Right, I had no idea these were on until Iain Weaver pointed them out in his latest TV Guide. They are however Very Much The Sort Of Thing We’re Interested In:
Drop Zone appears to be the BBC’s ill-fated answer to The Amazing Race, eight teams of three are dropped off in various locales around the globe by Steve Jones and charged with doing tasks in order to race to the helicopter and the next destination the next week. The last team back get stranded, if the hyperbole is anything to go by. The official site is here. I think this was pitched for BBC3 originally, so I can’t decide whether being thrown out on Sunday afternoons at 3:35pm on BBC1 is a promotion or demotion of sorts. Edit: My bad, it was always for BBC1.
Mission Millenium is France 3’s non-hit replacement for La Carte aux Tresors. I had been to the website, although I’m not entirely sure what’s going on and don’t want to delve too deep for spoilers, although they do appear to be searching for The Mask of Chaac. Anyway, TV5 are showing it on Monday at 1:04pm, with a repeat on Tuesday evening at 10:53pm. Don’t be late. The series is six episodes long and two hours each – it sounds a bit like Treasure Hunters/The Search (Jamie Theakston’s finest hour) from the TV5 description, although it’s a shame the title is about ten years off fashion.
I wanted to link to the TV Guide, but UKGS.C appears to be down for me right now.
Edit: Back now.
No one’s watching Schlag den Star? http://justin.tv/xstreamx26
I have no idea what game number we’re on. It appears to be something involving a quiz with multiple categories, cycled through one at a time. My best guess is first to three on three of the five categories.
The Quiz is a recurring round that happens most eps, I think.
Yeah, but it’s not the usual Blameron Oder Kasseron (I never spell that right). Unless if I’ve somehow missed this everytime it’s been done before?
The quiz is the SdS variant, yes.
Thomas wins the game three categories to nil, and probably could have taken the last two if they kept playing. That was game four, and Thomas seems to have swept everything so far, so it’s 10-0. I somehow have yet to catch the name of the star, though I know I know it’s been mentioned a few times by now.
Game 5 is Fechten, and Thomas is playing the Joker.
Oh wow, Fechten apparently means fencing. This will be fun.
Stefan wins 10-4. And the Star’s name is Felix, I’ve just now figured out. So Thomas is now up 15-0.
Game 6 is bolo golf, or whatever the proper term for the game of throwing two balls attached by a rope onto horizontally arranged poles is called.
They play this on Die Perfekte Minute with teabags, just for reference.
First to ten points, with the bars worth 3, 2, and 1 point from top to bottom. Felix goes first and uses rather terrible technique and gets nothing his first go. Thomas nails a three-pointer on his first shot.
And it appears to be *exactly* ten points, as Thomas is stuck on 9 and can’t hit that bottom rung again.
Aaaand with the score 9-3, the feed seems to have gone out.
We’re back, and it’s now 9-7 all of a sudden…
And as I typed out that last sentence, it sounds like Thomas nailed his final point. 21-0, now.
Matchball Time!
Game 7 is Stapeln. And now a commercial break.
Okay, so this game appears to be making a tower out of milkcrate-like bricks while climbing it at the same time. I think it’s highest after six minutes of stacking.
Unrelated: Those iPad commercials are also annoying in German.
Two minutes in, and Felix is off to a very slow start. Thomas is already on number 11, while he’s just mounted the intial 5.
For that matter, Thomas is now sitting on top of his stack (at either 11 or 12) waiting for Felix to catch up.
Wow, Felix is having problems just getting on 3…
Wa-hey, he’s finally up on top of six now. A bit late though, since there’s only a minute left.
I’m watching it – and after me bitching about the standard of streamings last week – I’m glad to say, I’ve been watching a very stable and HDish feed of Pro7 via a site that I won’t mention (as they are starting to remove and terminate connections of just such streamers!)
To be fair, this edition has been so one-sided at times, it’s been rather embarrasing for the contestant – his 100,000 euro really has never been under threat.
A comprehesive 28-zip whitewash.
Anyway, that all from Cologne until Sat 18th December.
Thomas sees Felix approaching and adds one more block to cushion his lead to 12. But with about eight seconds left, Felix’s tower falls! So Thomas wins the game and the sweep, all while perched twelve feet above the studio. Pretty epic way to win, really.
Looking at the “One Moment in Time” montage, it looks like the three games we missed were some sort of ping pong ball blowing-soccer/pongish game, basketball, and stacking blocks until they fall. Hm. Weird to do two extremely similar block-stacking games in one episode, ain’t it?
The games last night were (first two in order)..
Blow Football
Basketball
Quiz
Fencing (Joker round)
Block Tower building
Milk crate stacking
Vertical golf (bolo golf)
First person on Schlag den Star to get a whitewash and thrash the star. Ironically, the winning game tonight (The Tower) was the first game on Beat the Star where Darren Gough got whitewashed. That was also for a rollover jackpot.
Oh, the usual quiz with cycling answers is that you buzz in when you find an answer that doesn’t fit the given category – one of the correct answers is removed after each cycle. Or it might be the other way round, I forget.
Anyway I forgot this was on.
(checks this is still for poker stuff as well as gameshows)
Barny Boatman is on the BBC’s Newswatch this week!
Blimey. I hope he gets to explain the dealer button.
The “Quiz” game on Schlag den Star is a regular feature. There are five categories (Politics, Sport, Music, Geography, Films), a question is asked in rotation of the five categories. If someone answers a question in a certain category correctly then they score one point, then the next question is on the next category. The first to three points secures that category. The winner is the first person to secure three of the five categories.
At the end of the show it was hinting (although lost in translation) it would return in the spring. Since that is plausible as the first series was shown in March 2009 but the current series was pushed back for Stafan Raab’s masterplan to invade Europe.