The Oct. 12 episode of Degrassi: The Next Generation on CTV, which approached the difficult youth issues of bullying and school shootings, attracted just under a million viewers, making it the most-watched episode in the series’ four-year history, according to BBM data.

Although the 8:30 p.m. episode attracted 930,000 viewers, it did not approach the 1.4 million Canadians who watched CTV’s comedy hit Corner Gas at 8 p.m. Season two of Corner Gas debuted Oct. 6, drawing an audience of 1.53 million viewers, 34% higher than the season-one premiere. The series has steadily attracted audiences of more than one million for the last 15 consecutive episodes.

The network’s Tuesday night lineup seems to be a major ratings success and stiff competition for CBC’s Making the Cut, which airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. against Corner Gas and Degrassi.

Making the Cut’s audience, however, has grown steadily since it debuted Sept. 21 to 570,000 viewers. On Oct. 12, 615,000 Canadians tuned in to the hockey-themed reality show, just shy of the 720,000 who watched the season premiere of Da Vinci’s Inquest later that night.

CBC’s The Greatest Canadian, however, marks a major ratings success for the pubcaster, attracting 1.12 million Canadians when it premiered Sunday, Oct. 17, revealing Alexander Graham Bell, Pierre Elliot Trudeau, Tommy Douglas and, of course, Don Cherry as contenders for the ‘greatest Canadian in history’ title.

Oct. 16 should have meant the first game of the hockey season, but forced to find a replacement for what is usually its biggest ratings grab, CBC replaced Hockey Night in Canada with Movie Night in Canada. The pubcaster’s 7 p.m. showing of Disney’s CG-animated Dinosaur brought in 644,000 viewers. The audience jumped to 1.11 million at 9 p.m. for Raiders of the Lost Ark, and then fell to 334,000 at 11 p.m. for Jaws.

The first episode of CBC’s two-part miniseries Sex Traffic, from Halifax-based Big Motion Pictures (Trudeau, Trudeau: The Prequel), which got excellent feedback when it premiered at the Atlantic Film Festival earlier this fall, aired Oct. 10 to 458,000 viewers. The audience grew to 500,000 for the conclusion on Oct. 11.

-www.ctv.ca

-www.cbc.ca