Underbelly Razor

Underbelly Razor, Nine, 8.30pm
Final

Number One Ladies Detective Agency, ABC1, 8.30pm
Final

Movie: Julia & Julia, GEM, 8.30pm

Movie: Napoleon Dynamite, ELEVEN, 8.30pm

Movie: Body of Lies, Nine, 9.30pm

In the week of November 6-12  on Nine will be the season finale of Underbelly Razor as well as the last Joy Of Sets. Other than that, the week remains the same as usual. Refreshingly stable programming from Nine.

Sunday Nov 6
6.30 Frozen Planet
7.30 60 Minutes
8.30 Underbelly: Razor – Final
9.30 Person of Interest
10.30 Prime Suspect rpt
11.30 Flashpoint

Monday Nov 7
7.00 Celebrity Apprentice Australia
8.00 The Big Bang Theory NEW
8.30 The Mentalist NEW
9.30 CSI: Miami NEW
10.30 CSI: Miami rpt
11.30 Better With You
12.00 Undercovers

Tuesday Nov 8
7.00 Celebrity Appretice Australia
7.30 The Big Bang Theory rpt x 2
8.30 Two and a Half Men NEW
9.00 Mike & Molly NEW
9.30 Survivor: South Pacific
10.30 The Joy of Sets: The Final Curtain? Or Begging For A Second Series?
11.00 Embarassing Bodies

Wednesday Nov 9
7.00 Celebrity Apprentice Australia
8.00 Young Doctors
8.30 CSI NEW
9.30 Person of Interest
10.30 Who Do You Think You Are? Tim McGraw – season final
11.30 Better With You. Season Final

Thursday Nov 10
7.00 Celebrity Apprentice Australia
7.30 RBT
8.30 Unforgettable
9.30 CSI: Miami Rpt
10.30 Chase
11.30 Rubicon

Friiday Nov 11
7.00 Celebrity Apprentice Australia – All Fired Up
7.30 Two and a Half Men rpt x 2
8.30 Movie TBA

And on GEM, Monday night see the season finales of The Big C and Weeds from 10.30pm Monday Nov 7.

Terra Nova, 8.30pm, TEN
In the year 2149 the world is dying. With no way to reverse the damage to the planet, a coalition of scientists has found a portal to a new world and a new start – 85 million years in the past.

Underbelly: Razor, 8.30pm, Nine
Frank Green sparks a deadly vendetta that will tear Kate Leigh’s gang apart. With Big Jim facing the noose over a murder charge, Tilly reveals she is pregnant.

Wild Boys, 7.30pm, Seven
Dan’s past comes back to haunt him when an old girlfriend convinces him to marry her. The Wild Boys are also being threatened by a new bushranger in town, who’s dangerous, eccentric and rather elusive.

Junior MasterChef, 7.30pm, TEN
Our top 50 young cooks face two last challenges to earn a place in the MasterChef kitchen. They need to cook the ultimate cake for the ultimate guest – the Prime Minister of Australia Julia Gillard!

Alessandro’s Italian Food Challenge, 6.35pm, SBS TWO
Italian chef Alessandro Borghese travels across regional Italy searching for the best in traditional dishes. At each visit, Alessandro studies a traditional local recipe before offering up his own contemporary re-interpretation.

Nine rearranges Wednesday nights.

Prior to its premiere on Monday, Nine were promoting that The Farmer Wants a Wife would continue Wednesdays, yet Wednesdays still featured Top Design in the schedule at 7.30 with RPA at 8.30.

Now, The Farmer Wants a Wife will air at 7.30pm Wednesdays, which will be its regular timeslot from now on. At 8.30 a repeat of The Mentalist (odd choice), followed by RPA at 9.30 then Top Design at 10.30pm. Meanwhile on GEM, the same episode of Top Design airs at 8.30pm, while The Closer and Rizolli & Isles revert back to their usual times of 9.30 and 10.30 respectively.

Nine’s encore Night – GEM Friday night.

Both the Monday night and Wednesday night episodes of The Farmer Wants a Wife will air on GEM this Friday August 26, from 7pm. Then, at 9.30pm is an encore of Underbelly: Razor (presumably in HD) for the benefit of those who did not catch it first time round or want to see it again. The Farmer Wants a wife is also encored on Nine on the weekend – check local guides.

$#*! My Programming Is?

According to a promo tonight on Nine, next Tuesday (August 30) at 8pm is a new episode of $#*! My Dad Says. My question is why? If it didn’t rate before, what makes them think it will rate now?

Other changes…

There was a The Block Unlocked scheduled for 6.30pm, Sunday August 28, now that is out, in favour for two episodes of RBT from 6.30 – 7.30pm. Monday August 29 at 8pm is TBA, while Big Bangs remain at 7.30pm Monday and Tuesday, as well as Thursday at 7.30 and 8.00pm. That’s on top of weeknights at 7pm, and a few episodes on GO!

 The grand finale of The Block and the premiere of Underbelly: Razor have combined to secure the biggest night of ratings on Australian television for 2011. Together, these led the Nine Network to the highest winning shares of 2011, with a clean sweep of all demos across the 5 City Metro.

The Nine Network dominated the night’s viewing, securing the Top 6 shows across the 5 City Metro in all demos.  With Total People, the Nine Network had a dominant winning share of 46.9% of the free-to-air audience (Total People, 5 City Metro). With People 25-54, the Nine Network secured a massive share of 51.9%. With People 18-49, the Nine Network delivered a 52.9% share. With People 16-39, the Nine Network achieved a 54.8% share. The Nine Network’s share of People 25-54 (51.9%) was the highest nightly share of any free-to-air network in Nine’s target demo since the introduction of OzTam in 2001 (excluding sporting events).

The emotion-charged finale of The Block – Winner Announced in which underdog couple Polly and Waz won Australia’s most popular renovation competition becomes the highest rating program of 2011. The Block – Winner Announced secured a massive average Total People audience of 4.380 million, with a peak of 4.875 million (5 City Metro & Regional combined). Across the 5 City Metro, The Block – Winner Announced achieved an average audience of 3.089 million, with a mammoth peak of 3.428 million.

The premiere of Underbelly: Razor was the most successful program launch for 2011, recording the highest ratings for the launch of any new show for the year-to-date. It catapulted itself into the record books as the  second highest rating drama episode (behind Underbelly: A Tale of Two Cities) since official OzTam figures began.

Underbelly: Razor (Episode One) attracted a peak Total People audience of 4.045 million, with an average of 3.482 million (5 City Metro & Regional combined). Across the 5 City Metro, it achieved a peak audience of 2.867 million viewers and an average of 2.510 million.

Nine Network Managing Director Jeffrey Browne said: “We’re thrilled that Australians embraced the journey of our four couples on The Block throughout their rollercoaster ride over the past two months. The figures across the entire series have been phenomenal and prove that free-to-air television is stronger than ever and clearly the No. 1 medium for entertainment.

“The launch of Underbelly: Razor shows that Australians love nothing more than to see historic tales from their own backyard come to life on the small screen. We know this is a great product and trust that viewers will continue to enjoy the drama unfold over the coming months.”

Nine are hoping for their biggest night of the year as they air the two hour finale of The Block 2011 at 6.30pm Sunday August 21, followed by the two hour premiere of Underbelly Razor at 8.30pm.

The 2011 finale of The Block will feature the auction of the four houses which will determine which couple wins the series taking out the grand prize. The winning couple takes home $100,000 as well as the profit their house delivers. The other three couples leave only with their profit – which could well mean – that should any of the properties sell below their reserve, the couple responsible for that renovation leaves with nothing to show for their time on The Block.

Nine are hoping the finale pulls at least 2 million viewers and delivers a solid lead in for the Underbelly Razor premiere. The 2003 finale of the first season of The Block pulled 3.3 million viewers and still remains amongst the most watched shows of the last ten years.

Underbelly Razor is the fourth series (excluding the three telemovies that aired earlier this year) and again is based on real events. This time, the series is set in and around Kings Cross in Sydney in the 1920′s. Promos show some spectacular scenes depicting Sydney of the time, including a partial Sydney harbour bridge as construction was carried out during the late 1920′s.

The Block 2011 finale – 6.30pm Sunday August 21 on Nine.

Underbelly Razor – 8.30pm Sundays from August 21 on Nine.

Today marks my second anniversary writing for Throng Australia.

It all started two years ago, on May 6, 2009 with a post about frustrating TV scheduling discussing how time on free to air TV are never what they really are, and how EPGs that are not up to date to the minute means that shows can start up to 15 minutes late or sometimes, early as well. As recently as last Wednesday, the premiere of BIG on Nine was advertised as a 9.30 start, but ended up starting at 9.44. While the EPG for Nine was correct with a 9.44 start, it is still a far cry from the advertised time of 9.30pm.

The free to air TV landscape has changed considerably in the last two years. So much so, our networks are still getting used to it, understanding the new demands the multi channel environment place on them.

In May 2009, ONE HD was just six weeks old, after having launched in March that year as the first free to air full time sports channel and taking away Ten’s high definition channel. Nine’s first multi channel GO! was nothing more than a speculative rumour of a channel that was believed to be called GO!99, while nothing – not even a whisper was coming out of Seven about its multi channel plans.

Both Seven and Nine at the time were broadcasting HD break aways for around 6 hours a day, with break away programming for a few hours in the middle of the day, and more late night. HD break away programming gave viewers more options, but rarely offered any significant programming.

Overall, there were then 8 full time free to air digital channels, including SBS News as one of them. SBS News became SBS TWO in June 2009. Add to those 8 free to air channels another two for 7HD and 9HD, and there were 10 channels at times. Yet Freeview promotions advertised 15 free to air channels!

In May 2009, a little cooking show called Masterchef was airing on Ten six nights a week including 7.30pm Sunday and 7pm Monday to Friday. The idea was just starting to catch on, with an average of 1.2 million watching each night. Last year, at the same time 1.6-1.7 million. This year Masterchef is almost at 2010 levels – but the difference being, this year, it is the first week – the top 50 week.

Meanwhile, in May 2009, Nine were having problems with their Tuesday night programming, with shares around 6% below that of Seven and Ten. Talkin’ ‘Bout Your Generation was reaching over 1.6 million (nowadays, it‘s usually half that), NCIS 1.5 million. Seven’s Tuesday night included All Saints, still drawing over 1.1 million viewers. Nine’s Tuesday night was filled with Two and a Half Men, 20 To 1 and Underbelly repeats – none of which were doing anywhere near the business of programming on Seven and Ten.

Scroll forward two years and we do indeed have 15 free to air channels – the number effectively doubling that of 2009. 16 if you include community TV – which also has gone digital over the last 12 months. While the extra channels give viewers plenty of choices, they have redefined the level of ratings that determine what constitutes a show being a success or not.

At the same time as having these extra free to air channels, the amount of HD content has dropped to its lowest level in years. Free to air, prior to 2009, was a prime source for HD content. Now, with Foxtel launching over 30 channels in the past two years, most of them in HD, Pay TV has taken over as being the major broadcast source for HD TV – for those who can afford it.

In 2009, anything less than a million in prime time was effectively a flop. Now, figures below a million in prime time on main channels are a regular occurrence. Networks often have to accept prime time figures of 600,000 – 800,000 for some shows. This all just makes any show that surges past the million and over the 1.5 million mark all that more successful – which brings us back to Masterchef – even with 15 channels of choice, the phenomenon is still stronger than ever, and if the first week’s figures are anything to go by, then we are set for another record breaking year for the show.

And, again, Nine are faced with difficulties on Tuesday night, despite airing two of their high profile shows – AFP and Sea Patrol. The combination of Masterchef and NCIS on Ten and Australia’s Got Talent and Winners & Losers on Seven all that more stronger than Nine’s offerings.

So far 2011 has been a one sided ratings race with Seven winning every single week of the ratings year as well as the two Easter non-ratings weeks. With strong programming on its main channel, and two digital channels with well defined programming and objectives, nothing seems to be able to stop the network this year.

Ten, in reaction to low ratings are relaunching ONE HD as more of a general entertainment channel during prime time. The channel will still offer sports, but also mostly young male oriented programming in the evenings perhaps aimed to capture some of the market 7mate have taken. The new ONE, Masterchef on Ten, and ongoing and growing success of ELEVEN will see Ten a lot more competitive over coming months. As it stands, in the first week of Masterchef have ranked second, behind Seven and ahead of Nine for a number of nights of the week, as well as first on Monday night when the finale of The Biggest Loser aired.

Nine, on the other hand, are dogged with constant programming changes, digital channels that seem to have no real direction and shows that simply cannot pull an audience. The combination of unstable programming, last minute scheduling decisions, a lack of time to promote anything new on the channel and a fairly large degree of viewer dissatisfaction with the network are placing Nine in a precarious position for 2011.

Looking forward, and 2011 will almost certainly be another year that is won by Seven. Seven has The Amazing Race Australia premiering soon, Packed to the Rafters to return later in the year and a number of new titles set to premiere over coming months. Ten and Nine will fight it out for second, but it all depends on what Ten does post-Masterchef.

Nine does have Underbelly Razor later this year, but interest on the franchise is dwindling – so it will be interesting to see how it goes. Then there is The Block to air at 7pm weeknights – a gamble, which may or may not breathe life into Nine’s early evening.

After Masterchef, Ten have The Renovators which is set to be the next big reality competition series, described as being the Block on steroids. The network also has new Aussie series Inside Out, essentially a remake of hit series from the late 70’s and 80’s Prisoner.

In the meantime, here at Throng we will continue to keep you up to date, bringing you the latest TV news, ratings information, programming summaries, up to the minute programming amendments and much, much more.

Now for another year.

This time next year, in 2012, Masterchef will be back for its fourth year, while Seven will be in control of the free to air AFL broadcast rights, for at least four games a week. Still no word if any games will end up on Ten, or even Nine. At the same time, all Nine AFL games each week will be able to be seen live on Fox Sports.

As for free to air, TV channels, unless there is a drastic change in the way the networks are allowed to arrange their digital channels, we won’t see any new channels in the next 12 months, unless, of course, there is a miracle at SBS and SBS THREE materialises!

Nine have released to the media their major new shows and significant returning titles for 2011.

The release focuses mainly on new and ongoing Australian productions but Nine favourites like The Big Bang Theory, Two and a Half Men and The Mentalist all get a mention.

Here is the release:

Channel Nine announced today a number of new productions for 2011, adding to the already outstanding schedule from 2010 that won the network the ratings battle in all key demographics (16-39s, 25-54s, and 18-49s).

First up, the most anticipated new series from the producers of Australia’s number one drama, comes the gripping new instalment, UNDERBELLY RAZOR. Set during the roaring ‘20s in Sydney, when organised crime in Australia began. This is the story of the bloody battle between the era’s most feared vice queens – Tilly Devine and her rival Kate Leigh. It’s the most ambitious, daring UNDERBELLY yet.

Two of Australia’s great comedic talents, Tony Martin and Ed Kavalee, will be reunited on Nine in 2011 in The Joy Of Sets, giving viewers their unique take on television; the good, the bad and the fabulously misguided. From Zapruder’s Other Films (producers of The Gruen Transfer) The Joy Of Sets will take you to parts of the television universe you never knew existed.

Strengthening this line up of laughter, Nine welcomes international comedy icon BEN ELTON and his new creation, BEN ELTON LIVE FROM PLANET EARTH. A live comedy show jampacked with Ben’s unique take on pop culture, direct from Melbourne each week.

And, in anticipation of the 2012 London Olympics Games, Nine is delighted that John Clarke and Gina Riley will star in an all new series of the John Clarke/Ross Stevenson mockumentary, THE GAMES – London Calling.

Finally, Australia’s guru of lifestyle television, JAMIE DURIE returns home to Nine, hosting a massive new series, TOP DESIGN. Jamie will take viewers on a journey, searching the country to find people from all walks of life who are passionate about design and renovation. They will then be put to the test to create a masterpiece in this exciting new make over show.

These outstanding new productions join the strongest Nine schedule yet:

Nine, the Home of Drama: UNDERBELLY RAZOR, three major UNDERBELLY movie events – Tell Them Lucifer was Here, Infiltration and The Man Who Got Away, Rescue Special Ops – series 3 and Sea Patrol 5: Damage Control, The Mentalist and the CSI franchise.

Nine, the Home of Entertainment: All new Top Gear UK & Australia, Customs, RBT, RPA, Hot Property, This is Your Life, The Block, Getaway, The Farmer Wants a Wife and Millionaire Hot Seat.

Nine, the Home of Laughter: $#*! My Dad Says, Mike & Molly, Two and a Half Men, The Big Bang Theory, Hot in Cleveland, Mr Sunshine and Episodes.

Nine, the Home of the most respected News and Current Affairs: Nine News, A Current Affair, 60 Minutes and the Today Show.

Nine, the Home of Sport: The ASHES, the World Cup Cricket, the NRL and State of Origin series, the Rugby Union World Cup, and coming in 2012, London Olympic Games.