Ratings for the twelfth episode of the first season of the new series, Bad Wolf, on US television on the Sci Fi Channel, have come in: the telecast dropped a bit to a 1.02 household rating with an average of 1.3 million viewers, down from the previous broadcast ("Boom Town") two weeks before and the smallest average audience to date for a Doctor Who original this season. The show was on a week-long hiatus, with viewers possibly tuning out after the lack of a broadcast the week before. Season-to-date, Sci Fi reports that Doctor Who is currently averaging a 1.27 household rating and an average audience of 1.5 million viewers for the season. The season finale airs this Friday, June 9.

BARB today released the final ratings for week ending 21 May, which see the BBC One transmission of The Age of Steel rising from its overnight figure of 6.93 million to a consolidated final ratings figure of 7.63 million viewers. The episode's timeshift figure of 0.7m is the highest of the week, with various episodes of Coronation Street, EastEnders, New Tricks and The Bill all getting a timeshift of 0.4m. The episode remains second in the chart for Saturday 20 May, behind the annual Eurovision Song Contest, seventh for the week on BBC One, fifteenth for the week across UK television, and the eighth most watched show of the week; the programme's earlier timeslot for that week left it trailing several episodes of ITV1's Emmerdale for the first time this year. On BBC Three, Doctor Who Confidential on 21 May heads the BARB chart with 0.63m viewers, with the Sunday repeat of The Age of Steel in second place with 0.62m viewers.

The final figure for The Age of Steel represents a year-on-year increase of 0.52m on the 7.11m achieved by The Empty Child on the same weekend in 2005. This continues Series Two's almost unbroken track record of increased viewing figures against last year's episodes, with only Dalek performing significantly better for Series One. Yesterday's article in Media Guardian suggesting that viewers are disappearing from Doctor Who has been picked up by several other UK news media, most of which repeat various errors in that original article. In fact, this year's episodes have seen audiences increase against last year, from an average across the six weeks of 7.90m to a 2006 average of 8.49m. This year's episodes have also - so far - performed as well as or better than last year's in terms of chart positions.


Final figures are not yet available for the episode that provoked Media Guardian's article, The Idiot's Lantern, although its bank holiday weekend overnights (6.32m, 1st/19th) were also higher than last year's overnights (also on a bank holiday weekend) for "The Doctor Dances" (6.17m, 1st/18th). The pattern established by Series One is continuing, with the ratings dips following the same trends as last year but with smaller actual dips. BBC Three's repeat ratings continue to show an upwards trend whenever the BBC One debut has a lower audience, suggesting that the story Media Guardian may have missed is that a similar-sized total audience is making use of digital reruns and home recording each week to maintain an average total weekly audience of, currently, c.9.47m. (The same - widely ignored - pattern can generally be observed whenever one of the main soaps performs disappointingly in its main showing.) All of which is a roundabout way of saying that Doctor Who's UK success actually seems to be continuing, and suggestions that viewers are tiring of it are somewhat exaggerated...

Meanwhile, The Idiot's Lantern has also continued the series' consistent run of very strong AI figures, with the episode scoring an excellent 84 on Saturday, still among the higher AIs since the series' return, beaten by only three of 2005's episodes, though not as high as the 86 scored by both episodes of the preceding Cybermen story.

Ratings for the tenth episode of the first season of the new series, Boom Town, on US television on the Sci Fi Channel, have come in: the telecast dropped a bit to a 1.03 with an average of 1.2 million viewers, down approximately 200,000 viewers from the previous week. Season-to-date, Sci Fi reports that Doctor Who is currently averaging a 1.28 household rating and an average audience of 1.5 million viewers for the season. The show will not air this Friday due to the US Memorial Day weekend holiday, but will return on Friday, June 2.

Ratings for the tenth episode of the first season of the new series, The Doctor Dances, on US television on the Sci Fi Channel, have come in: the telecast had a slightly improved household rating this week of 1.09 with an average of 1.4 million viewers, up nearly a quarter of a million viewers from the previous week's season low. Season-to-date, Sci Fi reports that Doctor Who is currently averaging a 1.30 household rating and an average audience of 1.5 million viewers for the season.

As we noted early in the week, Doctor Who was one of the awards announced in the BAFTA coverage as shown on ITV, coming up about forty minutes into the show which was hosted by Bad Wolf guest voice Davina McColl. Kevin Whately and Amanda Holden announced the nominees in the Drama Series category, and the clip shown of Doctor Who was of thousands of Daleks flying through space from The Parting of the Ways. Here's a recap of what transpired:

Billie Piper, Phil Collinson, Julie Gardner and Russell T Davies came on stage to accept the award after the winner was announced, with David Tennant applauding from back at the show's table. Gardner did the acceptance speech on their behalf, thanking Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper and particularly Davies as well as everyone else who makes the show. When she mentioned Davies, his name got a large round of applause from the audience. Then suddenly from the wings - and much to the audience's delight - a Dalek appeared. Oddly, given that press and last night's news coverage had shown a regular gold Dalek gliding down the red carpet, this Dalek, although new series style in construction, was painted jet black. It angrily announced, with the familiar Nick Briggs voice, that "all BAFTAs will be surrended to the Daleks!", before Kevin Whately foiled it by placing his hand over its eye. The Dalek protested that it could not see, and then sternly warned them not to touch the Dalek. Gardner, clearly quite amused by the creature's presence, admitted that they wouldn't have been there without the Daleks.

One hour into the show the winner of the Pioneer Audience Award was announced, the nominees for which had been shown in two groups of four clips earlier in the evening between other awards. This award was announced by the Chairman of Pioneer, who simply stood there and didn't say anything, and much-loved British television actor Sir David Jason. Jason ran briefly through the nominees, and compared Doctor Who to Strictly Come Dancing - "one is about a spry but eccentric one million year old man and his sexy sidekick, the other is about a flying police box." After Jason, following some initial struggles with the envelope, announced Doctor Who as the winner, Billie Piper accepted the award on her own, the theme tune playing loudly through the hall as she walked to the stage. Grinning and describing the award as "a treat!" she enthused about how much the award meant to the cast and crew and how grateful they were, before wishing everyone else a "great evening".

Finally, around one hour twenty minutes into the ceremony, David Tennant came on stage. After speaking briefly about Dennis Potter, he said how any writer who receives an award presented in Potter's name must be very special. He then said how he was proud to count Davies as a boss and a friend, and then outlined the writer's career and achievements to date. There then followed a collection of clips of Davies's work since The Grand, interspersed with clips of actors and colleagues enthusing about his work. They included Julie Gardner, Nina Sosanya (Casanova), Anthony Cotton (Queer as Folk), Lesley Sharp (Bob & Rose and The Second Coming), Matt Lucas (Casanova), Nicola Shindler (founder of Red Production Company), David Liddiment (former Director of Programmes at ITV) and Billie Piper. Said Tennant, "Dennis Potter understood that television was an art form that was new and unique. His writing was consistently fresh, often controversial and always stimulating. Television drama would never be the same again after him. Any writer who gets a BAFTA presented in his name has to be something very special indeed. It is safe to say that tonight's winner is just that. He is one of the most unique voices in television today. I am delighted to describe him as my boss, but I'm proud as punch to call him a friend. It is Russell T Davies. ... A self-confessed Doctor Who enthusiast, Russell achieved the apparently unachievable – revitalising and updating a television icon that many thought was beyond redemption. But he injected the series with a heart, a wit and an imagination that made a forty year-old concept fresher than just about anything else around it. Russell's great friend, the writer Paul Abbott, said: 'the humanity and wit that Russell crams into the tiniest corners of human behaviour sets him far far above the professional typists masquerading as writers in this industry'. The exceptional quality of his output is only achieved by a working day that would leave most Calvinists shrinking in shame. He is the finest inspiration any friend and colleague could wish for, and he's given me two of the best roles that I could ever hope to get, so it is a great, great privilege for me to be chosen tonight to present the Dennis Potter Award to a man so fabulously deserving." Tennant then introduced a montage of clips followed by introducing Davies, who came to the stage to great applause and hugged Tennant. He thanked the Academy for "an honour beyond words". He said there were too many people to thank it was like "drowning in a sea of faces in your head". He thanked his agent and his boyfriend, and then thanked his friend Sally Watson, not a member of the television industry, but who once told him "why don't you write like you?" when he worried about comparing himself to other writers. He claimed it was the best piece of advice he had ever been given.

(Thanks to Paul Hayes)

Ratings for the ninth episode of the first season of the new series, The Empty Child, on US television on the Sci Fi Channel, have come in: the telecast had a household rating of 1.04 with an average of 1.2 million viewers, a drop of a tenth of a million viewers and the lowest broadcast of the new season to date. (The broadcast took place on Cinco de Mayo, however, with viewing levels possibly affected in the evening; ratings on the broadcast networks were also noticeably down that night.) Season-to-date, Sci Fi reports that Doctor Who is currently averaging a 1.29 household rating and an average audience of 1.5 million viewers for the season.

Doctor Who was the main winner at tonight's prestigious industry awards, the BAFTA Awards (or British Academy of Film and Television Arts Awards), taking all three of the awards for which it was nominated.Billie Piper and a Dalek accepted the award for Best Drama Series, as well as the Pioneer Audience Award for best television programme of 2005. Russell T Davies won the Dennis Potter Award for outstanding writing for television, which was presented to him by a kilted David Tennant. Davies is reported as saying, "We were told that bringing it back would be impossible, that we would never capture this generation of children. But we did it."

The BAFTA Awards ceremony will be televised from 9pm on Monday on ITV.


The show's success, alongside a number of other BBC successes, dominates much of the early coverage of the awards ceremony, with a two-minute report appearing on BBC News 24 and BBC One's evening news (also available online at BBC News); this report includes a brief clip of the Dalek arriving for the ceremony and David Tennant speaking to reporters on the programme's "cross-nation appeal". The Guardianappears to be making Doctor Who's awards front-page news, with "Doctor Who finally materialises on red carpet as TV series scoops drama prize" concentrating on the supposed previous lack of industry awards for the series, discussed by Russell T Davies in a recent Guardian podcast. (In fact, the series has won several industry awards, as previously reported by Outpost Gallifrey, although it missed out at the Royal Television Society Awards in March.)

In related news, actress Anna Maxwell Martin, who played ill-begotten employee Suki Macrae Cantrell in last season's The Long Game, won the Best Actress award for her role in BBC One's Bleak House, which also won the award for Best Drama Serial.

The results have also been reported in a second story by the Guardian, as well as The Independent, The Scotsman, The Times, Times Entertainment, The Sun, The Telegraph, This Is London, GMTV,icNetwork,NewsWire, Ireland Online, Breaking News, Irish Examiner, Evening Echo, Ananova, Newsquest.

ITV.com, ITN and Channel 4 News also cover the story but leads with the ITV network's only success of the evening, The X Factor.

TV, Radio Coverage: Tonight's evening news bulletin on BBC One at 10.30pm had a short report on the BAFTA winners towards the end of the fifteen-minute programme. There were no clips from the actual ceremony, only from the winning shows and behind-the-scenes and red carpet moments, the main event doubtless embargoed until the ITV1 broadcast tomorrow, but it was still a nice little report. Presented by reporter David Sillitoe, he opened by saying that Doctor Who was "the big winner" of the night, over a clip of the TARDIS crash-landing from The Christmas Invasion. There was a clip of David Tennant saying to the gathered press that the show had "a cross-nation appeal... unlike anything else I've ever been involved with." There was then coverage of some of the other winners, before Sillitoe finished by comparing the two main winners of the night, Doctor Who and Bleak House, describing them as "two dramas there were a gamble, but both proved that they could strike a chord with the public and the academy." The evening's triumphs for Doctor Who were also covered tonight on the BBC's news and sport talk station, Radio 5 Live, on The Weekend News programme, hosted by Lesley Ashmall and John Pienaar. The report, just after the 9.30pm news and sport bulletin at about 9.37pm. The report was from their man on the spot Colin Paterson, who opened by announcing Doctor Who as the big winner of the night. He happened to have Little Britain's Matt Lucas with him, who he asked about the show's success, although Lucas was somewhat bemused, not having been in the show as Paterson seemed to have thought he was, Paterson having assumed the comic was in it as he'd been in the premiere last year. Nonetheless, Lucas said he was glad that Doctor Who had won. Paterson mentioned that Russell T Davies had won the Dennis Potter Award for Outstanding Writing for Television, before moving onto rounding up the other winners.

General TV Series NewsMay 3, 2006 • Posted By Shaun Lyon
Ratings for the eighth episode of the first season of the new series, Father's Day, on US television on the Sci Fi Channel, are in. The numbers varied from those as reported the previous week; while the average household rating was slightly down, to 1.14, the average viewing audience held at 1.4 million viewers. (We don't know what the exact relationship is between the rating and the viewership figures, apart from the fact that the viewer numbers held this week.) Season-to-date, Sci Fi reports that Doctor Who is currently averaging a 1.32 household rating and an average audience of 1.5 million viewers for the season.

Ratings for the seventh episode of the first season of the new series, The Long Game, on US television on the Sci Fi Channel, are in. The numbers were slightly up from the previous week, averaging a 1.20 household rating with an average viewing audience of 1.4 million viewers, up one-tenth of a million from the previous week's low for "Dalek". Season-to-date, Sci Fi reports that Doctor Who is currently averaging a 1.35 household rating and an average audience of 1.6 million viewers for the season (noting also that the audience, according to their current mid-season demographics, is 64% male/36% female, with a median age of 47 years.)

It may not necessarily win during the big national award ceremony, but Doctor Who has won five categories at theBAFTA Cymru awards, the BAFTA ceremony for television and film made in Wales. The program today won the awards for Best Drama Series, Best Drama Director, Best Costume Design, Best Make-up Design and Best Photography Direction. Series executive producer Russell T Davies also the Sian Phillips Award for Outstanding Contribution to Network Television. In a quote to BBC News, BBC Wales head of English programmes Clare Hudson says, "We are thrilled that the spectacular contribution made by Russell T Davies to television over the past few years has won him such a very special award."