Viewers were concerned when The Biggest Loser was returning without star players Michelle Bridges and Steve “The Commando” Willis.
Under the guise of being “transformed”, the weight loss show was lead by series veteran Shannan Ponton and newbie Libby Babet.
But from the very beginning it was an uphill battle. The 11th season premiered a fortnight ago with 474,000 viewers.
The most recent numbers was a very light 254,000 viewers.
The network decided to take their once star player show from primetime and demote it to the daytime slot, airing at 1pm from Mondays to Thursdays.
Shannan, Michelle and The Commando were household favourites.
“We’re disappointed,” Ten program chief Beverley McGarvey said in statement.
“It really hasn’t resonated with audiences the way we had hoped.”
“It is a very competitive time of year. There are two very established shows on (My Kitchen Rules and Married at First Sight) that are creating a lot of noise.”
“We hoped it would do a lot better but it simply hasn’t. We think we’ve given it as long as we possibly can. It will move to daytime from Monday.”
The Biggest Loser:Transformed found themselves in a sticky situation, after they were accused of fat-shaming contestant Nikk, who weighs 78kgs.
Many watchers of the show voiced that her weight was not “fat” nor did it fall under the conventional Biggest Loser story guidelines.
Trainer Shannon shut down the conversation, telling The Project, “The judged are now becoming the judges, telling Nikki how she should and shouldn’t feel; how ridiculous it is that she’s on The Biggest Loser.”
“It’s almost like a little bit of reverse fat-shaming, where overweight people are looking in and judging other people.”
“How dare anybody else stand on the outside and say, ‘You should, you should, you should?’ … Saying Nikki doesn’t deserve to be there, she shouldn’t feel like this – there’s one problem with that equation: she does feel like that.”
The one-time Aussie favourite show will now be replaced by a series of programs including Modern Family and The Graham Norton Show.
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