Think Small

Well there's no stopping Seven - the week's top shows read like a list of Last Week's top shows...

Dancing with the Stars, Downtown Abbey, Australia's Got Talent, Masterchef, Winners & Losers, Amazing Race and Glee.

So lets look instead at Digital TV and what's working and what's struggling.

Sunday:

Lots of movies on this night so digital dominance is never assured, if you're after a mature drama then GEM is your option, more brash blockbuster fare lives on GO!, 7mate and Eleven.

The abject failure of the night is Royal Upstairs Downstairs on 7TWO, surprising and yet not, because most of the potential audience for this crap would be watching Dancing with the Stars in prep for Downtown Abbey. A case of Seven cannibalising its own lineup.


Monday:


GO! back when it started was something fresh and exciting, now it's more or less cheap and nasty. The number of original series on the channel has nosedived and those that are left are victims of wildly inconsistent scheduling.

GO! is now a dumping ground for channel nine reruns, specifically Top Gear and the Big Bag Theory, propped up with Movie reruns (some quite good) and timeshifted stuff from the main channel (like Come Fly with Me in this particular night).

What happened to the GO! that drew me away from cable with TMZ, Seinfeld and a dozen shows aimed away from the mainstream?

At the first sign of competition these things were junked in favour of Top Gear reruns.

Abject failure is oddly enough on GO! which has hollowed out it's sked so much that any sort of regularity or consistency is roundly ignored by viewers - hence the poor performance of the Funniest Home Vids daily show (basically FHV without the crap about competitions or corporate sponsors)


Tuesday:


Seven's schedule on this night is still britcoms but is a slightly different shape than Autumn's lineup giving a bit of breathing room to 11 which has picked markedly this week.

Even The Office on a lowly 111K is posting its best result all season, but Ten's attempt to go retro and replace Raising Hope with Frasier bombed losing over 20,000 from its leading and knocking Nurse Jackie (which is now airing 1 day after its US broadcast) and Californication out of contention.

Special Mention has to go to BIG on GEM, a reality show (also on Nine - there's that timeshifting at work again) evidently so boring that nobody can be bothered to even make a wikipedia page about it, and it charted so low that it didn't even make the digital top 100 - surely a sign that your show is a waste of everybody's time.


Wednesday


You know if I ever bothered to watch GEM - I think I would grow to hate myself, If GO! has turned into a clearing house for hits you've seen before, GEM has turned into a 24/7 Fly on the Wall channel, and the flies are all over this one - with titles like "The World's Hairiest Person and Me", "Embarrassing Teen Bodies" and "Brothers & Sisters In Love" if there's such a thing as hell, this is surely the only channel they can get there - well, this and C31.

I have to give a shout out to Jersey Shore over on Seven Mate - its one of the biggest TV phenomena in the US to come down the cable in some years, by the same channel (MTV) that gave the world The Osbornes, a show that has had so much impact in the US has fizzled out here - yet the reasons are obvious, anyone who wants to have seen it - has seen it.

MTV on Foxtel plays this show constantly, everyone else would've torrented the thing two years ago, (which is an appalling wait for Australians in this day and age)


Thursday


On Thursday's everyone gets a turn, the older skew on the night seems to throw up a situation with lots of shows scoring decent numbers and nothing really failing (Except for Heli-Loggers whose potential aud probably went to bed at 9.30 - quick Seven better slot in another rerun of Family Guy)

Monday May 9th, 2011

Good ratings for The Big Bang Theory in the face of the all conquering Masterchef. But Masterchef's highs still aren't rubbing off on the rest of Ten's sked.

Especially sad is GNW which didn't even air in the AFL states.

All I can personally say is thank FRAK that Seven has the AFL rights next year, they consistently have the most boring and stale lineup (from a 34yo male perspective anyway) and so I won't care one iota when AFL storms in on a Monday or Thursday night to disrupt the regular schedule.

Over on digital it was all 7TWO with GO! suffering a particularly bad night (only Top Gear appeared in the top 50) part of the blame there has to lay with their scheduling - to the casual observer GO! appears to have 4 shows: Top Gear, Big Bang, Two and a Half Men and Wipeout! and their scheduling has all the consistency and predictability of a game of roulette.

Nine outta just pick a night for each of these shows and use them to promote their less popular shows and stop peppering them all over the schedule.

Seven's turn

Yep Seven's turn to win Sundays as the 6.30 and 7.30 slots continue their round robin between the networks.

Sunday Night got a timeslot win on the weekend that Nine confirmed the Sunday ACA as a permanent fixture. For all their trouble ACA didn't do to well on Sunday night (despite yet ANOTHER TV reunion - this time for The Sullivans). In principle it makes more sense to have A Current Affair on a Sunday than it does on a Friday! But shows like this are habitual so it's hard to break into existing prime time slot with a stripped show.

A rerun of NCIS at 9.30 for Ten didn't do much better than its spin off, reinforcing the notion that save for a handful of shows, (Big Bang Theory and Top Gear cheif among them) viewers are becoming weary of reruns. As I've read over on Media Spy some episodes of Modern Family (a sophomore show) have been rerun by ten 4 times already! Maybe ten should think about throwing in some Bondi Rescue reruns instead, save for cable I don't think that show has ever been rebroadcasted.

Kitchen Dramas

Tuesday, 1 March 2011

Another Tuesday, another total domination by Seven, except curiously, the 9.30 showing, Conviction Kitchen. It's doing well for a 9.30 slot, but given its lead in it should be doing a whole lot better. Perhaps the audience has got their fill of cooking from Seven's powerhouse MKR (which continues to impress three nights a week) Perhaps an audience raised on Border Security and The Force has very little sympathy for prisoners trying to reform.



Nine shufled around their sked moving Top Gear to 8.30 and reaping the benefit of a more stable Tuesday, though 20 to 01 may as well have been at 10.30 it did so poorly.

Talkin About Your Generation is having an abysmal run, it doesn't help that all three 7.30 competitors (MKR, Big Bang and Your Gen) are probably chasing the same crowd, as is How I Met Your Mother, The Simpsons and the Britcoms on 7TWO, maybe Ten should try out a drama early on Tuesdays, just sayin.

Chopping Block

Tuesday, 15 February 2011

Packed to the Rafters was down somewhat week on week but still managed a cool 1.8 million which is more than anyone else.

The biggest week on week drop was Lie to Me which lost 412,000 viewers from last week's NCIS, next worst was Top Gear which last 147,000 viewers. Ben Elton dropped an unsavoury 71 grand week on week which puts his show squarely on the chopping block.



Best on Digital was again Neighbours which came 4th in its time slot with 383,000 viewers.

Bad Parenting and other disasters

Tuesday, 8 February 2011

Well, while Underbelly on Mondays has tumbled down from its lofty heights, Seven's Packed to the Rafters continues to draw a massive crowd to the network with almost 2 million viewers stopping by for the season premiere. Even better for Seven was the halo effect the show had on My Kitchen Rules giving that show its best audience so far this year with 1.55 million folks.


And then there's 9.30...

Look its not all bad - on the surface Parenthood improved week on week in the slot by 90,000 viewers but when you look at the lead in almost 1.2 million people deserted Seven after Packed to Rafters, not bothering to stick around for the American drama.

I either expect Seven to swap it with another 9.30 our (Desperate Housewives or Brothers & Sisters) or slot in something new altogether but either way expect this to find a 10.30 home pretty quickly, a 60% drop from 8.30 to 9.30 is not sustainable on anyone's books, let alone from the number one show.

Still at least Seven's programmers can take comfort with the fact that they're not Nine's programmer's.

Nine's 9.30 show suffered a 51.5% audience drop from a much lower base (the overplayed 18-49 draw Top Gear) which resulted in a lower audience (455K) the difference though, between Parenthood and Ben Elton Live from Planet Earth,is Parenthood hasn't been relentlessly promoted all summer.

Ben Elton has, to the extent that there's been some sort of faux rivalry started up in the media between Elton's show and Adam Hill's new show with Media favourite Hills being pre-ordained the winner (as far as I know they're not even in direct competition)

Admittedly Nine's promo was remarkably opaque with no actual footage of the show (it reminded me of the advanced promotion of David Tench Tonight) but still an audience under 500,000 at 9.30 is woeful and this show might be headed for the chop if it doesn't pick up quickly.

Actually, yesterday, GNW got under half a million in its 9.30 slot. Maybe live comedy is out of vogue (even Your Gen is down in Audience numbers at 7.30) replaced with the resurgent American sitcom.

Big Winners and Big Losers

Expect Tuesday nights to follow this pattern for a while - Masterchef dominated - it's audience rose by about 60,000, Australia's Got Talent stayed level at 1.4 million and is one of Seven's strongest performers at the moment.

Top Gear took a hit down about 150,000 viewers week on week - Nine shouldn't lose heart so much - viewers know Masterchef and Talent are limited runs while Top Gear will be on year round (given that there are other episodes playing on GO! thoughout the week - 1.2 million is quite impressive!

The big losers were the 9.30 shows with the huge family audiences fleeing in droves after 9pm. The turnout for the 9.30 episodes of The Big Bang Theory was abysmal - I'd admire Nine for trying out sitcoms at 9.30 but is it worth using Big Bang as filler material just as the show has started to catch on - might be better wheeling out one of their other starters like Community (currently on GO!) and seeing what happens.

The big winner on the night was Bondi Rescue on 1.3 million viewers up from 1.1 the week before - a stellar improvement.

The New Kath & Kim

Fresh meat for Tuesday in the form of a new series of Australia's Got Talent - this time with Red Symonds and Tom Burlinson replaced with Kyle Sandilands and Bryan McFadden - and the result was actually quite impressive with almost 1.5 million tuning in - still that can't compete with the all conquering Top Gear which is the most impressive public to commercial transition since Kath & Kim went to Seven (how's that working out for seven anyway?)

Restoration

If nothing else we now have rock solid proof that there are people who will not watch something, even if it may interest them, for the simple reason that appears on SBS.

There's at least 600,000 of these people in the 5 major metro areas according to Oztam!

Top Gear certainly performed well in it's new digs on Channel Nine, if Nine can keep up the interest it will go a long way to restoring a night which for them has been one disaster after another in recent years.

Though it had a strong debut, its 8.30 hour was bested by NCIS on Ten which demonstrated that despite the network's woes there are still some things on the channel people watch regardless of the lead in!

There is some concern over the performance of NCIS Los Angeles at 9.30 but as this was a rerun it's probably a very good result, much more concerning is Grey's Anatomy on Seven which collapsed under the weight of NCIS and Top Gear (I guess men managed to west control of the remotes on Tuesday night!) to burn two new eps to under 900,000 viewers is not a good sign for this show, though I'd be interested to see the timeshifting figures for these eps - and we'll come back to them next week when they become available.

Whatever we're watching - It's just not cricket

Tuesdays are another night I'll be watching with interest as Nine attempts to shake up Seven and Ten's duopoly on the night. Frankly Top Gear can't come soon enough as people seem to abandon cricket when presented with more exciting options.

Indeed both Biggest Loser and My Kitchen Rules were up 200,000 viewers a piece on the previous night, while the return of NCIS absolutely thumped channel Nine. NCIS LA - though a rerun - did not fare as well, though the 800,000 seems pretty standard for a 9.30 rerun.

While I'm talking about that - 9.30 reruns seem to be all the rage at the moment, Nine is rerunning The Mentalist 9.30 Monday and Thursday, Seven is rerunning Thank God You're Here 9.30 Thursday, perhaps with the 9.30 slot's diminishing returns we will see the advent of American style 2 Hour primetime schedules.

I hope not.

Serial Killer found bludgeoned to death with gold statue - Monday 23 February 2009

Underbelly continued its stride into the record books with a third week over two million, although losing 174,000 viewers week on week. Perhaps they were watching the season finale of Top Gear on SBS which ran for 90 minutes and clocked an extra 190,000 on the meter.

Customs and Two and a Half Men both dropped slightly also, affected by the driving show, whereas offerings on the other three nets held their ground from last week.

Good News Week has some minor good news lifting 65,000 viewers while Four Corners dropped by 193,000 but the real spoiler of the night was the Oscars which caused a minor drop for Dexter (yes its still on) 23,000 viewers and a significant drop for Brothers & Sisters (which would be pitching to the same aud) 130,000 viewers – the Sally Field borefest should stabilise next week when Nine plays it safe with Crime Investigation Australia – but with that move we can consider Dexter cooked.

Nine’s unconventional strategy of airing the Academy Awards show live and then fitting a prime time replay around their schedule paid off nicely allowing them to capitalise on the awards twice over without disrupting what is currently their biggest night.

2009 - Week 2 - The Crap

Yep, finally lets look at the rubbish, err, unscripted TV success stories for the past week...

90210 No – Monday 24 October 2008

Ouch!

I can’t even look – I’m just going focus on the other channels for the moment.

Nine, Seven and ABC all enjoyed a close tussle for control of the Night.

Nine kept their Monday buzz going with a retrospective on the old 90’s show Weddings, that show was quite popular in it’s hey day being one of the original fly on the wall series attempted in this country.

A rerun of CSI gained week-on-week beating City Homicide into second place with The Howard Years Part II a close third, Cold Case also showed a slight gain week on week but was still in fourth place with Enough Rope taking the slot for the ABC.

The Good News Week Awards did OK, no scratch that – in light of it’s lead in it did magnificently with over 200% retention!

The big stories of the night though were at 7.30. SBS which rides on 5-6% audience share, wheeled out a new season of the UK Top Gear (after several weeks of middling performance of the Australian version) and saw their numbers lift spectacularly – It’s easy to think that people just ignore channel 28, up there on the lonely UHF dial while everybody else parties on VHF, but when SBS get a hit going the people come running.

The Rich List saw a 200,000 viewer lift in their fortunes week on week, at first you think – good for them they’re picking up, but I submit to you a theory – if there’s nothing on that viewers want to watch then mediocrity wins out.

These were the Audience Shares for FTA in the 7.30 hour (by my reckoning)
9 25.74%
7 25.07%
SBS 22.11%
ABC 18.63%
TEN 8.45%

8 percent, 8… That is horrific. As Ten’s 7pm timeslot has lurched from disaster to even bigger disaster their 7.30 timeslots have taken a beating but this is the absolute worst 7.30 beating they have ever sustained.

Ten has shown some faith in the new 90210 by reintroducing it for summertime but where are the viewers? 7.30 is arguably a better timeslot for a teen drama than 8.30 but they just didn’t show up.

I’m not sure why – the new show is well made, it’s not embarrassing to watch, it contains a lot of continuity for fans of the original and it cracks along at a breakneck pace, so why aren’t people watching it.

Here’s my (crackpot) theory…

There’s no buzz, or rather, all the buzz is centred on what old 90210 star will next appear, does anyone know who the stars of this new series are? Let me put it another way…

Back in 1992/93 did anyone NOT know who Luke Perry and Jason Priestley and Shannen Doherty were? They were megastars at the time, helped a long in large part by the behind the scenes feuding, but Ten rode out a year of poor ratings (1991) with the show on Friday nights before it caught on with kids here and (more importantly) in the US.

The next big Teen thing was Party of Five – Ten waited two years to bring it out – by the time they did Scott Wolf (remember him?) and Neve Campbell were on magazine covers everywhere.

Back in 1997 the WB Launched Dawson’s Creek – ten waited until 99 to introduce it here by which time Joshua Jackson and Katie Holmes were fully on our radar even though we’d never seen them in anything.

In effect Fast Tracking (in the initial years) may be a teen show’s worst enemy. There’s no hard and fast rules of course some teen shows never take off or generate any buzz (One Tree Hill, Gossip Girl) my point is that although I don’t think it will go this low again (it’s moving to Sunday nights with a better lead in than Will and Grace and less competition) Ten is going to have their work cut out for them getting it to catch on with audiences.

The only thing that can help this show in the short term is for Rob Estes to take his young co-stars down to the Viper Room for a night out (with Paparazzi in tow) – or perhaps Lori Loughlin could introduce the kids to drunk uncle Jesse!