ABC launches Take 5 on a high-ish note

Ahhhh, the morning after the night before, and Australian TV viewers were bereft of their former monarch’s guiding hand on their TV remotes.

So back to The Block, which with 986,000 topped Farmer Wants A Wife‘s 773,000 and won the night for Nine from Seven. The ABC started a new program: Take 5 With Zan Rowe. Interesting idea, sort of a remixed version of BBC Radio’s long-running Desert Island Discs — 474,000 for the first episode with Guy Pearce as the talent. OK.

Tonight is the final ep of Shaun Micallef’s Mad As Hell, and the Shaun-shaped hole in our lives and on our screens will be hard to fill.

Network channel share:

Nine (30.8%)
Seven (28.4%)
ABC (17.2%)
Ten (15.6%)
SBS (8.1%)

Network main channels:

Nine (22.4%)
Seven (20.4%)
ABC (12.2%)
Ten (9.3%)
SBS ONE (4.3%)

Top 5 digital channels:

7mate (3.9%)
10 Peach (3.3%)
7TWO (3.0%)
Gem (2.9%
GO (2.8%)

Top 10 national programs:

Seven News 6.30pm — 1.481 million
Seven News — 1.466 million
Nine News 6.30pm — 1.078 million
Nine News — 1.034 million
The Block (Nine) — 986,000
A Current Affair (Nine) — 909,000
Home and Away (Seven) — 863,000
7pm ABC News — 837,000
The Chase Australia 5.30pm (Seven) — 811,000
Farmer Wants a Wife (Seven) — 773,000

Top metro programs: none with a million or more viewers last night.

Regional Top 5: Seven News 6.30pm 529,000; Seven News, 512,000; Home and Away, 338,000; Farmer Wants A Wife, 307,000; The Chase Australia 5.30pm, 301,000

Losers: With no queen to see off, just another boring Tuesday night.

Metro news and current affairs: