Frozen Planet

This, the final week of ratings may be one of the biggest weeks of the TV year as Networks fall over themselves trying to extract every last possible ratings point, but disappointingly, none of this content is in HD.

With the three commercial HD channels ONE, GEM and 7mate running their own unique programming, apart from the odd encore from time to time – as we often see on GEM – none of this week’s big shows will be seen in HD.

The few shows that do air in HD on these channels are mostly represented by movies, with a few other series also airing in HD.

So just how much – or how little HD – is there this week?

Here is the summary.

Sunday (6.00pm – midnight)
ONE
8.30 Movie: The Transporter

GEM
8.30 Movie: Mona Lisa Smile
11.00 Friends x 2

7mate
9.30 Movie: DOA: Dead Or Alive

Monday
ONE
6.00 Jeopardy! (Mon-Fri)
10.30 NFL

GEM
6.00 Friends (Mon-Fri)
7.30 Michaela’s Road Trip
10.30 Secret Diary of a Call Girl
11.30 Friends (Mon-Thur)

7mate
7.00pm How I Met Your Mother (Mon-Thur)
7.30pm How I Met Your Mother

Tuesday
GEM
8.30 The Closer
9.30 Rizolli & Isles
10.30 Megacities

ONE
9.30 Rush (confirmed now airing in HD)

Wednesday
ONE
10.30 RPM
11.30 NFL

GEM
8.30 Movie: The Perfect Storm

7mate
8.30 Hardcore Pawn
9.30 American Pickers

Thursday
ONE
8.30 Movie: 12 Rounds
10.50 Ultimate Fighter

7mate
7.30 Pawn Stars
8.30 Lockdown

Friday
ONE
7.30 Tools of The Trade
8.30 Movie: The Marine

GEM
7.30 Frozen Planet
8.30 The Mentalist
9.30 Movie: The Client

7mate
5.30 Big Fat Liar
7.30 How I Met Your Mother
8.30 My Name is Earl
9.30 Movie: American Pie Presents: The Naked Mile

Saturday
GEM
5.30 Drop Dead Diva
8.30 CSI: NY
9.30 CSI: Miami
10.30 CSI

7mate
6.30 Mighty Structures (note the 2nd ep at 7.30 is not HD)
10.50 WWII Lost Films

Worst night for HD content – Tuesday. Best night – Friday. As one can see, slim pickings for free to air HD considering just how much content there is over all the channels.

Some of the shows airing on the main channels that we COULD be seeing in HD, if they were aired on a HD channel include Wild Boys, Bones, Castle, Parenthood, Criminal Minds and The Amazing Race for Seven. On Nine, CSI, CSI: Miami, The Big Bang Theory, The Mentalist, Two and a Half Men, Mike & Molly, Frozen Planet, Person of Interest, Prime Suspect and Unforgettable could be seen in HD. WHile on Ten, Merlin, Terra Nova, Ringer, Glee, Modern Family, Law & Order, Law & Order: SVU and White Collar could be seen in HD if aired on a HD channel.

Note all the major reality series that dominate our ratings including Celebrity Apprentice, Junior Masterchef, The X Factor, The One and Beauty and the Geek – all of which conclude this week – are not even made in HD.

Programming information correct at November 20 and subject to change. HD information based on TV guide information, Not all main channel shows that could air in HD are listed. Story focusses on prime time 6.00pm-midnight only. According to TV guide information, nothing on SBS HD actually airs in HD. ABC News 24 also lists no shows as being in HD, even though the channel is an HD channel as such.

The Celebrity Apprentice, Nine, 7.00pm
Down to the final four, it’s the toughest challenge yet when the losing celebrities return to fire things up.

ABC News Speical, ABC News 24, 7.30pm
While the main channels had afternoon coverage, the only free to air evening covergae of President Obama’s visit is on ABC News 24

Poh’s Kitchen on the Road, ABC1, 8.01pm
Final. The Far Far North. It’s the final leg of Poh’s road trip and emotion takes her by surprise as she bonds with the Yidinji people in North Queensland catching and cooking eels before sampling locally grown coconut and vanilla.

Frozen Planet, Nine, 8.30pm
People are not designed to live at the Poles and are pushed to the very edge of their survival capability. In this episode, Human life is explored and we discover how it brings out the best in human ingenuity.

Millionaire Matchmaker, Arena, 7.30pm AEDT
There’s No Place Like Home. New. Third-generation matchmaker Patti Stanger is back in Los Angeles, and she couldn’t be happier about it. Patti’s first millionaire is New Yorker Gary Mancuso Jr, a 39-year-old internet mogul. At first he comes across as your typical fast-talking east coaster, but he ends up displaying a few of his “multiple personalities”. Patti’s other client is the very handsome Michael Donnellan, a 34-year-old production company owner who grew up in Italy and has lived all over the world. He seems charming, but Patti sees through his BS from the start, suspecting he’s a control freak.

The legendary David Attenborough presents Frozen Planet, a landmark series that traverses the two greatest wilderness areas on Earth – the Arctic and Antarctic – from Sunday, October 30, at 6.30pm on Channel Nine.

Over six enthralling episodes, this series from the BBC Natural History Unit paints a portrait of the polar regions that will take your breath away at a time when melting of the ice caps means they might soon be changed forever.

This series crosses the spectacular landscape of the North and South Poles and gives viewers a never-seen-before look at their charismatic wildlife. Using unique aerial photography and underwater cameras that plunge into the icy polar depths, we follow the life journeys of the animals struggling for survival in this unforgiving environment: the polar bear, the albatross and the adelie penguin.

Frozen Planet is an ultimate natural history of the fascinating polar regions. Its journey into the southern hemisphere starts at the Antarctic Convergence, where cold water from Antarctica meets the warmer currents from the north. This massive expanse of ocean includes the roughest waters in the world, in the Drake Passage, and remote sub-Antarctic islands packed with wildlife.

In the northern hemisphere we traverse the Arctic Circle, which includes much of Alaska, the tundra regions of northern Canada and the vast taiga forests of Siberia.

Finally the series explores man’s presence at the North and South Poles – a presence that almost pales into insignificance in the grandeur of two of the most inhospitable regions on Earth.

 

FROZEN PLANET

Premiere episode – Sunday, October 30, at 6.30pm

Episode two – Wednesday, November 2 at 8.30pm on Nine