CBB brings in 3m as Davidson is crowned man of the people
Last night mercifully saw Channel 5’s carnival of desperation and shamelessness finally wrap up, five days over schedule and with a newly crowned winner. The two hour finale of Celebrity Big Brother (9pm) saw the nation deem renowned pleasant human being Jim Davidson ‘an all right guy’ after his 27 day trial-by-reality-TV.
The 13th series of the non-pleb version of the reality show (the sixth for Channel 5) saw Davidson’s public redemption come to fruition as he fought off constant attacks from an angry and mentally fragile woman, Linda Nolan, who was baying for blood.
The controversial comedian’s tactics of looking half-decent-by-comparison proved a winning strategy as the tabloid mainstay was judged to be the most deserving winner amongst the clamour of badly behaved boy band members, a Hollywood prostitute and a brain-damaged homophobe.
In a household were Liz Jones came across as positively normal, producers knew they had a winning combination on their hands, even if it was in a bottom-of the-barrel kind of way.
The series new ‘open door’ policy saw family members, producers, hairdressers and – anyone who liked, really – wander in off the street, defeating the entire principle behind the original idea, only existing now as a cheap exercise in reverse psychology PR.
While the show has been consistently popular – bringing in on average 2 million viewers each week night – the finale seems to have been something of an under performance, given the amount of media attention and general chit chat generated.
Only 3 million viewers tuned in to see Davidson rechristened as a welcome member of society, with – God help us all – Dappy bagging the runner-up spot. While a 14% share meant that the vast majority of last night’s audience had the smarts to elude the horror of Celebrity Big Brother, those vocal types of Twitter made it the most tweeted about show of the day.
During the broadcast, tweets peaked at an impressive 17,997 per minute, resulting in 497,755 in total. This meant that there were 166 tweets for every 1,000 viewers.
At the same time, BBC One offered viewers the chance to feel prematurely old as the precocious tots from Outnumbered (9pm) hit those awkward teenage years with a vengeance.
The fifth and final-ever series saw a barely-recognisable Karen struggle to fit in with her new class, while middle brother Ben (who resembles an actual Muppet character now more than ever) had his musical dreams dashed due to lack of actual talent.
Despite the whispers of decent from loyal fans (apparently the passing of time is not a good thing for the show’s humour) the return of the semi-improvised show set in South London attracted 4.8 million viewers and a 19% share.
BBC One completed the hour of prime time comedy with yet another repeat of Mrs Brown’s Boys (9:30pm) which still managed to pull in 3.6 million viewers and a 15% share. While this is a solid audience for a repeat of a repeat, it does show signs that even the most ardent Agnes Brown fans have had their fill of old material.
At the same time, Channel 4 broadcast its most watched show of the day with yet another happy trip to King’s College Hospital in 24 Hours in A&E (9pm). As the fifth series continued, more real life ‘stars’ of the show were rushed through the doors in life and death situations.
1.8 million excited viewers tuned in to see who would make it through the episode and – as a bonus – have their guilty feelings quashed by the ‘thoughtful’ coda at the end. The latest bout of entertaining trauma secured a 7% share.
Over on BBC Two, cerebral thinking show Horizon (9pm) decided to find out once and for all which was better – sugar of fat? 2.5 million viewers watched a pair of twins hogged the camera as they went on separate extreme diets to see which one of them would win in a fight to the death.
In the end, the big winner of the 9pm slot actually kicked off an hour earlier as ITV’s bizarre tactics of drip-feeding fans a six episode series of Midsomer Murders (ITV, 8pm) over a whole year seems to work in the preposterous detective show’s favour.
In this quarter’s thrilling case, DCI Barnaby and DS Nelson investigated a man who was nibbled to death by a wild boar, leading to a picturesque country house and the usual line-up of frosty middle class suspects.
5 million eager fans tuned in for the rare seasonal sight of DCI Barnaby, as he attempted to catch his culinary-themed suspect. The latest case won the biggest audience in its broadcast window, resulting in a 22% share.
Meanwhile, Channel 4 was trying hard to make The Jump (8pm) into a thing that captured the nation’s heart, although any show that sees Henry Conway break a bone can’t be all bad, right?
2 million viewers watched as former cricketer Darren Gough’s lifelong dream of winning a random Channel 4 reality show was destroyed. 2 million viewers watched as Gough’s jump was ruled not up to scratch, leading to dramatic scenes as he was forced off the Austrian slope (not really).
A 9% share meant that the chilly show secured Channel 4’s biggest audience of the day and easily secured the same amount of viewers as Celebrity Big Brother did on a standard night.
Earlier on the day, ITV cornered the soap market with the two biggest shows of the day. Emmerdale at 7pm was watched by 6.9 million viewers and a 33% share.
Roy’s exciting funeral plans for Hayely helped Coronation Street (ITV, 7:30pm) nab the day’s biggest audience with 8 million viewers and a 36% share tuning in.
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.