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Gallipoli concludes disappointing run

Ratings: Seven wins the night, but ABC's Monday line-up was solid.

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Nine’s flagship drama Gallipoli bowed out last night with a double episode premiere.

At 450,000 and 353,000 viewers it had dropped again on last week (479,000 / 373,000) although it picked up another 135,000 in Timeshifted viewing. Nevertheless, it’s hard not to be disappointed that such a well-made drama did not find an audience.

ABC had a strong night with good audience retention between all of its primetime shows.  Even without its ABC News 24 simulcast Q & A increased on last week’s 611,000 (primary channel) to 727,000 viewers.

Of course it was Seven network that won the night with a 31.7% share then Nine 24.0%, ABC 20.0%, TEN 18.8% and SBS 5.1%.

My Kitchen Rules resumed its #1 crown at 1.55m for Seven then Seven News (993,000 / 975,000), a winning Home and Away (917,000), Revenge (639,000) and Million Dollar Minute (459,000). Parenthood was 285,000 / 222,000.

Nine News (1.01m / 1.06m) led for Nine followed by good numbers for The Block coded as two titles (926,000 / 902,000), A Current Affair (889,000), Hot Seat (620,000) and two Gallipoli episodes (450,000 / 353,000).

On ABC it was ABC News (849,000), Australian Story (833,000), 7:30 (816,000), Q & A (727,000), Media Watch (717,000) and Four Corners (698,000). All bettered anything on TEN across the night.

The Project was up on last Monday at 636,000 / 452,000. TEN Eyewitness News was 617,000, Law and Order: SVU was 577,000 and Elementary was 249,000.

On SBS ONE it was Simon Reeves’ Sacred Rivers (246,000), Richard Hammond’s Wild Weather (230,000), SBS World News (132,000) and Gourmet Farmer Afloat (124,000).

Neighbours enjoyed top slot on multichannels at 279,000.

Lateline‘s return was seen by 54,000 in News 24 but another 361,000 watched the ABC replay.

OzTAM Overnights: Monday 9 March 2015

21 Responses

  1. It didn’t seem right. The characters overcooked the Aussie bit too much and looked to clean for blokes who had been rolling around in filth for 8 months. It also had be obligitory love tryst. I don’t think therefore it was high quality at all.

  2. I was expecting Gallipoli to be lightweight pop history for the teens, but it was actually pretty good. My guess is the makers were inspired by Band of Brothers and The Pacific as the show had a similar level of gritty realism. Another positive was the way the Turks were shown as human beings and not demonised as the enemy. They were, after all, defending their home country.

    I was also surprised the show hit the beaches straight away, without the usual slow build-up. I do think, however, that more time could have been spent on character development before they arrived in Turkey. Overall, a very mature production for Oz and a fitting way to mark this important milestone.

  3. Geez I bet Channel 9 are hurting bad from Gallipoli’s dismal ratings. Expecting ratings above at least 1.5 million for each episode was wishful thinking.
    I personally found the Australia: the story of us episode covering the events of Gallipoli more interesting. Nine’s Gallipoli dragged on too much with too much time focused on British Generals talking amongst each other and not enough actual warfare.

  4. The sad irony for 9 is that the Sunday episode of ‘Australia: The Story Of Us’ (whichsome of it was on Gallipoli) rated better than Gallipoli

  5. The problem with Gallipoli was that nothing really happened in a dramatic sense. A bunch of guys sat on a hill. OK, so they got shot at occasionally, but there was very little plot momentum. In stories like this, the writers need to create momentum at the character relationship level. But that was never done. You got the odd scene where characters bickered and had fisticuffs, but mostly the relationships were static or non-existent. This is a problem which afflicts almost all Oz TV and film. If you compare Oz TV to US high-end TV, the differences are vast. High-end shows are constructed around complex character relationships. The plot is almost secondary. This creates an internal dynamic which propels the story along, even without plot contrivances. This gives stories that elusive Must-Keep-Watching quality. I’m not saying we should copy US shows, but we could certainly learn from them…

      1. Obviously stuff like Breaking Bad, Orange is the New Black, House of Cards, Sopranos, etc is good. Not all US stuff is great, but the good stuff is spectacular. British and Scandinavian dramas are OK, but the US stuff sets the benchmark IMHO. I can watch Breaking Bad over and over and over again. It just keeps getting better because of the sheer depth of the writing.

  6. The format for Gallipoli was all wrong. It should have followed the traditional format of the 80’s as a mini series, instead of s striped 1 hour per week. Also it needed to start at 8:30pm, not at 9-9:15pm. Maybe nine should have waited til April to screen it, over 4 weeks.

  7. Gallipoli went on the journey of dramatising one of Australia’s most mythologised stories and messed with the myth. The backstory about two brothers pining for the same girl, creating tension between them, was totally unnecessary.

    1. But isn’t it time that the myths of the 1910s, that are still propagated in primary schools, were replaced with the facts?

      The script wasn’t good enough. It didn’t have the characters or story to make a gripping drama and it didn’t have the detail or facts to work as a proper history. And it was far too long and didn’t have the budget to be convincing.

      1. I pitched a project to the ABC that did precisely that – as is now taught at tertiary level history, that questioned where the ANZAC spirit and legend was forged – not at Gallipoli, but well before. It was at Gallipoli the government of the day shepherded our best young men as lambs to the slaughter, weakening this dynamic young country for generations. The factual series The War that Changed went into this territory. Naturally ABC drama couldn’t see the drama in that and we had the very superficial ANZAC Girls instead. ABC drama is not exactly excited by controversial ideas that challenge us.

    2. The Little love triangle would have been ok if there was any pay off to it? If they’ve shown him going home and telling her that the brother was dead or something…..But as it was it was just pointless.

    1. I think that was the trouble. The first episode was underwhelming & many didn’t return for the subsequent episodes. The first episode has to be a cracker to keep the audience. I didn’t like the use of voice-over or family flashbacks.There seemed to to insufficient extras – a dozen Anzacs against half a dozen Turks. The guns sounded like cap guns & the music was jarring. I didn’t bother watching again.

      1. I didn’t think Gallipoli was gripping TV and gave up after the first 2 episodes. Having said that, one thing I did admire about the series was the sound design. As Darcey09 points out, the guns sounded like cap guns. In reality, that’s what guns on a WW1 battle field sound like.
        We’ve been conned over the decades as Sound Editors have beefed up gunshots to make them sound like cannons. Some of the Hollywood gunshot sound effects are made up of 3 or 4 components. The reality is that rifles on an open battlefield sound like cap guns, and the most prominent sound is the whirring and whizzing of bullets and shrapnel as they fly over your head.
        I think it was a brave move to make the battle sounds more realistic but I’m still waiting for the ultimate reality though when you see a bomb explode and then hear it 1 to 2 seconds later. It always looks like a sync mistake on film.

  8. How many times through the week is Gourmet Farmer repeated ? If it picks up that number for every repeat it could be one of SBS top rating shows, even though the viewers are spread across the week.

  9. I’m surprised that MDM is so far behind Hot Seat at the moment, considering there is a brilliant, and very deserving champion playing for big money.

    Gallipoli was an outstanding drama, and very sad to see it bomb like that.

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