Saturday Night’s Alright For Writing – 26th Feb 2011

By | February 26, 2011

Sorry, other than Wednesday’s excitement it’s been a bit of a slow news week. Hopefully next week will be a bit better (there’s another pilot recording review to come on Tuesday).

In the meantime here’s a picture of Elton John so it can only mean our lazy catch-all post for discussion all things Saturday night, whether it be unfortunate allegations in The Sun regarding contestants (thanks to Travis P for the link – follow him here on Twitter) to failing to get your head around the last couple of questions on Secret Fortune once again (but look at those ratings!).

  • Let’s Dance for Comic Relief (BBC1, 7pm)
  • Ant and Dec’s Push the Button (ITV, 7:30pm)
  • The National Lottery Secret Fortune (BBC1, 8:20pm)
  • Take Me Out (ITV, 8:45pm)

And also the next few episodes of Power Struggle/Maa al tayar should be avaliable on Al Jazeera, hopefully.

42 thoughts on “Saturday Night’s Alright For Writing – 26th Feb 2011

  1. Barry

    N’oubliez pas les paroles celebrated it’s 500th episode with this:

    BAISER!

    Reply
  2. Travis P

    Thanks for the twitter plug, Brig. The number of followers have now massively increased by one!

    Reply
  3. Alex

    “Ha ha, I love the fact that someone has searched on Google for Do A Thing And Win Some Points on Bother’s Bar, a programme I’ve yet to pitch”

    Actually that was me. I was thinking of stealing the name to use as my blog. Fortunately I didn’t so you don’t need to kill me.

    Reply
  4. Des Elmes

    Secret Fortune: dreadful start as the £100k goes on the first question, and the answer selected is the lowest-ranked…

    Reply
  5. Des Elmes

    They’ve certainly got rid of a lot of low amounts, though – but now they’ve rejected the top answer to question 4…

    Reply
  6. Des Elmes

    And now the top two answers to question 5… this is a rather hit-and-miss performance…

    Reply
  7. Des Elmes

    Who else preferred it when the Saturday draws had only one presenter?

    Having two also means more Miss Klass, it seems… 🙄

    Reply
  8. Des Elmes

    Those who remember Davina’s chat show will know it was a huge flop…

    Reply
  9. Des Elmes

    The right time to hit good form – it’s a £20k v £75k finish… 🙂

    Reply
  10. Joe

    K7Media has confirmed that smash-hit gameshow, Odd One In, is returning this summer. After the success of the previous series all regular team captains and Bradley Walsh are back so you can continue to enjoy your favourite new summer-time gameshow.

    Reply
    1. Travis P

      If you mean K7 on the twitter feed then they actually got the news from me. They simply retweeted it.

      Reply
    2. Travis P

      and I wouldn’t call it a smash hit if it only had 3 million viewers in the summer. I suppose it’s cheaper to make than Magic Numbers.

      Reply
    3. Coolcat

      Odd One In didn’t have team captains. It had a regular home team (Manford and Andre), and guest pairs as the away team. Every week. That was the point. Did you watch it at all, Joe?

      Reply
      1. Travis P

        Knowing Joe, he probably did. That and definitely 101 Ways when that was airing last summer. 🙂

        Reply
  11. Travis P

    Let’s Dance for Comic Relief – 7.36m (32.0%)
    Secret Fortune – 5.93m (25.2%)
    Push the Button – 4.02m (17.2%) , +1 174k
    Take Me Out – 4.44m (19.0%) , +1 245k

    That is a shock. Paddy McGuinness scoring more viewers than Antan Dec.

    Secret Fortune continues to do well. Looks like the BBC have found their third lottery show.

    Reply
    1. Joe

      Secret Fortune is dire. It’s basically a rip-off of Million Pound Drop and Deal or No Deal mixed together. Endemol aren’t stupid, people at the company are aware that Secret Fortune has taken some of the key elements from those two shows.

      It is only getting good ratings because it’s got 7m+ people watching the show before it and is up against incredibly weak (and awful) competition from Push the Button (which incidentally I voted the worst show of 2010 in Brig’s poll the other week). Secret Fortune would flop if it isn’t given such easy scheduling.

      Reply
      1. Travis P

        I felt Push the Button last year wasn’t good or crap but the move to a live series this year has tarnished the show. The games are less inventive. The series last year was nearly live as it was on a 48 hour delay. I do like The Accumulator challenges though, although it does take a page from Banzai’s book.

        Reply
        1. Alex

          Yeah, the Accumulators are basically Banzai, without the theming, awesomely old music or ridiculousness.

          Sadly, the things that made Banzai good.

          Reply
  12. Brig Bother Post author

    Endemol aren’t stupid, people at the company are aware that Secret Fortune has taken some of the key elements from those two shows.

    But that’s alright Joe, correct me if I’m wrong, taking existing formats and then changing an element is how big hit formats like The Voice are made aren’t they?

    Reply
    1. Jennifer Turner

      Wasn’t “Secret Fortune” filmed bloomin’ ages ago anyway? I thought it had been sitting on a shelf since before any announcement was made about MPD.

      Reply
      1. Brig Bother Post author

        I remember similar accusations regarding how ‘interesting’ it was that Push the Button is live this time round, despite the fact that Ant and Dec came out and they wanted to do the second series live quite a long time before MPD happened.

        Reply
      2. Travis P

        BBC annouced Secret Fortune in December 2009!

        http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2009/12_december/03/ni.shtml

        Recording took place in the last week of June 2010.

        The Drop was annouced in late January. The Million Pound Drop was annouced in May.

        Wild Rover got their first with Secret Fortune, not Endemol with MPD. Still, nothing new as Perseverance and National Lottery Come & Have a Go had practially the same endgame but both shows launched in the SAME month.

        Reply
          1. Joe

            Still a blatant copy of Deal or No Deal. I’m going to have a word with a few people about this.

          2. Travis P

            Good luck! I know Endemol Itala had a case with Fattore C but they might not have any luck with Secret Fortune.

          3. Brig Bother Post author

            In fact if this is close enough to warrant an investigation, I’d be surprised if Fremantle didn’t want to have a look at Success Verkerzard/Risking it All and Million Pound Drop, really.

          4. Joe

            I don’t mean lawsuit or anything like that when I said I was going to have a word with some people. Just a friendly chat, you know. I do like the fact that so many programmes these days are inspired by the Deal or No Deal concept. People at Endemol take that as a complement.

          5. Gary

            I’ve always loved the format where you get offered an amount of money for your box, and you can either deal for that amount of money or you can no deal to try and get an increased offer or just decide to go all the way to the end and take the contents of your box.

            I really miss Take Your Pick.

          6. NJ

            By this logic Talkback should’ve been having a few words about Panic Attack.

          7. Kylie

            LMAO. Good luck with it. Hilarious considering the amount of formats that Endemol have been ‘inspired’ by.

          8. Mart with a Y not a I

            So, in the high court when the case of Endemol UK Vs Wild Rover takes place – what filmsy premise would Endemol take?

            That Secret Fortune by having the contestants removing pre-determined amounts from the prize cash structure out of the game by answering questions is ripping off Deal Or No Deal?
            Not..a..bloomin..chance..of…winning.

            Removing prizes/cash out of the game is not a new idea, nor is it an exclusive idea owned by Endemol.
            As Brig has mentioned, The Million Pound Drop is basically Success Verkerzard/Risking it All only played 8 foot off the ground from the Dutch original.

            It seems it may be OK to take a great handful from other peoples ideas and hide them under a blizzard of vari-lites and Davina McCall shouting and pass it off as your own, but should another company try and use a gameplay machanic (which itself has been in use long before Deal Or No Deal) it rattles Endemol.

    2. Travis P

      Bit like The Prisoner’s Dilemma. Trust Me was the first show to use the dilemma in 2000 but unsurprisingly, Endemol adapted it for Shafted and Golden Balls.

      Reply
      1. Travis P

        I have a feeling they’re keeping witth the weekend combo. That’s what Joe had hinted recently.

        Reply
  13. Jennifer Turner

    Something really bizarre. You know those extended versions of panel games? “Have I Got A Bit More News For You” and “QI XL”… well, Radio 4’s “The News Quiz” is getting an hour-long one!

    Imagine an :alarmed: smiley at this point.

    Reply

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