The Nine Network learned some tough lessons in Week 32. Two of its bright new hopes, Rescue: Special Ops and The Farmer Wants a Wife -both of which attracted critical acclaim- took middling figures for their season premieres. Nine appears to be finding out the hard way that a disillusioned audience may not even sample new content.
Seven streaked home with 28.7% over Nine’s 23.8% and TEN’s 21.5%. The ABC had 17.1% and SBS 8.9%.
Seven won 18-49 and 25-54 demos, and was just pipped in 16-39 by 0.1% by TEN. Seven also won Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. It tied Saturday with the ABC while Nine won Thursday. Seven again won all 5 cities.
Packed to the Rafters was the week’s top show with 1.87m viewers. Seven’s other big shows included Seven News, Dancing with the Stars, Today Tonight, Miracle Of The Hudson Plane Crash, Better Homes And Gardens, Surf Patrol, Air Ways, World’s Strictest Parents and Home and Away. If the network has any Achilles’ heel, it is Thursday night. Double Take (832,000) and TV Burp (774,000) landed third, but this week switch slots. True Beauty (613,000) will be burnt off in double episodes this week and next. After losing a day to the Today show recently, Sunrise reaffirmed its position with several days 100,000 ahead of its rival.
Nine News (Sunday) was again best for the Nine Network with 1.51m. That left Two and a Half Men and Getaway as its only other shows with performances above 1.2m. The network’s traditional Sunday night succumbed to a battle between Seven and TEN. Regular performers 60 Minutes and Random Acts of Kindness slipped while Rescue: Special Ops had a fairly soft debut of 1.13m viewers. On Monday Farmer Wants a Wife was even lower on 1m. On Tuesday, nothing past 7:30pm could manage 1m with Gordon Ramsay all but rejected. By Wednesday Australia’s Perfect Couple sunk to a dismal 672,000. Better news again for Hot Seat, continuing to breathe down Deal or No Deal’s neck while the AFL Footy Show remains a constant performer.
Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation was TEN’s best on 1.51m, effectively the first time the audience has “blinked” away from its 1.6m home. Also strong was Rush -now a solid performer at 1.21m. Its repeat movie The Devil Wears Prada and Eragon delivered a strong Sunday result. NCIS, The Simpsons and Good News Week were also good. A Jamie Oliver special struggled while TEN has now moved repeats of Rules of Engagement and Biggest Loser: US. Friday’s performance was dismal, just a 16% share. No sign of improvement yet for The 7PM Project‘s figures even though the show is ironing out its wrinkles. TEN News at Five continues to win its slot.
Spicks and Specks passed 1.5m for the ABC this week, giving The Librarians (1.05m) a great lead-in. Tara‘s 1.06m helped the network beat TEN for the night. Also strong were ABC News, Grand Designs, Australian Story, The New Inventors and a savage edition of Media Watch. But the ABC was also a victim of Sunday’s tussle, slipping to 11.7%. It had better results on Saturday when it tied for first with Seven.
SBS boomed to a 14.7% share on Saturday and 13.7% on Friday with 608,000 for the 2009 Ashes Series. Food Safari cooked up 456,000 on Wednesday. But Liberal Rule limped out on 191,000 -not encouraging for East West 101 soon.
I wonder how CH7′s follow-up to “Miracle on the Hudson Plane Crash” will rate?
It’s titled “God screws up miracle by allowing plane/helicoptor to colloide”
“God says D’oh”
Yeah shocking about 60 minutes. Thye would have bean better off crossing to the reports talking but not talking about the story. Would have amped up the contraversy a bit and could have discussed what has happened.
Two and a Half Men is a disgrace.
Shows like that are only meant to be used to fill the gap over the summer not all year round.
The show is just 40 minutes long with numerous jarring ad breaks . I will not watch tv this way .I am not alone ?
I’m amazed Rescue received critical acclaim. Next the Brand Power ads will be used as a proving ground for actors.
Australia truly struggles to create great TV and caters more for sales internationally in a fast food way of making TV
And about 60 Minutes – why don’t they have back up stories anymore to fill when one is pulled at the last minute. That would have been better then what they did last night. Surely they would have a story or two up their sleeves just in case they can’t show one.
Bring Temptation back,but only have Scott McGregor the
male model just standing there in boxers only.That’s at least a good 23 minutes viewing.
Or Price Is Right is due for another run.
But i have suggested before Blankety Blanks with Bob Downe as host.What about it 10?A replacement for the soon to bite the dust 7pm Project?
Putting Farmer head to head with City Homicide is a bad move on nine’s part I reckon it isn’t going to help ratings. City Homicide is better off on Monday and I think their ratings wont be affected. But I love Farmer too so I think putting that on Wednesday like before will make sure both shows rate well.
Yes bring back temptation.
Yes, Nine should never have ditched Temptation. It used to work consistently and I think Nine should bring back The Price Is Right, not sure how it used to rate but it was such a great show.
All Nines ‘new’ shows have all been done and seen before. Perfect Couple is so lame and has such a stupid concept. The Footy Show, 2.5 men and Getaway are about the only shows that work and 2.5 men is horrible TV.
@ducko:
Also, I think it should be noted that I watched Rescue: Special Ops and (for the most part) loved it, so I don’t think I’m being very biased.
Ditching Temptation would have to be one of the dumbest things Channel Nine has done ever.
It was one of the few things at 7pm which wasn’t a US rerun or some crappy soap
Basically the only Nine Programmes I have watched since then are Getaway,The Shak and whenever it is on during Cricket Season Hi 5 or Humphrey B Bear.
Rescue Special Ops has no chance for its second outing given any lead-n 60 minutes would have given it would have been eaten away when they dropped their last story (without even so much as a mention) and played nearly 10 minutes of ads including a ‘sneak peak’ to Perfect Couple – which clealy noone is interested in.
I realise they had no control over their story being pulled but do they really wonder why nobody bothers watching anymore.
David, my post was meant for Harry & George. Please don’t think that it was directed at you.
@ Craig, i suspect Zamora meant Go or 9HD, rather than Go 9HD.
Ever since they ditched Temptation, there’s absolutely no ‘appointment’ viewing for me on Nine.
I have to agree with Craig. Channel 9 would have been smart to replace Sea Patrol with Rescue: Special Ops. Heck, they could have even debuted the first episode behind the finale of Sea Patrol. Push Farmer back to 7:30 Mondays where it belongs. Rescue: Special Ops at 8:30.
George, I agree.
I gave Rescue a 4 star review thanks and it’s in Top Pick for tonight. But this article is on network ratings.
@Ducko:
If Rescue: Special Ops was on a low-rating night and it got the rating it got then it would be understandable, but for the amount of promotion Nine did and the fact that it was on a Sunday night timeslot with pretty weak competition is what’s worrying.
I think you’ve been a bit harsh on Rescue & a bit biased towards Rush.
@ Gerry
A show which rates 1.13 on a Sunday isnt as good as a 1.21 on a Thursday which is really low figures. Rush is about the only thing that works for TEN after Tuesdays. Its a fair call.
@Gerry and David:
Also we need to take into account that Rush airs on Thursdays, a low-rating night while Rescue: Special Ops is on Sunday, one of the highest-rating nights of the week.
Plus Rush got 470,000 viewers in Melbourne this week, which is very good for a Thursday. It’s just let down by Sydney and Brisbane. And then when you factor in that it’s average was under 1 million last year, it’s shown significant growth.
How did TEN go in the other two demos it didn’t win David?
@Zambora – GO! is not HD it’s an SD channel.
Mind you to every one has moved to SD but that is what FreeView and the news FTA channels are for, to get people to move to the new digital services.
I gave up on nine years ago,. there is not a single show I watch now that is on nine.
Yes Nine need to pay their dues to the audience by :
1) Suplying quality programming
2) consistently enough so we know its there.
3) earn a track record which means losing the short turm ratings war while remaigning stable, investing in ideas that grow an audience not fizzle and burn.
Thanks David. I am one of these “a disillusioned audience may not even sample new content.”
My question to Nine is wh should i bother to watch Nine when you are intent on shuffling programmes here and there, running eps out of order & then even sillier putting the programmes that could of worked on Go 9HD) when not man people have HD at this stage. Nine go back home.
Kudos again to Seven and Ten.
IMO Rescue should have replaced Sea Patrol on Mondays at 8:30 followed by Farmer, put Drop Dead on Sunday nights as some lighter entertainment to wind down the week.
But Nine still has a problem even coming close to wining a week, what is it so far 2 wins for the year, out of how many Seven have walked away with?
Gerry, yes it is weird. But it depends on a network’s audience size. 1.1m for ABC for instance is a very strong figure, whereas it is only so so for Nine or Seven. 1.2m for TEN at 8:30 is very bloody good and Rush won its slot. Nine had a lot riding on its premiere, but it came a (close) third. In my view not a great result for a launch.
Hopefully Nine learn a lesson from this. Both Rescue and Farmer are fantastic shows that are very well produced (especially Rescue). Hopefully they will gain an audience. However, I wouldn’t call their premieres complete failures. They could be better though.
Well done to Hot Seat. Maybe Nine now know that sticking with a show can lead to success. Hot Seat didn’t debut that great, but now it’s building a solid and dedicateed audience. Well done to Eddie.
It’s weird how you say Rush is a “solid performer,” eventhough it’s not that far ahead of Rescue’s numbers.