In the Sunday ratings battle for the Lindt cafe siege specials, it was ultimately Nine’s 60 Minutes which emerged triumphant over Seven, despite Seven’s cameras having a bird’s-eye view of the hostage drama.
Nine’s two-hour special – featuring an empathetic veteran 60 Minutes reporter Liz Hayes interviewing eight of the hostages in great depth – averaged 1.3 million viewers in the capital cities and 1.7 million nationally.
Woven with re-enactments of their 16-hour ordeal, Hayes’s interviews painted a detailed picture of the harrowing experience of being trapped by gunman Man Haron Monis inside the Martin Place cafe in December.
Seven’s special, Inside the Siege: the Untold Story, had interviews with another six of the surviving 16 hostages and had footage from the network’s cameras which were trained on the scene from across the road. Seven was just behind Nine on 1.1 million viewers in the five capital cities and 1.6 million nationally.
Both programs contained fresh details about the attack, including that some hostages felt abandoned by the police and emergency services and were critical of the operation.
In one of the more emotional interviews, Marcia Mikhael, 43, told Seven: “I know there are a lot of officers who risked their lives to be there and I thank them from the bottom of my heart.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not being ungrateful to them, but I just think the army would have been a better – more appropriate to be handling this situation.”
She was critical of the way she was rescued from the cafe at the end when barrister Katrina Dawson was lying mortally wounded beside her.
“They actually carried me across the entire cafe, through the front door of the cafe,” she said. “And for them to do that, they had to step over Monis. As they’re going over him I look down and I see him. It wasn’t a pretty sight. Half his brain was hanging out.”
The networks had conflicting witness accounts of the execution of Tori Johnson.
While Mikhael maintained Monis was silent before shooting Johnson, Louisa Hope, 52, said he told the cafe manager to kneel before him. Monis then “steels himself, goes firm and very hard and very absolute” and then “he just shoots Tori”, Hope told 60 Minutes.
Mikhael said there was silence as Monis reloaded his gun and prepared to shoot Johnson. “No there was nothing said,” she told Seven. “Absolutely nothing. If he kneeled maybe Man Monis pushed him down. There was absolutely nothing spoken.”
Hope has multiple sclerosis and was accompanied by her mother, Robin Hope and was limited in her ability to move. She was one of the seven remaining hostages during the shootout when police stormed in.
Selina Win Pe, who was forced to make phone calls to the media and appear in hostage videos, revealed she thought Monis “was going to do something to me physically” at one point when he held a gun against her at the back of the cafe.
But it was two young men, both part-time workers at the Lindt cafe, who appeared to capture the hearts of the audience.
Jarrod Morton-Hoffman, 19, and his fellow worker Joel Herat, 21, revealed they had stashed knives and scissors in their pockets and considered trying to overpower the gunman at one point.
“I may look 12, but I have aged quite a bit,” Hoffman said. “It’s not the type of experience that I would generally go through.”
Hoffman played a crucial role in the police negotiations with Monis and managed to calm him down and stop him shooting people after hostages escaped.
Another cafe worker, dental student Fiona Ma, 19, also showed remarkable composure, fetching food and drinks and escorting people to the toilets. Ma also kept a mobile phone hidden and let people call their loved ones while the gunman wasn’t looking.
The bravery of the hostages shone through in both programs, and on Twitter the audience applauded the strength of mind and composure shown by the 18 people who faced the terrifying experience.
Despite fears the programs would be exploitative and the criticism of payments made to the hostages by both Nine and Seven, the tragedy in which two people died was largely handled tastefully.
Nine opted not to do re-enactments of the moment Johnson and Dawson were fatally shot, and concentrated instead on the bravery shown by the hostages, whether they escaped or waited it out.
On social media the audience praised the calm intelligence and maturity the hostages showed.
Wife just commented that Lindt must have a good hiring policy. #qualityhumans #sydneysiege
— Dave Hughes (@DHughesy) February 8, 2015
We've met some incredible Australians tonight #sydneysiege
— BenFordham (@BenFordham) February 8, 2015
Stories of the #sydneysiege survivors show how unbelievable, tragic, merciless the whole thing was. All good people. All the best to them.
— Liz Burke (@lizeburke) February 8, 2015
Despite the intense competition between the two networks, the extensive promos and the acres of news reports devoted to the siege, more Australians opted for lighter fare: My Kitchen Rules and The House of Hancock.
The most popular program on the night was My Kitchen Rules with 1.7 million viewers in the city markets and 2.4 million nationally, followed by The House of Hancock on Channel Nine.
