The Curse of the Black Spot has debuted in Australia to excellent ratings. TV Tonight reports that the episode averaged 837,000 viewers in the five major capital cities. It won its national timeslot, was the top-rating drama of the day and the fourth highest rating programme for the day overall. The corresponding Confidential Cutdown also rated a solid 575,000 viewers in the five major capitals. Meanwhile, the previous week, Day of the Moon averaged 895,000 viewers in the five major capital cities. Again, it was the top-rating drama of the day and the fifth highest rating programme for the day overall. The corresponding Confidential Cutdown also rated an excellent 672,000 viewers in the five major capitals. The Impossible Astronaut averaged 865,000 viewers in the five major capital cities. Again, it was the top-rating drama of the day and the fourth highest rating programme for the day overall. The corresponding Confidential Cutdown also rated a strong 634,000 viewers in the five major capitals.

The BBC have now released trailers and previews for the forthcoming fifth episode of Doctor Who, The Rebel Flesh, the first of a two-part story written by Matthew Graham.

---

 
The Rebel Flesh will premiere on BBC1/BBC1HD at 6:45pm, 21st May in the United Kingdom; then follows on SPACE in Canada at 8:00pm ET, BBC America in the United States at 9:00pm ET, and on ABC1 in Australia at 7:30pm on the 28th May.


 

5.9 million viewers watched episode four of Doctor Who: The Doctor's Wife, according to unofficial overnight figures.

The story, written by Neil Gaiman, attracted 28.6% of the overnight audience and was the third watched programme of the day. The most watched programme was The Eurovision Song Contest 2011 with 9.4 million watching which pushed Britain's Got Talent into second place.

Doctor Who once more drew many viewers to BBC One with the audience rising from 3.6 million to 5.9 million as the programme started and then dropping back from 6.2 million to 3.3 million when it finished.

Against Doctor Who, New Animals Do the Funniest Things on ITV1 had 3.2 million watching.

Doctor Who currently stands as the twentieth most watched programme of the week.

The overnight figure is based on the published timeslot, which was 6.30pm - 7.20pm and so is dragged down slightly by the following programme. Final ratings, based on the exact time broadcast, and including those who record the programme for later viewing, should be available next Sunday.

ON BBC Three / BBC HD Doctor Who Confidential had 716,000 watching, the highest rating of the series so far.

The BBC have released two videos by The Doctor's Wife writer Neil Gaiman, where he discusses scenes from the story that he enjoyed writing for the story, but ultimately were dropped from the final shooting script:

The BBC have released details for Week 22, which includes the synopsis for the sixth episode of the series, The Almost People; this is due to be broadcast on BBC1/BBC1HD on Saturday 28th May, with the time of broadcast yet to be confirmed. This is the second part of a story by Matthew Graham.

As part of the promotion for this weekend's Doctor Who adventure, The Doctor's Wife, the BBC have released a number of interview segments involving writer Neil Gaiman, who discusses writing for the series, visiting the Doctor backstage, and also provides an introduction to his episode.

Note: the videos contain plot elements of the story which could be considered spoilers.


Entertainment website Digital Spy have also released interviews with both Neil Gaiman and this week's guest star, Suranne Jones:

---

 
The Doctor's Wife will premiere on BBC1/BBC1HD at 6:30pm, 14th May in the United Kingdom; it then follows on SPACE in Canada at 8:00pm ET, BBC America in the United States at 9:00pm ET, and on ABC1 in Australia at 7:30pm on the 21st May.

Doctor Who moves to 6.45pm for the fifth episode of the current run, The Rebel Flesh.

The first of the two-part story, written by Matthew Graham and directed by Julian Simpson, will be sandwiched between the two parts of So You Think You Can Dance, which has been moved back to an earlier start.

Doctor Who will go up against Sing If You Can on ITV1, in which contestants perform well-known songs while undertaking challenges designed to distract them. BBC Two will be showing Flog It, with people invited to try to make money out of their antiques by taking a risk at auction, while Channel 4 has The Restoration Man, the first of a series in which architect George Clarke joins people as they embark on projects to transform unusual and historic buildings into family homes.

Barb have now issued final ratings for the week ending 1 May making Doctor Who: Day of the Moon the 15th most watched programme of the week.

The placing is 20 points higher than that based on the overnight ratings, the rise being due to the large numbers who recorded the programme and watched it at a later date.

The last episode to fall outside the top twenty for the week, was Silence in the Library in 2008.

Doctor Who: The Curse of the Black Spot, had an Audience Appreciation figure, or AI, of 86 once more putting it in the excellent category.

With nothing on Sunday getting more than 6 million viewers, Doctor Who finished 18th for the week on overnight figures, with a top ten place possible when the final figures are released next week.

The Sunday repeat on BBC Three was watched by 0.41 million viewers

Episode Two: Day of the Moon had a final consolidated audience figure of 7.30 million viewers, a 36.7% share of the total TV audience, according to figures released by Barb.

The number includes those who recorded the programme for viewing within 7 days of its initial showing. The figure is much larger than the initially reported overnight figure. A full report for the week, which will reveal the shows position in the weekly charts will be released by Barb tomorrow.

The figures do not include those watching on iPlayer, where over 1.2 million have accessed the programme within the first week of transmission.