HD Ratings: Too Many Chefs …?

The gap between MasterChef NZ and MasterChef Australia: Fans & Faves widened on Monday, when the former led the latter by nearly a point in the core commercial demographics.

But TVNZ 1 was the night’s big winner, with its line-up surging ahead of the competition.

MasterChef NZ averaged 2.9% of Three’s target audience, 25-54 year-olds (vs 2.0% for TVNZ’s F&F), and 2.2% of 18-49s (vs 1.6%).

Fair Go scored its highest viewership in weeks, with 6.0% of 25-54s and 3.7% of 18-49s, helping lead-out Bradley Walsh & Son: Breaking Bad to average an unbeatable 5.4%/3.5%.

This set up a repeat of Gordon, Gino & Fred’s Road Trip to win at 8.30 with averages of 4.1%/3.1%.

The tail end of F&F did out-rate Three’s 9-1-1 (1.8%/1.5%) while lead-out The Man With the Penis on His Arm (3.2%/2.3%) dominated post-Gordo & Gino (Three’s 9-1-1 Lone Star averaged 0.9%/0.7%).

Earlier, TVNZ 2’s comedy/soap block appears to have recovered its viewership after the Big Brother Australia debacle decimated ratings, but TVNZ 1’s mix of game show, news and infotainment remains unassailable.

Duke’s The Office (UK) and The Orville averaged 0.8%/0.8% and 0.2%/0.1% respectively while Prime’s movie Terminator 2 drew 0.0%/0.6%.

TVNZ 1 won the night with 30+ shares of the key demos while Three led TVNZ 2 (albeit narrowly in the 18-49 race).

Note: These overnight ratings exclude viewership of the networks’ +1 SD channels.