HD Ratings: MasterChef Finale Steams Ahead

Talk about a slow boil for TVNZ 2’s two-hour season finale of MasterChef Australia on Monday.

The first hour simmered in third place, opposite TVNZ 1’s Fair Go and Border Patrol, and Three’s The Block NZ, in the core commercial demographics.

But the second hour scalded the Kiwi dramas on those channels and helped it to average overall 5.8% of 25-54 year-olds and 4.0% of 18-49s.

It peaked at 6.5% of 25-54s and easily led TVNZ 1’s My Life is Murder (3.1%) and Three’s Head High (2.3%).

But the first hour was no match for Fair Go (6.3%), Border Patrol (5.4%) or The Block (5.2%).

Once again, TVNZ 1’s shows benefitted from high viewership of lead-ins 1 News at Six (13.4%) and Seven Sharp (8.9%).

1 News had double the 25-54 and 18-49 ratings of Three’s Newshub Live, although the race was closer between SS and Three’s The Project, with the latter averaging 6.3% / 4.4% of the key demos.

MasterChef’s win, however, couldn’t sustain lead-out The Walking Dead, which opened with 2.4% of TVNZ 2’s target audience, 18-49s, and closed with 0.9%, to average 1.1% — better than the previous week but behind TVNZ 1’s 20/20 (1.5%) and Three’s Emergency Call (1.2%).

The pattern was the same in the 25-54 demo, where Prime’s 8.30 movie, the 15-year-old Inside Man, led the competition from 9.45-11.15.

Overall it averaged 1.9% of 25-54s and 1.1% of 18-49s, which was a strong result for the channel.

Lead-in Best of American Pickers also fared well, with 1.8% / 1.2% averages.

Duke’s Paralympics coverage was also popular, peaking at 2.6% of 25-54s from 8.15-8.30 and averaging 1.6% from 7.00-10.00 before dominating late-night.

In the 18-49 demo, it averaged 1.1% over the three hours.

TVNZ 1 won the night with 29+ shares of the core demos while TVNZ 2 and Three were neck and neck.