Masterchef finale falls flat with viewers

THE once mighty Masterchef Australia is cooked with the announcement of its winner barely averaging one million metro viewers last night.

THE once mighty Masterchef Australia franchise is cooked with the announcement of its winner, Emma Dean, barely averaging one million metropolitan viewers last night.

On a very fragmented Sunday night’s viewing, the 2013 finale of the series that supercharged reality television averaged 1.057 million viewers in the five capital cities (and 1.380 million nationally) for its final segment after averaging 921,000 for its episode.

This compares poorly with previous series, of course, and is also down on this year's season launch of 1.107 million in June. The earlier Masterchef Professionals series earlier this year concluded with 980,000 viewers and last year’s Masterchef Australia finished with 2.314 million.

The series has been trumped by a Seven cooking show  that was created merely to try and spoil Masterchef's astounding success. My Kitchen Rules is now ascendant with the announcement of its 2013 winner averaging 3.27 million. Even the finales for The Block Sky High (2.8 million) and The Voice (2.3 million) have surpassed the one-time cooking phenomenon.

Network Ten has confirmed it is dumping all spin-offs of the reality cooking show including professional, all-stars, kids and celebrity versions to concentrate on its original Australian format next year.

The new hit reality contest is The X Factor, which topped Sunday night’s ratings with 1.360 million metro viewers as it went into live performance mode. It topped Nine’s Australia’s Got Talent, which averaged 1.057 million.

In the news battle, Seven won with 1.306 million against Nine News’ 1.275 million, with Seven having a rare win in Melbourne of 84,000 viewers thanks to the AFL lead-in match featuring Collingwood.

Seven won the night with a 26.1 per cent metro channel share against Nine’s 20.7 per cent, Ten’s 14.2 per cent and ABC1’s 12.0 per cent. Seven won among 25-54 year-olds with a 26.6 per cent channel share and a 32.6 per cent network share against Nine’s 21.3 per cent channel share and 30.7 per cent network share.

Seven’s Sunday was boosted by the continued good form of its US dramas Bones, with 1.023 million, and Castle (715,000), which attracted big viewer numbers well into the night.

ABC1’s Sunday schedule was down slightly on previous weeks with a Grand Designs repeat (687,000) drawing the series' worst Sunday result for the year.

Nine’s Underbelly: Squizzy also recorded its worst audience for the series, with 489,000 for its first episode and 381,000 for its second - well down on its average of 760,000 during its previous four weeks.

OZTAM OVERNIGHT RANKINGS, SEPTEMBER 1
1 THE X FACTOR LIVE PERFORMANCE Seven 1,360,000
2 SEVEN NEWS Seven 1,306,000
3 NINE NEWS SUNDAY Nine 1,275,000
4 AUSTRALIA'S GOT TALENT Nine 1,124,000
5 MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA - THE WINNER ANNOUNCED Ten 1,057,000
6 BONES Seven 1,023,000
7 60 MINUTES Nine 985,000
8 MASTERCHEF AUSTRALIA - FINALE NIGHT Ten 921,000
9 ABC NEWS ABC1 857,000
10 DREAM BUILD ABC1 719,000
11 CASTLE Seven 715,000
12 GRAND DESIGNS ABC1 687,000
13 THE TIME OF OUR LIVES ABC1 665,000
14 MODERN FAMILY Ten 497,000
15 UNDERBELLY: SQUIZZY Nine 489,000
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