Idle Question

By | January 18, 2011
20 Comments

Right, I notice from my logs I’m getting a lot of hits for Don’t Scare the Hare right now, and that is probably because my hilarious pilot review of it (9th September, let’s not forget)  is the top result on Google at the moment. And I noted with some amusement that the original ticket listing for Don’t Scare the Hare reverted to ‘Saturday night game show’ on the BBC ticket site fairly quickly.

I do believe they are filming right around now, so has anyone been and how was the experience?

I’m meant to be going to at least two pilots in the next few weeks. FEAR ME.

Meanwhile, if you haven’t seen it yet, Buzzerblog has done an interview with executive producer of The Cube Adam Adler.

Show discussion: Perfection

By | January 17, 2011
71 Comments

This is on at 4:30pm on BBC2. I won’t be able to watch it until later, but feel free to leave your thoughts.

Edit: Watched it now. What do I think? (Here’s a link to Martyn’s recording review from July)

Well I think it’s alright actually. The game works on a technical level (although it’s interesting that short of attaining perfection, the single player’s best chance would appear to be getting precisely two right and two wrong as it makes working out the correct answers through elimination more difficult) and it moves at a fair old pace. The risky negotiation bit at the end feels quite unique and clever even if it’s a mishmash of other things. 45 minutes of it is probably a bit much – it’d probably work better as a slightly extended 30 minute game. I’m not entirely certain why the single player shouldn’t be allowed to go back and change answers within the time allowed. And there’s probably a better way of revealing the correct answers that logic already tells us are correct anyway.

The 12 Yard polish is probably to the show’s detriment, it lacks a certain warmth. Many shows work on a technical level, to actually be popular and well liked in daytime these days I think you need to be able to engage with it and I’m not sure what Perfection‘s “in” is. Still, it would make a good home game.

Poll of 2010 PREVIEW

By | January 16, 2011
13 Comments

Alright, I’ve just spent the last few hours collating all the votes. The full write-up will come along in the next few days. In the meantime here are some facts:

  • One Endemol show has done very, very well.
  • One Endemol show may have broken the record for highest percentage of votes cast in the Hall of Shame, beating The Colour of Money. BREAKING NEWS: I’ve jsut checked – it’s close, but it doesn’t quite manage it.
  • If the blank and obvious protest votes in the Hall of Fame counted as their own entity, “2010 was a bit poor really” would place fourth.
  • There have been some dramatic shift in fortunes in the Golden Five.

But can you guess which shows fit which facts?

Board of Excitement 16th-22nd January 2010

By | January 16, 2011
21 Comments

Well there’s not much on this week, so I’m first going to remind you that it’s the first event of The Bother Series of Poker 2011 this evening with another picture of some of the ‘great’ prizes on offer to the overall winners:

The fun starts at eight, although I think you’re allowed ten minutes of late registration should you forget then have a sudden realisation you should be somewhere at that time.

In other news:

  • Perfection – Nick Knowles pops-up with the first episodes of troubled BBC2 true or false quiz. A Show Discussion box for this will be avaliable tomorrow. (4:30pm, Monday-Friday, BBC2)
  • Only Connect – It’s the Crossworders vs Alex Guttenplan off of University Challenge +2. I saw Guttenplan walking through a college once. FACT. (8:30pm, Monday, BBC4)
  • Total Winter Wipeout – I’m just going to merge the two shows here for now. Winter Wipeout is on Thursday on ABC in the US, Total Wipeout is on Saturday at 6pm on BBC1.
  • Poll of 2010 – look out for the results for this sometime this week. Look out especially for the special statistic on how well “2010 was a really bad year” would have done if all the protest votes counted as one. 

Also in the States, American Idol begins a Cowell-less run on Wednesday and Thursday and Fox are also holding back on ratings missile Million Dollar Money Drop as no new episode airs this week as it’s the President’s State of the Union address on Tuesday. Apparently. Edit: No I’m wrong about that, there’s an episode Tuesday.

Meanwhile, Endemol Joe has news of a new pilot being filmed:

Hello Bothers Bar readers. Please start applying for Endemol’s new ITV gameshow which is set to be a smash hit: http://www.itv.com/beontv/newgameshowpilot/default.html

It is similar to The Chase but better.

Anyone over the age of 18 and any gender will be eligible to enter.

So there we are. It also sounds like it’s only going to have six questions an episode which I can’t help but feel misses some of the attraction (or, HEH, the thrill) of The Chase. It’d be interesting to know which bit of Endemol is making this, I’d be much happier trusting the old Endemol West guys to make an entertaining show compared to the old Brighter Pictures lot.

Show discussion: Schlag den Raab 15/1/11

By | January 15, 2011
45 Comments

Before we begin, final reminder that the Poll of 2010 closes tonight at midnight, the results will follow ooh, sometime in the next week hopefully.

However tonight is the first Schlag den Raab of 2011. Look out as Stefan Raab and a contender play Ker-plunk for tonight’s jackpot of €500,000. Tonight’s musical guests are Bruno Mars, Adele and Max Mutzke (I know I can’t believe it either, Max Mutzke!)

The action starts at 7:15pm GMT (8:15 CET) on ProSieben, although hopefully there will be a naughty internet stream for everyone outside of Germany.

The Chase

By | January 13, 2011
57 Comments

The Chase on ITV1 is not by any means the perfect show, but it has the force of personality to paper over the cracks and as such is a show that I approve of even though I don’t really make time to watch it on a regular basis.

Today’s episode (that of the 13th January) was a complete cracker and I’m really glad everyone alerted me to it. Mark Labbett is basically perfect in his chasing role and everyone seemed to be having a rather jolly time (except the bloke on the end). Also, the criticism I was making at the start of the series, that the muliple-choice round questions had become a bit pub quiz machine-y, seemed a bit less appropriate today.

Right then – presumably Chasers are on some kind of performance related pay, but what I would like to know is who sets the amounts that get played for in going up or down a step? Is the Chaser just acting as the mouthpiece of the producer? Or is it a bit more interesting than that?