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Viewers switch off Hostages (or just a coding error?)

Ratings: A coding error for two Hostages episodes impacts on its numbers. But Seven wins Wednesday.

2013-11-28_0932It seems viewers are all done thank you with Hostages.

Last night the show pulled just 280,000 -an unacceptable number for a first-run 8:30 show. For the last two weeks the show has rated lower than CSI which follows it at 9:30pm. Nine is continuing the show into summer, but don’t be surprised if CSI gets an upgrade to 8:30 as a result.

UPDATE: Seems a coding error may have been at fault. Nine advises the show pulled 493,000 with 280,000 as the average across a first-run and daytime repeat.

In the countdown to Saturday’s end of survey, Seven won Wednesday night.

Seven network was 31.8% then Nine 27.0%, ABC 19.3%, TEN 16.5% and SBS 5.4%.

Home and Away (1.15m) topped the night for Seven then Seven News (1.08m), Today Tonight (1.00m), Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD (628,000), and Million Dollar Minute (505,000). Surveillance Oz was 368,000.

Nine News was 1.06m for Nine but everything else fell under 800,000. A Current Affair was 777,000, RBT was 719,000, Hot Seat was 528,000, CSI was 422,000, The Big Bang Theory was 413,000 (4 cities). Hostages was a turn-off at a mere 280,000.

ABC News (813,000) led ABC1 then 7:30 (688,000), Qi (626,000), the final Ja’mie: Private School Girl (623,000), Would I Lie to You? (503,000), and Shock Horror Aunty (415,000).

TEN Eyewitness News (604,000) was best for TEN then The Project (471,000). Yet another Mean Girls repeat was 371,000 and The Simpsons was 352,000.

On SBS ONE it was Bill Bailey’s Jungle Hero (263,000), 24 Hours in Emergency (224,000), World News Australia (158,000) and Borgen (97,000).

Big Bang was best on multichannels at 339,000.

Sunrise: 392,000

Today: 313,000

ABC News Breakfast: 61,000 / 41,000

Wake Up: 37,000

OzTAM Overnights: Wednesday 27 November 2013

22 Responses

  1. Agree with Poss. where would channel 9 be with TBBT repeats, and of course the repeats, and not forgetting the repeats, and wont forget the sport, they don’t have much idea of anything else these days to pull the public viewing in and if they do get any decent shows they just flog them to death like double series of the block next year and the voice and voice kids, channel 9 is really pathetic these days compared to a few years ago.

  2. An average episode is not 23 minutes more like 20-21 minutes. The length of an episode is usually 30-32 minutes, and the are always 10-12 minutes of ads in a single episode not 7 minutes. Last night was not much different, at the very most an extra 4 minutes of ads.

  3. Been recording Hostages and CSI from day 1 but with 9’s infuriating delayed starts we’ve missed 3 eps of CSI and whenever 9 throw in an unannounced double ep of Hostages we miss half of CSI.

    What’s the point in even bothering to watch the time-shifted stuff when they clown you about so badly?

    From now on, I’ll refer to 9’s programmers as “Stupid Crab B*tch Water Buffalo Faces”.

    (My thanks to Clive Robertson of 2UE for the enlightened description).

  4. Even with the amended figures, Hostages is a flop. There are only 15 eps so Nine will keep it running over summer but I agree with David – CSI and Hostages may switch timeslots.

  5. What amazes me is that H&A was three combined episodes an they usually run for 30 minutes each, yet 7 strung it out for nearly two hours 1 hr 47.
    Which means each episode is 23 minutes with 7 minutes of adverts.
    Last night there was 38 minutes of adverts instead of the usual 21 minutes!
    I realise this will not contravene any self regulated laws but it is a disgrace!

  6. I wasn’t really impressed with the H&A finale. The promos made it seem like the explosion was going to happen at the music festival. And once again the finale involves one of the Braxtons. *Yawn*.

  7. Your whole article is wrong, Hostages actually did more than it did last week! That said, it is rubbish! The fact is US dramas don’t work on FTA anymore, Seven is the only network to have any US dramas working, Blacklist has been solid, but Nine and Ten have nothing!

  8. Thanks to Seven for telling us “One Will Die”. A cliff-hanger is supposed to be just that. You don’t promote the fact that “One Will Die” when multiple could die, or none at all. Someone been watching “Number 96” tapes?
    “280,000 as the average across a first-run and daytime repeat” – but, as an advertiser, I’m only interested in how many watched the first run, not any of the reruns where my commercials are not rerun.

  9. Not really a surprise……. I only just made it through the first episode of Hostages!

    What does surprise me is the fact that 9 can still come in second……. It shows sport, reality and where would they be without TBBT????

  10. Hostages has become very convoluted and a bit hard to follow, like most ongoing storylines. It’s a matter of dragging it out as long as possible, which is not a good move as the storyline usually gets sillier and sillier. They should do as the Brits do, make it short, sharp and easy (sometimes!) to follow.

    And Toni Collette’s awful schoolgirl hairstyle doesn’t enhance her credibility as a top surgeon either. Do surgeons really strut around in stilettoes, long hair flowing?

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