News reaches us that two long-running shows are to end imminently. The Bill, ITV’s 27 year old police drama, has finally been sent down for good after numerous re-jigs and re-shuffles failed to find the audience, who showed Bin Laden-esque elucivity. MTV’s The Hills is quitting while the going’s good, announcing their final series which will air in the UK in May.

The Bill’s Mark Wingett (PC Jim Carver) commented  “It hurts. It’s a great, great shame. I think moving the slot was an unwise decision. It kind of got lost.”  He was a little more candid at the Birmingham Memorabilia event last year when he said that ITV had sacrificed the show to get more money for football rights, however ITV claim that they have not ditched the show to cut costs, and will be re-investing the budget in prime time drama.

The demise of The Bill looks like death-by-revamp – too many changes, too little understanding of the audience and what they would put up with to watch what was becoming a rather old-fashioned and cliched show. At his high point the show was attracting over 10 million viewers on average per series, but recently ratings have dipped significantly, with a loss of 2 million after the time slot change.

Over on MTV, season 6 will be the denoument of The Hills, a show which brought us Brody Jenner, Audrina Patridge and Heidi Montag (thanks). After star Lauren Conrad left part way through season five, the show didn’t seem to suffer, though ratings were already decreasing steadily. The spinoff ‘The City’ with Whitney Port, and the forthcoming ‘The Audrina Show’ will be its legacy.

“We are lucky and honored to have worked with this cast and tell their stories for this long, and we are grateful to the many dedicated fans who have stuck with us over the years. We owe it to those fans, the cast and the show to go out on a high note. And this season will deliver on that goal in terms of drama, story, real emotion and an organic culmination of this saga,” said Tony DiSanto, President of Programming, MTV.