ScreenScribe

The first reviews are in for Sky’s new SoHo drama, Banshee, and while opinion is split over its merits, Outrageous Fortune’s Antony Starr gets two thumbs up as the hero. Newsday dismissed Banshee as B-grade pulp, complete with “a grizzled hero fast with his fists (and the ladies), plenty of soft porn, graphic violence, implausible plotting, [...]

Series Premiere: Tricky Business (TV3, 8.30) Mercantile agents Kate and Rick have everything ahead of them, until Rick makes an ill-advised business decision that traps them deep in debt and means they have to sell up and move in with her parents. Don’t mistake this Aussie, cross-generational family drama for another Packed to the Rafters clone (complete with another [...]

NZ On Air has approved funding of $6.9 million for series two of TV3’s HD hit, The Almighty Johnsons. Thirteen more episodes of the ‘go gods’ comedy/drama have been commissioned from South Pacific Pictures for screening next year. The first series, which averaged a 9.8 rating and 25.7% share in TV3’s target 25-54 demographic, had [...]

TV2 tonight will screen a world premiere in HD. Panic at Rock Island is a disaster telemovie co-produced by Wellington’s Gibson Group and Goalpost Pictures Australia. It won’t air on Channel Nine until later in the year, making tonight’s 8.30 broadcast a world first. About two Kiwis at a Sydney Harbour rock concert where a [...]

TV2 is soon to resurrect Fringe in a new late-night slot. The stylish paranormal hour will resume its second-season HD run next month at 10.30pm on Thursdays. The demotion comes six months after TV2 squandered Fringe’s potential by teaming it with incompatible re-runs of The Mentalist opposite TV3’s HD juggernaut line-up of Outrageous Fortune and [...]

Fans of Westie hit Outrageous Fortune went wild over its series finale last night, when the six-year-old drama clocked up its highest ratings yet. An unprecedented 472,500 18-49 year-olds tuned into see how the Wests would ride off into the sunset. This equated to 28.4% of its target audience and an astonishing 51.5% channel share. [...]

Monday’s premiere of the HD reality hour, The Detectives, gave another HD sleuth, The Mentalist, something to think about when the two went head-to-head in the ratings. The Gibson Group commission drew 12.2% of TV One’s target demo, 25-54 year-olds, compared with 13% for TV2’s crimefighting juggernaut. The gap widened with the one demo all [...]

The next couple of weeks will see a slew of local shows debut in HD as well as an epic conspiracy serial that’s likely to be summer’s most compulsive drama. TV3 is replacing Outrageous Fortune, from November 16, with The Event, a riveting thriller that’s like 24 meets FlashForward, only more coherent than the latter [...]

TV3’s HD natural disaster dramatisation, Eruption, scorched the competition last night when it won its 8.30pm two-hour slot in all of the key demographics. It helped the network to win two nights in a row, with Tuesday’s Outrageous Fortune also beating the opposition. Eruption snared a roughly 27% share of not only TV3’s target audience, [...]

TV3 is banking on the unprecedented popularity of Outrageous Fortune to give newcomer The Big C a big head start in the ratings. The strategy worked wonders for Nurse Jackie and Californication, and The Big C should appeal to a similar audience, especially as it will be double-billed with the return of The United States [...]