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Clichéd detective drama Chasing Shadows ends with 2.8m

Clichéd detective drama Chasing Shadows ends with 2.8m

Thursday night brought the end for ITV’s latest crime drama Chasing Shadows (9pm), which wrapped up its short run after four episodes.

Featuring an impressive cast, the drama focused on The League of Gentlemen’s Reece Shearsmith as a quirky, obsessive detective who’s depiction may or may not have been trivialising developmental disabilities, as every TV copper must have some sort of sociological twist these days.

Kind of like Charlie Brooker’s satire A Touch of Cloth – but without any of the jokes – Chasing Shadows struggled to bring anything new to an overcrowded police procedural market. In a landscape that hosts Broadchurch and Happy Valley another clichéd by-the-books series just won’t cut it, a sentiment the viewing figures seem to match.

With back-up from ER and Doctor Who‘s Alex Kingston and the multi-talent that is Noel Clarke, the series kicked off with 3.4 million viewers, falling to 2.7 million for the following two weeks.

Yesterday’s final case saw Shearsmith’s unorthodox detective wondering if he’d been duped by his most recently-caught serial killer, sucking in 2.8 million viewers and a 14% share.

Also turning learning difficulties into entertainment at the same time was star of the big screen, Toby Jones, who showed up in BBC Two’s TV film Marvellous (9pm). The true story, which detailed the life of Neil Baldwin, a man with learning difficulties who led an extremely colourful life, secured an audience of 1.5 million viewers.

An 8% share tuned in for the hour and a half running time, with a cameo from housewives’ favourite, Gary Lineker, no doubt helping.

Over on BBC On Who Do You Think You Are? was watched by a series low audience as TV presenter and DJ Reggie Yates tracked down his paternal grandfather to Ghana and uncovered the usual surprises along the way.

3.6 million viewers tuned in for the genealogical fun, but despite the lower than usual audience, Reggie’s odyssey secured the 9pm slot with an 18% share.

Over on Channel 4, Educating the East End (9pm) reminded us all that teachers deserve every single holiday they receive, netting 1.4 million viewers and a 7% share.

Still on the subject of teaching, Channel 5 decided to throw in a bit of misogyny, a sprinkle of automobiles and came up with the perfect 9pm recipe. Never Teach Your Wife to Drive did exactly what it said on the tin, with 724,000 viewers (a 4% share) tuning in to see couples bicker in a car.

Earlier at 8pm, BBC One rolled out a sixty minute long sneer-fest in which desperate couples handed over their house in order to be redecorated by some budding amateur ‘interior designers’ on Your Home in Their Hands.

Fronted by leggy female drag queen Celia Sawyer, 2.8 million viewers tuned in to see a cherished bedroom turned into something resembling the vomit of a child who ingested a whole pack of Crayolas.

A little bit earlier, ITV rolled out the first of two episodes of Emmerdale as a damaged couple spent a trip to the countryside planning how to kill each other.

6 million viewers tuned in at 7pm to see Debbie rush to the lake to save her mother, Charity, from new husband Declan, resulting in a 33% share. Unusually, the return trip at 8pm brought in a higher audience, with 6.3 million viewers and a 33% share tuning in for the shocking outcome.

There was also a big surprise for fans of EastEnders at 7:30pm as the show rolled out a big surprise in the form of a shock reappearance from diminutive mini Mitchell matriarch, Peggy.

6.3 million viewers and a 33% share watched as Barbara Windsor returned with fuming energy as she vowed to destroy Sharon and Phil’s wedding and making viewers feel ancient by hanging on to twenty-year old baggage.

The latest familiar face to return in the run-up to next year’s 30th anniversary secured Thursday’s biggest audience.

The Social TV Analytics report is a daily leaderboard displaying the latest social TV analytics Twitter data from SecondSync. The table shows the top UK TV shows as they are mentioned on Twitter, which MediaTel has correlated with the BARB overnight programme ratings for those shows (only viewable to BARB subscribers).

Overnight data is available each morning in mediatel.co.uk’s TV Database, with all BARB registered subscribers able to view reports for terrestrial networks and key multi-channel stations. Overnight data supplied by TRP are based on 15 minute slot averages. This may differ from tape checked figures, which are based on a programme’s actual start and end time.

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Dr Alistair M Campbell, Secretary , Australian Association of Holistic and Transpersonal counsellors Inc., on 10 Oct 2022
“Discovered this on BritBox and found it the most interesting viewing I’ve seen in a long time. Having finished the first season I went looking for a follow up and discovered the bad news. Can’t believe it didn’t rate when it was first produced.”
Jo Lo, nurse, retired, on 05 Oct 2022
“2022---and your show Casting Shadows just won yet another fan. Came across it accidently and had to watch all 4 episodes at once as it was rivieting! How could you leave us all hanging wondering what happened to his housekeeper. Does caring for her daughter help him come out of his shell and learn to relate to people better? Does His partner eventually come to understand he is autistic and learn how best to deal with him and understand him? Autism is such a massive epidemic now that this series provides autistic people someone on TV they can relate to, and could hel-p others learn how to better relate to people. You MUST reissue this series and restart it with a season 2---looking back in time (since so much time has passed) to show what happened to the housekeeper and how the dectective handled himself, being the newly responsible party for the child. Show him gradually learning to love someone ohter than himself--and how love draws a person out of their shell, etc. You REALLY REALLY blew it when you cancelled this WONDERFUL show. It is NOT too late---you can still bring it back, picking up where you left off---just do it as a futuristic time frame looking back on what happened to the housekeeper. PLEASE.....”
GailOlson, Retired, None, on 10 Feb 2021
“Just found this on Amazon Prime. I was very disappointed to see it only had 4 episodes. I’d like to meet the numbskull who made that decision to ask why.”
Kay C, Legal, None, on 14 Aug 2016
“I'm from North America and I recently saw this on DVD. I loved this show, just loved it. I hope they make a season 2 of this drama. Some of us in North America would enjoy it too I think!”
Sue Butler, Senior Manager, None, on 11 Feb 2015
“Really Great Drama! Having failed to notice the original autumn screening I stumbled across episode 1 on ITV Encore. Intriguing characters and really different, thoroughly refreshing actually. I was hooked from the beginning and do hope there's a series 2. It would be fascinating to know how the story line develops, particularly the missing housekeeper and relationships between characters. If this had received as much marketing as Broadchurch I suspect it would have had much higher ratings. Sadly no one I've spoken to has ever heard of it!”
Paul Butterworth, RETIRED, NONE, on 16 Dec 2014
“Chasing Shadows was like a breath of fresh air! So what does ITV do? Can it after only 4 episodes...... Why, when there is a pletherer of soaps, and a shortage of quality (as usual) or "NEW" inoventive shows? PLEASE give us a new season of "Chasing Shadows" we deserve it!!!”
James Posey, Retired, Retired, on 07 Dec 2014
“Good Drama. Totally different from the other British Mystery Thrillers. But you did something that got me upset. You left me with a cliffhanger in regards to his housekeeper getting lost. That will be very exciting if you continued the series.”
Elaine Mason, Retired, None, on 13 Oct 2014
“Please, please, bring back Chasing Shadows! We really enjoyed it, On the edge of our seats throughout. So different from the run-of-the-mill police dramas we are used to watching. A stellar cast with the wonderful Reece Sheersmith and Alex Kingston. Well done, ITV! We taped all episodes and watched them all in one day. Brilliant!”
Lynda Chantler, Retired, No company, on 29 Sep 2014
“I enjoyed Chasing Shadows, I am abroad at the moment so watched all episodes on I Player catch up. Hope there is a second series”
Stuart Cato, None, None, on 27 Sep 2014
“Shame it is stopping. We thought it was good. It was refreshingly different from the run of the mill”

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