HD Ratings: Three’s Block-buster the Biggest

Three’s The Block NZ continues its vice-like grip on Sunday nights, laying waste to TVNZ 2’s Hollywood heavyweights.

This weekend the reality phenomenon averaged 9.6% of Three’s target audience, 25-54 year-olds, against 5.5% for the free-to-air premiere of Daddy’s Home.

And in the other core commercial demographics, it averaged 7.6% of 18-49 (vs 4.5%) and 10.5% of household shoppers with kids (vs 7.2%).

Only in the 18-39 race did Daddy’s Home edge out The Block, with 5.2% vs 5.0%.

The Block’s popularity set up its lead-out, the FTA premiere of Jason Bourne, to beat 2’s premiere of Bad Moms in the 25-54 and 18-49 demos but the latter was tops in the 18-39 and HHS/k markets.

Three won the night in the 25-54, 18-49 and HHS/k demos and only narrowly lost to TVNZ 2 in the 18-39 stakes.

The previous week, Three’s The Block and a re-run of Spy dominated in all the core demos opposite 2’s FTA premieres of The BFG and Underworld: Blood Wars.

And even 2’s August 19 premiere of Avengers: Age of Ultron proved puny against the superheroic Block in the key demos, with the latter pulling at least double the viewership.

Only against Three’s premiere of the cerebral sci-fi movie Arrival did Ultron topple the competition with its climactic final act. But viewers switched back to Arrival when a re-run of Elysium succeeded Ultron.

It will be fascinating to see if the Sunday season of Shortland Street, which starts this weekend with an hour-long episode, can dent The Block’s supremacy (last week it helped Three to win three of the nights in the 25-54 demo, with support from time-slot winning Westside, NCIS: LA and Hawaii Five-O).

Meanwhile, TVNZ 1’s The Curious Mind is averaging fewer 25-54 viewers than predecessor Cold Case: the premiere rated 4.4%  and Sunday’s episode 3.9% compared to 4.7% for the season finale of Cold Case.

Lead-out Q+A appears to be gaining viewers slowly in its new 9.30 slot, however. While still woefully low, its 25-54 average improved from 0.5% on August 19 to 1.2% a week later and 1.0% on Sunday.