TV Tonight

Ratings super-battle looming

ncis-2It’s shaping up as one of the biggest battles in the TV ratings year.

The week of September 27th sees big drawcards from all of our 5 Free to Air networks, hot on the heels of the US fall season. Get ready for some big guns, in what will surely be the mightiest week before the final survey week in late November.

And with Nine just tipping Seven last week, with considerable thanks to GO!, the fight is on to launch new titles.

On Sunday September 27th the usual battle between heavyweights Sunday Night, 60 Minutes, Midsomer Murders, Rescue: Special Ops, Australian Idol, Border Security and Rove is joined by a new local series of Who Do You Think You Are? on SBS featuring Ron Barassi. Nine moves a new ep of 20 to 1 into the 6:30 slot.

Updated: On Monday night Seven has the premiere of FlashForward. Nine has a fastracked ep of Two and a Half Men at 8pm followed by The Mentalist.

TEN no longer has new Supernatural with Little Britain USA and Nurse Jackie now set to follow Good News Week.

Tuesday night the season premiere of NCIS on TEN, Packed to the Rafters on Seven and the second season of East West 101 on SBS (bound to get caught in the crossfire).

Wednesday night Nine has  the 2.5 hr Hey Hey it’s Saturday live reunion on Nine, TEN launches Celebrity MasterChef followed by NCIS: Los Angeles. The ABC has its Spicks and Specks 70s Special followed by the first episode of Hungry Beast from Andrew Denton’s production company.

On Thursday there’s Glee, Rush, a conspicuous TBA from Seven (new Amazing Race anyone?). Nine has new CSI and the NRL Footy Show Grand Final in some markets and a repeat of The Mentalist in others.

If that isn’t enough, it’s also the last week before Daylight Saving hits, when it’s traditionally much harder for networks to grab our attention early in the evening, plus the NRL Grand Final and the offical launching of GO!

Phew!

26 Comments to “Ratings super-battle looming”

  1. Chloe says:

    TEN are suddenly my favourite channel for fast-tracking SN. Can’t wait for FlashForward, looks incredible, and The Vampire Diaries.

    @daqua_99

    We have the same taste in TV :D
    I like regular doses of Family Guy and American Dad though.

  2. David Knox says:

    Jacket: it’s now out already. See Programming posts.

  3. jacket says:

    I cannot wait to see Season 5 of Supernatural on Monday nights. Thankyou channel TEN.

  4. Ben says:

    You’d think 9 are going to keep winning now until 7 release details of their new channel.. GO! is only going to grow in popularity and its going great guns

  5. daqua_99 says:

    My weekly viewing will be:

    Monday – Flashforward, Vampire Diaries
    Tuesday – Survivor
    Wednesday – Terminator, Fringe, Eleventh Hour (if home)
    Thursday – Amazing Race
    Friday – GNW (online from Ten), whatever DVDs I’m watching (currently Supernatural season 2).

    Such a good time to be into TV shows :D

  6. Cindy says:

    Wow, there’s so many new shows to watch.

    Monday – FlashForward, Supernatural, The Vampire Diaries
    Wednesday – Celebrity MasterChef
    Thursday – Glee, Amazing Race

  7. Benjamin says:

    So in the first week of October, all states except Qld & WA, will have shows screened an hour earlier.

    I can’t wait for Ch 10 to screen “Supernatural s5″ on Sept 28!!.

  8. mac says:

    @craig, i was just saying at least there will be episodes airing that i haven’t seen several times before, even if it’s at a ratio if 1 new ep per 9 repeats week.

  9. franz chong says:

    Monday should be interesting.Now that Farmer has ended It’s back to Good News Week for Me.I don’t watch that Peanuts on Steroids or Drugs crap otherwise known as Southpark

  10. Goonies says:

    NCIS, Glee, Hungry Beast, Master Chef. Everything else is a total meh to me!

  11. harry says:

    Cant wait for NCIS Season Premiere!

  12. Guy says:

    @ Chloe

    Yes TEN is fast-tracking Supernatural. It returns to Mondays 9:40pm

  13. Guy says:

    I must say TV is hotting up. I was also hoping for Fast-tracked Bones and Castle for Sundays but it seems Seven are going to hold them over to 2010. Mercy is also due to premiere so i wonder where Seven will slot that one. I actually think it may be Thursdays 8:30pm to try and get the Grey’s audience to watch it.

    Hey Hey will fail i think. There is too much stuff on TV to watch it. PTTR, RSPCA Animal Rescue, Last Chance Surgery, NCIS, All Saints, Survivor. So why would i want to watch some Hey Hey Reunion which should be on Saturday night not Tuesday.

  14. tasmanian devil says:

    Wait a minute David…isn’t Sep 28th on a Monday? Surely you mean Sep 27.

  15. Craig says:

    @mac you’ll still get endless re-runs of 2.5 men with just one new eps thrown in for good measure.

    I did notice Nine using the ‘fast track’ term on a 2.5 men promo, don’t see that much anymore.

  16. Michael K says:

    Time to order the PVR with a quadruple tuner! ;-)

  17. Jackson says:

    I wonder how Glee will go on Thursday Nights. I would have thought a pretty significant part of their target audience would be working, being thursday nights. Seems like an odd programming decision.

  18. Daniel says:

    Needs more SGU

  19. mac says:

    good to see nine fast racking men, it cant come any sooner with all the endless repeats they have been showing.

  20. Chloe says:

    Wait a second…is TEN fast-tracking Supernatural? For this year? Please please tell me it’s true!

  21. Belinda says:

    It is going to be crazy keeping up with this. Mondays 8.30 (for me) are now GNW, Four Corners/Media Watch, Flash/Forward, South Park and in a few weeks possibly something new on Nine and/or Go. Tuesdays: Hey Hey, East West, Survivor, The Beast. With not much besides the ABC shows on Wednesday I can catch up on all the recordings.

  22. Rhys says:

    Wow, hasn’t the launch of the US Fall Season started to make an impact here in Australia.

    I predict in a few years time the traditional calendar year rating season will be replaced by September to May. I can’t see any other way around it, as people will always want the latest content hot off the satellite.

    Gone are the days where people are willing to wait 6-12 months to see a show from the US, can’t the dumbass Australian networks realise this????

  23. Craig says:

    Some nights I feel like I need a bank of HDD recorders to catch all the action!

    See this is yet another reason people DL shows even if they are fast tracked. Tuesday I want to record or watch up to 4 shows at 8:30 so it looks like I’ll see NCIS elsewhere, record Rafters and East West and maybe just watch Nine to mock the Hey Hey reunion.

    This is not even including shows on PayTV at the same time, Sanctuary(SciFi), True Blood(Showcase) and Jekyll on UKTV! yes all at 8:30! At least with Pay you have the option f watching them at different times.

  24. Ruth says:

    Looking forward to *FlashForward* Ch 7 Monday’s.
    I see they are moving *City Homicide* – which has been very good this season – to Wednesdays.
    Interestingly Wednesday should be a good night for Ten with *CMC* followed by the new *NCIS: Los Angeles*
    Thursday’s *Rush* has really picked up this season and the stories are just getting better each week.
    ABC look to have more interesting programmes coming up too with Andrew Denton’s *Hungry Beast*
    Can’t find anything excitingly new on Ch 9. Perhaps folks will tape *Hey Hey it’s Saturday’s* 2.5hr reunion as its up against the excellent PTTR and All Saints.

  25. Adrian says:

    We Are In For Some Good Viewing.

  26. ryan says:

    bring it on!

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