film, resulting in a 4% share.
Earlier at 8pm, BBC One brought the masses Fake or Fortune? which is basically a glimpse into what Fiona Bruce gets up to for fun when Antiques Roadshow takes a break. 4.3 million viewers watched as Fiona and bessie mate art expert Philip Mould took a road trip to Lancashire to look at old paintings, resulting in a 21% share.
On BBC Two, the thirteenth series of Dragons’ Den (8pm) saw the latest line-up of investors (which, surely, at this stage has more iterations than the Sugababes) pass up more silly ideas, resulting in 2.4 million viewers and a 12% share.
ITV’s satanically saccharine mash-up of Ant & Dec’s Saturday Night Takeaway and Long Lost Family continued as Surprise Surprise (8pm) brought more bite-sized teatime tears to the nation. An audience of 2.8 million viewers and a 13% share watched as Holly Willoughby concentrated on smiling through the pain.
Meanwhile Channel 4 was busy getting its hands dirty by digging up the past in London’s Lost Graveyard (8pm), a detailed look into the capital’s secrets being unearthed by the Crossrail project.
1.9 million viewers tuned in to see how dangerous life in London was in the 16th century, translating to a 9% share.
But it was the incredible manure-scented excitement of Countryfile (BBC One, 7pm) that took in the weekend’s biggest audience. 5.1 million viewers tuned in to see the ‘gang’ head to Northumberland for the 1 millionth time this year, resulting in a 28% 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.
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