HD Heads-Up: August 25

Housewives, Bachelorettes feud … Adele’s a hit … Saturday spring clean …

TV3 will use Family Feud to try to boost viewership of Real Housewives of Auckland. On September 6 it will air All Stars: Bachelorettes vs. Real Housewives, in which the stars from Housewives and The Bachelor NZ compete to win big for charity (as ABC did in the US). Win big is not what Housewives did when the premiere was simulcast on TV3 and Bravo on Monday, although viewership was consistent over the hour. It averaged 4.0% of 25-54 year-olds on TV3 and 1.0% on Bravo compared to 5.3% for Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders and 6.3% for Wentworth. It also finished third in the 18-49 contest but did win the 8.30 hour with viewers 25-54 in the northern (ie Auckland) region …

More popular was Housewives lead-out Adele Live in New York City, which won the 9.30 hour with 4.1% of 25-54s (vs Lucifer’s 2.5% and What Really Happens in Thailand’s 3.8%). It was also competitive with Thailand for 18-49 eyeballs, winning two of its quarter-hour segments and losing overall by only 0.2 rating points …

TV One and TV3 are sprucing up Saturday afternoons with a slew of new local factual ent shows that will go head-to-head in HD from September 3. TV One will premiere Pet Medics (4.00) and Our New Zealand Escape (4.30) and TV3, Thirsty Work (3.55) and Creative Living (4.25). Pet Medics is about an East Coast vet practice while Escape follows 10 celebrity couples in what sounds like a glorified tourist promotion of weekend getaways. Thirsty Work also goes cross country, but to tap into the brains behind some of our best beverages, and Creative Living chronicles the demolition and transformation of a central Auckland villa …

TV3 has improved its Saturday afternoon line-up immensely with the addition of comedies that previously were on Four but now are being re-run in HD (Community, Bob’s Burgers, Fresh Off the Boat) and from September 3 will add Animal Super Senses (4.55), a 2014 BBC2 series in which a biologist and a physicist explore wildlife’s secret powers (according to The Guardian, the show has “more than enough standout moments to transcend its format”) …

Coming and goings: The ITM Fishing Show pulls up anchor on September 3 … Married at First Sight USA finishes with a two-hour reunion special on September 7 has been dumped from primetime and will air Saturday afternoons from this weekend … Bondi Rescue resurfaces on Prime on September 7 … TV3 premieres Holiday Horrors: Caught on Camera on September 1 …

TVNZ’s only network movie premiere for the week starting September 3 is Good Kill — and the bad news is this 2014 Ethan Hawke thriller will air in SD on Duke (10.15 Sunday). That week’s HD coming attractions are all re-runs: Planes 2 (TV2, 5.20 Saturday), Frozen (TV2, 7.00 Saturday), Sahara (TV3, 7.00 Saturday), Old School (TV2, 9.05 Saturday), Ronin (TV2, 9.20 Saturday), Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back (TV2, 10.55 Saturday), Jonah Hex (TV2, 12.50am Sunday), Trouble With the Curve (TV2, 2.20am Sunday), Transformers: Dark of the Moon (TV3, 7.00 Sunday), We’re the Millers (TV2, 8.30 Sunday), In Time (TV2, 9.50 Sunday), Cradle 2 the Grave (TV2, 10.25 Sunday) and This Means War (TV3, 8.30 Monday) …