HD Ratings: Lukewarm Start for Summers

Indian Summers, the new British period drama that TV1 promoted as a television event, didn’t rate above 5% of the commercial demographics when it debuted on Sunday.

It averaged 1.9% – 4.9% of the key demos, and was most popular with 25-54 year-olds.

The Channel 4 slow burner, about the last days of the British Empire in India, was no match for TV2’s network premiere of Elysium (7.7% – 12.0%), which scored blockbuster ratings and dented the appeal of TV3’s Westside (6.4% – 7.8%).

The Outrageous Fortune spin-off was down on its premiere (7.8% – 8.7%) but still rated solidly given the competition.

Indeed, it was only a couple of points behind lead-in Dancing With the Stars (6.5% – 9.1%), which opened slowly against TV1’s Sunday (7.3% – 10.9%) but dominated in its last half-hour opposite Nigel Latta Blows Stuff Up (5.4% – 7.1%).

Sunday had the advantage of a huge lead-in from One News (8.3% – 13.5%), which went to air with the latest on the death of former All Black Jerry Collins and his wife, and decimated TV3’s new half-hour bulletin and revamped 3D.

But TV3 performed later in the night with DWTS, Westside and new US drama Rush, which averaged 3.8% – 5.2% to finished well behind Elysium but ahead of TV1’s Our Girl (1.3% – 2.8%), which started half-an-later than usual because of Indian Summers’ 90-minute launch.

The result was a fiercely contested night among the HD networks that saw TV2 win two of the key demos and its rivals one each:

TV1 had another exceptionally strong news night on Saturday, which boosted Country Calendar’s ratings (6.5% – 9.1%) but not the premiere of David Attenborough’s Rise of Animals (2.5% – 4.5%), which rated lower than the re-run of Frozen Planet in the same slot.

TV2 won the night with its movies but TV3’s crime combo of Motive (1.4% – 3.7%) and SVU (2.3%- 4.4%) is gaining traction in the 25-54 and household shoppers-with-kids demos.

TV3’s Friday night light-ent line-up faltered, with TV2’s comedies and re-run of Real Steel (5.3% – 8.8%) dominating in the 18-39 and HHS/k demos but TV3’s Graham Norton Show (6.1% – 9.2%) getting the 18-49 and 25-54 vote.

TV1’s SD Location Location Location (2.6% – 6.1%) won the 7.30 hour in the 25-54 stakes while TV2’s Mom and The Big Bang Theory see-sawed with TV3’s Lip Sync Battle in the others.

TV2’s The Undateables continued to engage viewers on Thursday, winning the 8.30 hour with a massive 7.8% – 13.1% of the key demos opposite the final of TV1’s Our Zoo (1.2% – 3.6%) and TV3’s Lost & Found (4.5% – 6.1%).

TV2 also owned Wednesday, with its line-up proving unassailable until 9.45, when Once Upon a Time provided vulnerable to TV3’s re-run of The Italian Job (3.2% – 4.8%), except in the HHS/k demo.