Do you agree that this series caused BBUK to be axed?

[Ant.]

CBB18 averaged 2.1 million (the lowest a summer CBB had been up to that point I believe)
CBB19 averaged 2.4 million (the lowest January CBB at the time)
CBB20 averaged 1.8 million (the lowest a summer CBB has been)
CBB21 averaged 1.9 million (the lowest January CBB)
CBB22 averaged 2.0 million (I'd argue this is relatively low given the controversy?)

The series before CBB18, BB17, did relatively well for a Civilian series, with 1.6 million viewers - A LOT better than BB18's average of 1.24 million. This only got worse by BB19, barely averaging a million.

It is apparent that BBUK lost a sizeable amount of viewership after CBB18, but what was the reason? There was no noticeable change in the format for another year (CBB19, CBB20, and BB18 were all series that felt familiar - whether they're as good as other channel 5 series is up to debate), with change only being felt with CBB22 onwards (when the show was on its way out).. But was CBB18 that bad people turned off for good?

Production seemed to remain the same for the following year yet the franchise had a dramatic decrease (heck, even the new, good production we saw in BB19 was too late to save the sinking ship that was BBUK :skull:) in viewers. So it has to be asked; was it actually CBB18?

Correlation or causation? If it didn't, what else ended BBUK? (Ben Frow practically killed it, yes, but I mean, what caused the decrease in viewers?)

[Jake.]

I think it was just fatigue. 3 series of the same thing a year was only going to grab attention for so long.

[Ant.]

Personally I think it had some factor, but I find it hard to believe that the Bear win as big as an effect as I would be led to believe. Helen's win garnered thousands of complaints yet BB16 only dropped by under 200,000 viewers -Bear's win seems a lot less controversial with the public so I can only wonder if there was another reason the numbers declined so much (there was surely no way a lot of the viewers just got sick of the editing and show in general and all jumped ship at once, right?)

[Epic.]

Yes as I've mentioned it countless times. The win of such a clearly terrible person after many campaigned and hoped it wouldn't happen caused numerous declarations all over fb and twitter by people that they were 'NEVER watching the show again' because the month long glorification of a human turd like Stephen Bear is representative of the perspective outsider viewers have of BB; that it's simply a platform to marvel at talentless, douchey z-listers with no class or wit to them. It was a stereotype the show always had but after a series that angered many with no satisfying payoff, it left things pretty permanent.

[Ant.]

I think it was just fatigue. 3 series of the same thing a year was only going to grab attention for so long.

Sounds really plausible to me, especially with Summer CBBs doing worse viewers-wise than the other series

[Matthew.]

It’s all Bear’s fault utter ****

[Denver]

It never truly recovered from the race row

[Jake.]

Sounds really plausible to me, especially with Summer CBBs doing worse viewers-wise than the other series

Plus, CBB19 averaged 300k more than 18. I think 20 and 21 both had a decrease in viewership because of less “action”/stuff going on. 19 had Kim, 22 had the Roxanne/Ryan thing.

[Tony Montana]

Yep. Many viewers actually threatened to switch off if Bear won.

They definitely stuck to their words as evidenced by CBB19’s and BB18’s ratings compared to CBB17 and BB17.

[Jake.]

Idk though, viewers aren’t going to stick around for ever. Even on CH4, CBB went from massive highs to lows.

[JerseyWins]

CBB20 & 21 killed it... very boring seasons on a show that was on its last limbs as it was.

[RileyH]

20 was good so let's not

[GiRTh]

Yes as I've mentioned it countless times. The win of such a clearly terrible person after many campaigned and hoped it wouldn't happen caused numerous declarations all over fb and twitter by people that they were 'NEVER watching the show again' because the month long glorification of a human turd like Stephen Bear is representative of the perspective outsider viewers have of BB; that it's simply a platform to marvel at talentless, douchey z-listers with no class or wit to them. It was a stereotype the show always had but after a series that angered many with no satisfying payoff, it left things pretty permanent.:thumbs:

[Ant.]

CBB20 & 21 killed it... very boring seasons on a show that was on its last limbs as it was.

Why do you talk about them as if they don't account for 50% of your BBUK viewing experience :suspect:

[Ant.]

20 was good so let's not

Tea

[DouglasS]

I love these bear hating theories :laugh:

People are still obsessed with him and his win. He might be the most talked about CBB contestant ever on here? Most relevant housemate ever :worship:

[Underscore]

20 was good so let's not

charah did that :love:

[Ant.]

charah did that :love:

people like "cbb20" boring... we forgettin' CHADNIGHT???

[Ant.]

i respect everyone's opinions but jerseywins. jersey shut up @ you voting no

[Shaun]

no Lewis F did

[Daniel-X]

I’d say Bear winning was a major fact alongside the terrible ‘all stars’ cast for CBB19. Nobody was an all star that series besides Speidi & James J, the rest were simply people who’d done it before who they managed to lure back for a pittance of money. The fact it was hyped up for so long in the media with rumours of Perez, Pricey, Hopkins, Steph Davis, Tiff, Frenchy, Luisa, hell even Bear (as much as I loathe him) who are actual recognisable CBB HMs and stars and all failed to appear just did the series no favours.

[JerseyWins]

I love these bear hating theories :laugh:

People are still obsessed with him and his win. He might be the most talked about CBB contestant ever on here? Most relevant housemate ever :worship:
This

The only way he killed the show was that he gave people too high expectations moving forward which 20 & 21 could not deliver on :fan:

[Amy Jade]

I think there are lots of factors but I do know people who turned off forever after certain events. I know people always go 'oh 2 people is that all' when this is explained but I can only tell you what happened.

• 4 in 4 out: 2 of my friends never watched again after it, they felt manipulated and Marc was a plant to kick up a fuss when the series was working well enough without.

• Bear winning: Ratings dropped the next series so it is documented his win hurt the series. I know a fair few who quit when he won, loads of friends on Twitter and fb gave up. My nan never watched again either dispite being a BB viewer since BB1.

• Boring series. I don't need to explain this...

• Roxy drama. Don't actually think this hurt viewers as much as gave Ben Frow a justification to retire the show. He wanted any excuse.

[Liam-]

I love these bear hating theories :laugh:

People are still obsessed with him and his win. He might be the most talked about CBB contestant ever on here? Most relevant housemate ever :worship:

This

The only way he killed the show was that he gave people too high expectations moving forward which 20 & 21 could not deliver on :fan:

https://media1.giphy.com/media/PkdntmnKGzK2O4g4cr/giphy.gif?cid=19f5b51a5ccf62a82f54634c673a6cb0&rid=giphy.gif

[Tony Montana]

I love these bear hating theories :laugh:

People are still obsessed with him and his win. He might be the most talked about CBB contestant ever on here? Most relevant housemate ever :worship:

Talked about for the wrong reasons. Nobody is praising him.

[Tony Montana]

This

The only way he killed the show was that he gave people too high expectations moving forward which 20 & 21 could not deliver on :fan:

:facepalm: Stop chatting **** Jersey.

[Withano]

If a show becomes literally painful to endure, they’re not gonna stick around

[Jarrod]

Frow wanted Big Brother gone as far back as 2016, which ties in with the Bear win etc. I don't think Bear was the reason, nor that series in particular.

Frow wanted Big Brother to air at 11pm, he said this back in 2016 at the TV fest. He said: In future, Big Brother will play at 10… maybe Celebrity will be at 9. Ideally I’d have it at 11, but it’s a bit expensive to play at 11 at the moment.”

A year later, at the same TV fest, he says that he'd be happier without Big Brother on Channel 5 - even though Big Brother has put C5 on the map with so much.

Flash forward to the 2018 festival and he's axed Big Brother. So, not so much a series fault but a controller who didn't want Big Brother on the channel anyway. The issue is, when Big Brother moved over to 5, we had Desmond who actually wanted it on the channel, no matter how rough the series were. When Frow took over in 2013, the only good he did was getting rid of Brian Dowling and putting Emma in the top spot, apart from that he's never been that bothered by the show nor its rewards.

On top of all of that, he let Big Brother slip down and lose what it was actually supposed to be - a reality show. It got lost in a weird version of itself that was being dictated by those at C5. Viewers got bored of the bad version of itself we had and ultimately gave Frow a pretty good reason to get rid. He didn't like it, viewers disappeared.

[montblanc]

https://media1.giphy.com/media/PkdntmnKGzK2O4g4cr/giphy.gif?cid=19f5b51a5ccf62a82f54634c673a6cb0&rid=giphy.gif

:joker::joker: