C5’s 7th Celebrity Big Brother in three years nets 2.2m
Only three short days after Channel 5 released the survivors from the Big Brother 2014 compound the broadcaster rounded up another 14 souls that should know better and locked them up the in freshly vacuumed house, all for the nation’s prime time entertainment needs.
But, as ever, there was a twist to keep the show’s regular audience of 1 million viewers interested: all of the desperate faces who were clamouring to get on the nation’s TV screens were of the (kind of) famous variety.
Over nine years Channel 4 managed to squeeze in seven series of Celebrity Big Brother (9pm) around the main show but last night saw the launch of Channel 5’s seventh series since they acquired the licence three long years ago.
Good job, then, for the never-ending parade of disposable reality ‘talent’ queuing up to jump on board.
Monday night’s launch saw a parade of faces torn from The Sun‘s headlines, entering the house and frantically attempting to launch themselves as household brand names, proving that in today’s media ecosystem starring on a show called Benefits Street is merely a stepping stone to global domination.
The two-hour launch of the 14th series of Celebrity Big Brother secured an audience of 2.2 million viewers, with the parade of the terminally ignorant netting a 12% share.
The show also performed well on Twitter, generating the highest amount of tweets for any TV show yesterday.
At the same time on BBC Two, presenter Michael Mosely was asking some scary questions about the dangers of red meat. The latest eye-opening edition of Horizon (9pm) was watched by 1.8 million viewers and an 8% share.
Meanwhile, BBC One backed as safe a bet as any with the latest run of the crime show that empowers the elderly, New Tricks (9pm).
While the men of this cold case-solving drama are allowed to be as old as the hills, main lead Amanda Redman was replaced last year by fresh faced whipper-snapper Tamzin Outhwaite – who now bizarrely fronts the team of elderly men.
The debut of the eleventh series of harmless procedural fun netted 5.8 million viewers and a 25% share, the biggest 9pm audience.
Which meant that former Monday night victor, Long Lost Family (ITV, 9pm), shed a few viewers, as well as the usual amount of tears.
The show, in which Davina McCall and Nicky Campbell feign familiarity with strangers before making them cry in front of zoomed-in cameras, was down by almost a million viewers to 3.5 million viewers and a 15% share.
On Channel 4, the sixth episode of Royal Marines Commando School (9pm) focused on the naivety of some recruits whose nerves got the better of them when they realised they were being trained to be expert killing machines.
1.4 million viewers watched as one hopeful explained that he joined up after reading an exciting feature in a lads’ mag (seriously). The documentary netted a 6% share, Channel 4’s biggest audience of the day.
Despite all this, it was the three teatime soaps that netted the top four spots of the day. Emmerdale racked up fourth place at 7pm on ITV, with 5.9 million viewers and a 33% share.
EastEnders (BBC One, 8pm) saw Ian Beale become evil again; convincing Patrick’s loved ones that he was better off being packed off to a nursing home after his stroke, in an effort to keep Ian’s crack whore secrets buried. Just under 6 million viewers tuned in for the family fun, resulting in a 28% share.
A double dollop of Coronation Street (ITV) bagged Monday’s gold and silver medals as Ken and Deirdre attempted a romantic trip to Wales to kick start their marriage. The day’s biggest audience tuned in at 7:30pm to see the fallout of Ken’s yearlong sabbatical, resulting in 6.8 million viewers and a 35% share.
At 8:30pm, 6.5 million viewers (a 30% share) watched as jailbird drunk Peter Barlow got himself nice and tight just in time for his spawn, Simon, to visit him in prison.
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.
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