Doctor Who: Flux hits the halfway point for final ratings as BARB reveal the +28 results for Once, Upon Time. Meanwhile, we also have a full set of +7 numbers as The Vanquishers arrive
We’re now midway through collecting the final viewing figures for Doctor Who Series 13. They reveal that the third chapter of Doctor Who: Flux, Once, Upon Time, has now been seen by 5.23m viewers. That’s a further 0.56m on top of the +7 result, for a total time shift of 1.47m. That’s 39.1% of the total audience for Once, Upon Time who didn’t watch on the night, but caught up later.
This is a pretty typical time shift for Doctor Who generally and the Whittaker era specifically. The average catch up audience for Series 11 and 12 was about the same, at 40.6%. This is the first week where binge watching may have been a factor, with all episodes of Flux available at once for the last week. There’s some minor sign of that. Previous episode War of the Sontarans had 0.4m viewers catching up in Weeks 2-4, 0.16m fewer than Once, Upon Time. Could that suggest up to 160,000 people binge watched Flux this week, having waited until now to begin? Possibly.
It’s also another successful week for Doctor Who in terms of chart performance. Once, Upon Time has finished at #15 in the final chart for the week. This also made it both the #6 BBC show for the week (behind both editions of Strictly Come Dancing, then Shetland, Top Gear and Showtrial) and the #6 drama for the week (behind Shetland, Showtrial and on ITV both episodes of The Tower and Angela Black.)
As expected, with six editions of I’m a Celeb to contend with, The Vanquishers fell out of the Top 20
Also this week, the +7 viewing figures for Doctor Who: Flux finale The Vanquishers are available. In its first week 4.61m people watched The Vanquishers. That’s a 1.03m (28.8%) increase from the original overnight. That total’s down 0.22m (4.6%) from previous episode Survivors of the Flux, though still ahead of Village of the Angels, and consistent with last year’s series finale, just 0.08m (1.7%) lower than The Timeless Children’s +7 number.
With six editions of I’m a Celebrity last week, Doctor Who inevitably fell down the initial chart rankings a little, to just outside the Top 20. However, The Vanquishers was still the highest rated drama of the week on any channel. On the BBC, it was the sixth biggest show overall, behind Strictly Come Dancing (both editions), game show The Wheel, Top Gear, and the BBC News the day live announcements were made about the next steps in the battle against Covid. It’s just about possible The Vanquishers will creep back into the Top 20 for the final results, though, with the likes of The Wheel and the news typically having relatively few catch up viewers.
Over the next couple of weeks, there’ll be an update for only one episode each Monday. So Blogtor Who will be taking the opportunity to take a deeper look at the six episodes of Flux overall.
Doctor Who will return on New Year’s Day with Eve of the Daleks on BBC One at 7pm and on BBC America and AMC+ in the US
Sarah (Aisling Bea) owns and runs ELF storage, and Nick (Adjani Salmon) is a customer who visits his unit every year on New Year’s Eve. This year, however, their night turns out to be a little different than planned as they find themselves joining forces with the Doctor, Dan and Yaz in a fight against the Daleks.
