Has My Kitchen Rules jumped the shark? Channel 7 cooking show premieres to lowest ratings ever
My Kitchen Rules premiered to its lowest ratings ever on Sunday night and viewers have blamed everything from the “boring” themes to petty drama.
Confidential
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The new season of My Kitchen Rules has been touted as the “fiercest competition yet”, but the reality cooking show seems to have lost its spark.
Sunday night’s season 11 premiere of MKR: The Rivals debuted to 498,000 viewers across the five city metro market, registering as the franchise’s lowest launch ever according to OzTam ratings figures.
This disappointing figure is down 39 per cent after last year’s launch attracted 819,000 viewers.
The show was thrashed by the Australian Open Men’s Final between Novak Djokovic and Dominic Thiem, which drew a five city metro audience of 1.52 million people. Channel 10’s I’m a Celebrity... Get Me Out of Here finale scored 884,000 viewers.
Since launching in 2010, My Kitchen Rules, which features judge Pete Evans and mentors Manu Feildel and Colin Fassnidge, has always maintained at least one million viewers during the premiere however last year marked the first time that ratings dropped below the million mark.
The show peaked at an impressive 1.7 million viewers during the season five premiere but has consistently dropped every season since.
Channel 7 took a gamble with the last few seasons, by focusing on drama between contestants as opposed to the cooking.
Viewers were left outraged during season nine when Sydney cooks Sonya Mefaddi and Hadil Faiza were embroiled in tense feuds with fellow contestants. This eventually led to them both being unceremoniously booted from the show and they later received death threats on social media.
Boring as
— Rae (@lucky_rae) February 2, 2020
@mykitchenrules thought it was going to be different this year but sadly name calling has started already
— Lady Eve Herbert-Sadler (@drummergran) February 2, 2020
I’m not the biggest #MKR fan. The wife likes to watch it, so I will glance every now and then.. but this season kind of feels stupid.. why are they not cooking in their own house?
— zachyp35 (@zachyp35) February 2, 2020
I thought it was “My Kitchen Rulesâ€.. just odd
The uncomfortable viewing continued the following year on season 10 and premiere ratings significantly dropped to 819,000.
The latest season sees “five favourite teams go head-to-head with five new teams”, however viewers have already tuned out.
On social media, critics blamed everything from the “boring” theme to the petty drama.
One viewer tweeted, “Thought it was going to be different this year but sadly name calling has started already.”
Another wrote, “”Boring as”.
Channel 7 did not respond to Confidential’s request for comment.