BBC’s final series of The Voice UK continues to fade
Saturday brought another fall in viewers for BBC One’s soon-to-be-poached singing show with a ‘twist’, The Voice UK (7:45pm) which suffered a -12% drop in popularity just one week after launching the fifth series to 7.1 million viewers.
The second episode in the current run saw the blind auditions continue, with the show’s seven week unique selling point (judges not seeing the contestants, activating their spinning-chair power if they’re aurally tickled) traditionally providing the show’s inimitable moments before turning into a forgettable X Factor-lite soap opera.
Not even the addition of erratic variants like former androgynous ex-con Boy George and contrived kook machine Paloma Faith could stop last week’s début from suffering a year on year fall of -12%.
This weekend’s 80 minute slice of innocuous chair-swinging, karaoke craziness secured a total audience of 6.4 million viewers and a 30% share. While this resulted in Saturday’s most-watched show, it also represents a worrying -25% drop in viewers compared to the same episode last year.
Elsewhere, Pointless Celebrities (BBC One, 6pm) managed to take the day’s number two spot with 5.1million viewers and a 27% share.
ITV’s biggest hit came in the eye-catching form of the spandex-loving contestants on Ninja Warrior UK (7pm), with this week’s superior-people-trying-but-failing fun resulting in 4.2 million viewers and a 20% share.
Sunday brought a completely different TV landscape, with viewers flocking in their droves to see Matt Baker and Ellie Harrison explore the International Centre for Birds of Prey in Gloucestershire.
As usual, the lure of Countryfile (BBC One, 6:30pm) was too much to resist, with 7.5 million viewers and a 34% share tuning in.
But it was the return of nostalgic and highly dramatic birthing soap Call the Midwife (BBC One, 8pm) that secured the weekend’s biggest hit.
The launch of the fifth series saw the plucky sisters and nurses of Nonnatus House deal with a child suffering from the side effects of Thalidomide. The difficult scenes helped the show secure 8 million viewers and a 32% share.[advert position=”left”]
On ITV, Endeavour‘s latest two hour case saw DC Morse search for a missing au pair while dealing with those shadowy and suspicious academic types. The latest mystery brought in an audience of 4 million viewers and a 17% share.
At 9pm, BBC One’s monstrously ambitious adaptation of War & Peace reached the halfway mark. After opening up with 6.3 million viewers two weeks back, the second instalment of Tolstoy’s epic dropped by 1 million viewers.
It was handbags-at-dawn for Count Dolokhov and Pierre last night, while everyone else got all fancy and clean for a dance, with the ensuing duel being watched by 5.1 million viewers and a 22% share.
On the completely opposite end of the culture spectrum was Celebrity Big Brother on Channel 5 at 9pm. Although the themes were similar, mostly made up of aggressive confrontations followed by on-camera love making, the audience wasn’t quite the same, with 2 million viewers and a 9% share tuning in.
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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