TV Ratings: Peep Show, Merlin, Strictly Come Dancing & X Factor

There was great news for Channel 4's Peep Show last Friday; traditionally a low-rated series that justifies its existence through DVD sales and industry kudos. The sixth series debuted with 1.81m (plus 208,000 via the time-shift channel), making it Peep Show's most watched episode ever! Either word has finally started to spread about the series following its high-profile BAFTA wins, or there were a lot of hypnotized Derren Brown viewers stuck to their armchairs and unable to reach their remotes!

On Saturday, BBC1's Merlin conjured itself 5.08m viewers for its series 2 premiere; its second worst performance ever, but actually not that far behind series 1's average of 5.74m. As consolation, it beat a particularly gripping edition of ITV1's gameshow The Cube.

The big weekend clash was between BBC1's Strictly Come Dancing and ITV1's X Factor, a scheduling conflict for Saturday primetime that caused great anger amongst fans -- despite the fact both shows regularly stepped on each other's toes last year, and nobody cared. Anyway, Strictly was the loser in this TV battle, managing 7.72m to X Factor's 9.27m. It was X Factor's lowest number this year because of Strictly's arrival as competition, but still enough to defeat its BBC rival. The BBC apparently have no plans to avoid further clashes, either...