Million Pound Drop – Live! returns for another eight-part run on Fridays and Saturdays, 10pm on Channel 4 from the 28th January.
Hat tip to Travis P.
Meanwhile, Who Wants To Be a Millionaire apparently isn’t except in specials form. It’s a sad end for The Most Important Show In The History of TV (I’ve always said if you want to know why TV is like what it is today the 20m viewers Millionaire was getting in its heyday is the genesis), still Chris Tarrant is on The Magicians this weekend.
I think there’s something amusing about the fact that Who Wants to be a Millionaire? is only going to be played by (likely) millionaires in future (or at least people who are very well off). What should they change the title to?
Edit: Endemol Joe suggesting the story is bogus and civilian contestants are not off the cards. Make of that what you will.
Shame – works much better nightly.
P.S. Anyone heard of a new 12 Yard gameshow where contestants play for local charities. Saw an ad in our local paper today, with applications to be sent to “hero” @12yard.
Could be interesting to have a show with people playing for charities they genuinely care about – celebs gave up that pretence years ago when I’m a Celeb started paying them!
Heard something similar to that on Buzzerblog called You Deserve It, or words to that effect.
I was going to suggest that, but I thought Buzzerblog Alex said “You Deserve It” was some other production company’s format (ie not 12 Yard), I forget the name of it, but it also had a number in the name.
Yes, it’s a Dick de Rijk format being done over here called Holding Out For a Hero, unless it’s just a very similar format idea.
This?
http://www.lostintv.com/tv_show.cfm?f=1294859681531&content_type_id=231
Ta. Gethin Jones appears to be hosting!
There was a contestant call for “Hero” on UKGS last year. It said this:
—-
NEW EXCITING QUIZ SHOW
The makers of Who Dares Wins and In It to Win It are looking for a HERO but not just any hero…
A QUIZ SHOW HERO.
Is there a cause close to your heart?
Someone who works tirelessly for others in your community?
Or a group crying out for help?
We are looking for some extra special contestants to take part in a new extra special quiz show.
Your general knowledge could change someone else’s life forever……….
If you would like to opportunity to be a real life hero then we need to hear from you.
[then contact details and boilerplate]
In other news, it’s just been announced they’re axing regular episodes of Millionaire. Specials only from hereon.
And celebrity specials at that, according to the Mirror – so no more civilian contestants allowed.
Not surprised. The signs were there, shame they’re not going to try out Millionaire: Hot Seat though, given their cheap payouts to one person per show.
The live celebrity shows obvivously is the way forward and would work if they do 2-3 a year (Christmas, Easter etc…) but need to work out the niggles and have ITV give them a bigger timeslot (90 minutes for three couples with a fourth in reserve).
That’s terrible news! I had always wanted to be on WWTBAM, but I kind of knew that they wanted to steer towards celeb-only shows.
In unrelated news, I’ve put up a rather amateur-style review of Money Vault on my YouTube page – keshihead07
Must be a slow news day for Channel Five. They are actually covering the Millionaire axing.
Meanwhile, on Million Dollar Money Drop:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jmzOhq6ICo0
(Warning: video title spoils the whole bloody thing)
Lol @ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-eGgF_27IZM&NR
Heh!
Yes, agreed very much so!
So – not counting these celeb-only specials – the end of an era has finally arrived.
And to think how much different ITV was when that era began on 4 September 1998…
* The regions still existed, of course.
* ITV2 was still three months away from launch.
* Children’s programming was still important.
* News bulletins still had ITN in their names, and the likes of John Suchet, Nicholas Owen and the late Carol Barnes were prominent.
* Richard and Judy were still hosting This Morning.
Basically, the monkeys were significantly less obsessed with trash, celebs, pretty faces and stamping the ITV name everywhere they possibly could.
And as regards game shows…
* Les Dennis and Roy Walker were still going strong on Family Fortunes and Catchphrase respectively.
* Blind Date and Gladiators were still prominent on Saturday nights.
* The likes of Strike it Rich and Bruce’s Price is Right were still going.
But then, one would expect television to change quite a lot over twelve and a bit years, wouldn’t they?
It is a shame, though, that the show is going the same way as FF and Mr and Mrs…
Fort Boyard would have been starting about then, wouldn’t it?
Yes, it would have – but I was talking in terms of ITV.
Yeah, I appear to have lost the ability to read proper. Ooh dear.
My friend at CPL tells me regular episodes of Who Wants to Be A Millionaire HAVE NOT been axed. This story is bogus.
At least get your facts straight. No one from ITV has stated the regular series has been axed and I have it on good authority it will be back.
By the way, very high ratings for Million Dollar Money Drop yesterday. Its best since ep 2.
It’s the word of mouth success we were all expecting.
I’ll be the judge of that. I see on the offical Facebook page they’re putting a spin on things saying “We are talking to ITV about new episodes… Watch this space!!” but doesn’t actually confirm they have axed the civillian version of the show. Also futher down the thread they said there is no news regarding contestant applications.
Anyway, I thought Sony (formally 2waytraffic) now owns the show and not CPL.
I am an avid watcher of the show and actually know more than the twits at ITV. Saying it was the first live episode last month when it wasn’t (it was the second). Also I heard that ITV weren’t happy with the clock format and was in two minds whether to air the episodes or not. Which explains whey they dumped them in the summer in the Tuesday night graveyard. I am so convinced the civillian edition will no longer air what it was before. That said, I won’t be surprised come 2012 it will return as either Quarter Millionaire for daytime audiences (since Spain does actually use that title) or Millionaire: Hot Seat since that format is cheap and quick to make.
The rumours are that the clock format was imposed by Sony. The original team hate the new version and are going to leave. However, everyone knows that as soon as Millionaire gets cancelled in the UK, then the golden goose stops laying eggs and the worldwide revenues will shrink to nothing. Therefore, this is why you have the fudged compromise of the specials that allows them to keep the brand going in the UK without having to make the weaker-rating civilian shows.
Millionaire is a twitching rabbit that should’ve been put out of its misery years ago. I watched about five minutes of the live show on Buzzerblog and had to switch off out of pity. What a humiliating end to what was once a national treasure. Do they just let the runners write the questions now? It was just ITV this and celebrities that. I’d rather watch £1MPD, and that’s not even the NEXT BIG THING*.