Show Discussion: Alphabetical

By | August 15, 2016
79 Comments
alphabetical_01

#hostholdingaquestioncard

Weekdays, 5pm,
ITV

And so the next Summer quiz contender approaches and this time it’s Jeff Stelling with a UK version of a European reversioning of a light UK daytime panel game. That panel game was The Alphabet Game, the most famous European version is the still running Pasapalabra from Spain (Although it’s travelled to most of the major markets although not still running in many of them).

Three players play games and quizzes based around letters of the alphabet to build up time, the player with the most time gets to take on the current champion in the endgame for a progressive jackpot, if nobody wins the jackpot the person who does better at the game comes back to try again as champion the next day.

The endgame for the popular Spanish show is legendarily difficult (basically you have to get a question right for every letter of the alphabet without making a mistake), often building up for over a year and getting into seven figures so it will be interesting to see if they’ve adapted it at all for the UK market – it only has ten episodes to impress after all and there may be a point where nobody winning anything turns people off. But fans of quiz should be pleased, around 200 questions an episode are promised and Stelling is a safe pair of hands with this sort of thing.

Shows we had forgotten about then recently remembered and it turns out they’re pretty much all on Youtube

By | August 14, 2016
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Do you remember back in the good old days of 2010 we had a brief love affair with the Canadian show Mantracker (“the Interceptor your Dad would like”)? It was on the Extreme Sports Channel, I don’t know if that still exists, I can’t be bothered to look it up.

Recently I found myself trying to remember what it was called, then looking it up on Youtube and it turns out there’s loads of episodes on Youtube, here’s a random one:


That’s from Season five, there were seven made (with a different guy for the final series).

Speaking of Interceptor, it occurred to me recently how highly GIFable it would be with the kids if it was around today. I would make some myself but I can’t be bothered.

And speaking of shows we had forgotten about but briefly remembered etc etc it looks like hot on the heels of a reasonably successful Match Game reboot in the US ITV want to bring back Blankety Blank, although they don’t have a host in mind for it yet (Stephen Mulhern).

Of course the recent Celebrity Squares revival didn’t work out too well, but we’ll see.

Dates for the Diary

By | August 11, 2016
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Things happening in the next fortnight:

  • Alphabetical with Jeff Stelling takes over the The Chase slot from Monday promising 200+ questions an episode. It’s based on Pasapalabra (itself quite an extreme European reversioning of The Alphabet Game) which has a legendarily difficult endgame with a jackpot that rollsover when it isn’t won which has gone into seven figures several times. It will be interesting to see if they’ve modified it to make it a bit easier for this test run, otherwise don’t expect a winner.
  • The Big Fat Quiz of Everything – It seems a bit odd starting a three episode run of this during the second week of the Olympics but there we are. 9-10:30pm on C4.
  • Spotless – a “one-off Summer special” where contestants must do challenges whilst avoiding getting covered in paint, as measured by the ICONIC Spotless Scanner (it says on the embargoed press release you’re not allowed to look at until the 16th August despite being freely findable on the ITV Press site) for big cash prizes. That’s on Saturday 20th at 8pm against the last proper day of the Olympics. It’s also by Possessed.
  • Murder in Successville – Our favourite “look, it is sort of technically a gameshow even if it isn’t really in the spirit of one” leaps from online only BBC3 to Sunday nights on BBC 2 from August 21st at 10:30. We now prefer Chief Gordon Ramsey to the actual Gordon Ramsey.

Lots of things apparently starting on the 22nd August (MEGA MONDAY):

  • Think Tank – New series of reasonably agreeable if unexciting quiz, although it’s now going out at 3:25pm which probably counts as a promotion of sorts. BBC1.
  • Debatable – Patrick Kielty and three celebrity guests try to persuade a plucky contestant hoping to walk away with thousands of pounds that they know best. 6pm, BBC2.
  • Make Me An Egghead – The artist formerly known as Are You An Egghead? returns after Debatable, it’s a quiz tournament for people who want to join the Eggheads. 6:30pm, BBC2.
  • 500 Questions – Yes! Finally the UK version of throw things at a wall and hope it sticks format starts its four episode run at 9pm on ITV with none other than popular ITV personality Giles Coren in charge. To be fair, it’s not set the US alight but it sounds like it’s done pretty well in Germany, and by the sounds of it it’ll be similar to the German version, so.

University of Intelligence

By | August 9, 2016
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I’m actually putting this up here as a reminder for me to watch it after it was suggested to me last week, it looks like a Japanese brainpower quiz played by universities – this episode seems to be Oxford vs Tokyo and looks quite interesting and entertaining.

Youtube can translate auto-detected subtitles on the fly which may well be a feature worth turning on.