HD Ratings: Wells Well Up to the Task

Wednesday was a Jeremy Wells lovefest, with TVNZ 1’s Seven Sharp and TVNZ 2’s Taskmaster towering over the competition in the core commercial demographics.

At 7.00, Seven Sharp averaged a stonking 8.8% of 25-54 year-olds — double the viewership of Shortland Street and The Project and only 1.5 rating points behind 1 News at 6pm.

The trend was the same in the 18-49 race.

And at 8.30, the season-two premiere of Taskmaster averaged 3.8% of 25-54s and 3.3% of 18-49s vs 3.0% / 2.5% for TVNZ 1’s Location Location Location and 2.3% / 1.7% for Three’s LA’s Finest.

Even so, it couldn’t match last Wednesday’s Russell Howard Stands Up to the World final, which averaged 4.1% / 3.7% against the same competition.

Taskmaster’s success set up Would I Lie to You? to win the 9.30 hour, with 1.8% of 25-54s and 1.7% of 18-49s.

TVNZ 1’s Coronation Street edged out Three’s Hawaii Five-O for second place in the 25-54 demo and led it among 18-49s.

Prime’s premiere of Louis Theroux: Shooting Joe Exotica averaged 0.7% and 0.5% respectively of these key demos, on the back of 25-54 averages of 1.4% for Traffic Cops and 1.2% for Air Rescue.

At 7.30, TVNZ 1’s Beat the Chasers dwarfed its rivals, with 5.5% of 25-54s and 4.5% of 18-49s vs 3.8% / 2.9% for MasterChef Australia and 3.6% / 3.3% for The Block NZ.

TVNZ 1 won the night with 30+ shares of the 25-54 and 18-49 demos while TVNZ 2 and Three fought it out for second place: the former narrowly led with younger viewers and the latter with older.