Downton Abbey returned for its sixth and final series with its lowest launch audience to date of just over 7.6 million viewers.
The hype and expectation around the opening 90-minute special of the Julian Fellowes period drama could not stop it slipping below its previous low, the 7.7 million overnight audience for its first ever episode in 2010.
Sunday’s 9pm launch, which had a 36% share of the audience, comfortably saw off BBC1’s latest Sunday night adaptation, LP Hartley’s The Go-Between, which could only manage 2.6 million viewers, an 11.9% share, also from 9pm.
Downton Abbey was nearly a million viewers down from the 8.4 million (38%) who watched last year’s fifth series opener, and the 9.5 million who watched the start of series four in 2013.
The first episode of the second and third series were each watched by around 9 million viewers, with a similar share of the audience as last night.
Downton Abbey, which could yet return on the big screen, sparked a revival in ITV’s drama fortunes in 2010, fuelling viewers’ appetite for period drama and boosting the fortunes of British on-screen talent and programme makers in the US.
BBC1’s The Go-Between was comfortably the least watched of its three Sunday night literary adaptations to date, following last week’s An Inspector Calls, with 5.8 million viewers (24.4%) and the previous week’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, with 4.9 million (24.2%)
Elsewhere last night, the second outing for Shane Meadows’ This is England ‘90 on Channel 4 had 1.4 million viewers (6.2%), down from 1.9 million (8.6%0 last week.
It once again had the better of BBC2’s Special Forces: Ultimate Hell Week, which had 1.3 million viewers (5.8%). The BBC2 show was narrowly ahead of Channel 5’s Celebrity Big Brother: End of the World, with 1.2 million viewers (5.6%).
The Sunday edition of ITV’s The X Factor had 7.3 million viewers (33.2%) seeing off BBC1’s Countryfile, watched by 5.4 million (26%) and Antiques Roadshow, with 5.7 million (25%).
