What have we got to look forward to this week?
- The Amazing Race (Sunday, CBS): I’ve avoided all details about this so far, except I gather that two ex-Big Brother contestants are on it and Miss Teen South Carolina who said something stupid about Geography once. The first episode will probably be quite similar to the first episode of the other 15 seasons, I confidently predict.
- Valentine’s Day (Sunday, The Western World): Awwww.
- A new feature (Sunday, Bother’s Bar): Try not to get too excited now.
- Only Connect (Monday, BBC 4, 8:30pm): Middle-class but not posh is how it’s going down on Twitter where all the cool working class kids like myself hang out. This week it’s the Insurers vs Gamblers. There’s only one more heat left! But I’ll have to watch this on Catch-up because I’m probably off to see…
- Treasure Tag (Down in That London):… with Cat Deeley on Monday evening. Normally I have an idea as to whether I think I’m going to like a show or not based on the premise before I go to see it, this one has me feeling very mildly positive. I fully expect them to mess that good feeling up by taking six hours to record. Anyway, look out for a write-up if I go.
- The Krypton Factor (Tuesday, ITV1, 7:30pm): I might have to stop billing this if I actually keep forgetting to actually watch it (I mean, I was at the final so I know who wins for goodness sake). This is the penultimate heat, by my reckoning.
- Survivor (Thursday, CBS): Trying to avoid spoilers here (for another day at least, you’ve had plenty of time by then), but quite enjoyed episode one. The villains are brilliant, it feels like some sort of pirate camp over there. Challenges are repeats of old challenges with occasional twists, and I can’t believe how much the survivors really go for it in the brawling-based challenges to the point that I’m beginning to find them mildly uncomfortable to watch. Also Boston Rob is awesome, you Survivor-fan idiots!
- Solitary v4.0 (Saturday, Fox Reality): Episode two was, in a word, epic, with the completely brilliant Solitary Roulette task (should be made into its own format, until David B pointed out at the poker last week that it was basically round two of 15-1) and a treatment where contestants whack themselves with various objects of varying degrees of kink to make enough noise to register on a clap-o-meter until they can take no more. Just when you begin to think Solitary has run out of interesting avenues to go down it’s still able to surprise and amuse. This is episode four, which I confidently predict will be a bit like episode three but with one less person in it.
- The Bother Series of Poker Game 2 (Next Sunday 8pm, Bother’s Bar, Full Tilt): you missed out on a fun game last week, don’t be scared to join in this one especially as I fully intend on taking David B down. Requests > Search by Tournament ID > #138380498.
Working in an Oxbridge library does not equal working class. Cleaning the library does.
It does because I’m just assistant staff much like Billie Piper in Doctor Who, I’m like some class chameleon.
You mean you’re posh playing the part of someone working class?
Or that you’re working class in an environment where class is irrelevant?
I think you’ve read too much into this.
Incidendally, I’ll be in Vienna next week so may not be around for pokey-poke.
THIS MEANS NOTHING TO (No – Ed).
You had me confused for a moment when you mentioned episode 4 of S4.0… until then I realized that technically within the confines of the dates given, it actually is episode 4, and episode 3 just goes out tonight. Touche.
No war but the class war!
Here in NZ I have just been watching some olympic coverage, but TAR starts tonight… but only season 14!
Has anyone been watching Solitarios at all? A lot of the challenges seem to be samplings from the first three US seasons, but they used an interesting food challenge in a recent episode. Each pod has two boxes, labeled A and B. Inside one box is a pizza. Inside the other box is a slice of pizza frozen in a block of ice. All four remaining pods selected the box with the ice, meaning that they had to thaw/chip/smash away at the ice to free the frozen slice before they could open the other box and eat the pizza. In another episode which has apparently aired (but not yet been put up on the website), the pods are challenged to keep a few chickens, chicks, and eggs all in the center of the pod at once. With the obvious hilarious consequences.
A bit of news I’ve gleaned about the new season of Premier League Poker if you’re interested-
-They’re taping in Vegas this week
-12 players, but instead of 6-handed tables as was done before, it’s 8-handed (except the final table).
-Because of this, each player only plays four times instead of 6.
-Scoring is 16-11-8-6-4-3-2-0.
-Final table is set as usual- Top four point scorers go through automatically, 5th plays 8th and 6th plays 7th heads-up, 9th-12th are eliminated.
(I sorta don’t like this- this either means fewer episodes or, more likely, each of the qualification rounds will be two episodes. We’ll see I guess, but I always thought this was a good format and shouldn’t be mucked around with too much).
That actually sounds quite interesting – I wonder why Vegas? Well I don’t wonder really. Does this also mean they’re going to be deeper stacked games, like the recent World Open 5, because I can sort of see that working.
I understand there will an internet qualifier who will get a free berthing to the final table through Full Tilt (I think). I hope they’re keeping points = chip stacks for the final.
If you look at Daniel Negreanu’s blog, you can find out who the twelve players are (well, eleven plus A. N. Internet-Qualifier).
NOT-SPOILER! Oh.
Good spot, for those who want toi know the line-up:
1. Evgeny Timoshenko
2. J.C Tran
3. Daniel Negreanu
4. Tony G.
5. Luke Schwartz
6. Roland de Wolfe
7. Vanessa Rousso
8. Phil Laak
9. Ian Fraser
10. David Benyamine
11. Phil Hellmuth
12. Online Qualifer
That looks very highly entertaining, buy-in appears to be $100,000.
Honestly? I was disappointed by it. No Annette, no Vicky, no Devilfish, no Dwan, no Andy Black, hey, even no Juha Helppi. Yay Roland, yay Daniel, yay Luke, yay Tony, yay Phil, sort-of-yay other Phil, blah about the rest.
There is sense in the concept that people who finish 9th to 12th one year get relegated and don’t play the next year, but that’s not a concept that they’ve stuck firm with over the years.
No Annette is a real shame, as much as I like Victoria Coren, she would openly admit herself she is probably the weakest player most years, but about three-quarters of the people there I think will make for an entertaining and egotastic event, which for this sort of thing is for the best I think.
And yes, they are deep-stack games.
Actually, Phil Laak was a last-minute replacement- Doyle Brunson was scheduled to play, but had to pull out because of a health issue.
and Vanessa Rousso is a pretty good player, so don’t count her out.
Phil Laak has came across quite well on recent TV tournaments in the UK (which he’s taken a shine to, apparently) so I wouldn’t mind if he won it.
A question I need the answer to (because I reckon you lot will all know this): Cheryl Cole offa de X Factor: does she say “you were” or “you was”? This is the sort of thing Wikipedia never mentions.
It’s also the Got to Dance final this evening on Sky 1, but I don’t know if anyone has actually been watching it.
This could be an interesting program…
France 2 is doing a documentary (it appears it will air in the next few weeks) about the famous Milgram experiment….
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milgram_experiment
The twist is the participants in the experiment believe that they’re on a gameshow..
http://www.youtube.com/user/LaZoneXtreme
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YDJu6hu47JE
Not the best quality clip, but it was the first one that came up.
Also, I’m pretty sure the (strikethrough text) world-famous Howie Mandel did a similar bit with a Japanese game show theme on “Howie Do It.”
Ugh, that’s pretty horrible. Given that France 2 is state-owned, I think there’s a decent chance that they might care about ethical considerations like debriefing the participants, properly following up and explaining the design of the experiment. Howie Mandel? Can’t imagine he’s even as likely as Endemol to explain what’s gone on and why (cf treatment of Big Brother housemates) let alone, say, Jeremy Beadle.
FR1 and 2 are very conservative. They wouldn’t handle something like the Weakest Link in the way that the BBC does, for instance.
Howie did a full debriefing on-camera. Almost too soon, frankly. Not that I appreciate any of his hidden camera gags, but he really could have stretched out the bit another thirty seconds or so before the reveal.
It’s weird though, Milgram’s experiment seems to be the more popular experiments that keeps resurfacing in different ways. Different tweaks have been made over the years to ensure the mental well-being of the participants, and it’s been set up in different ways, but you don’t ever hear much about ITV’s new series, “Bandurarama” (study how someone beats up a doll, win up to a quarter-mil for duplicating the act on a random hobo) or “Skinner’s Winners” (Push the button and win a pri– oh, wait!).
(Trigger warnings for the links, which contain pictures of the show’s set.)
The whole set-up was overseen by professors from the University of Nice with full debriefs and explanations afterwards. Television producers Christophe Nick and Thomas Bornot worked on the show, which is playing at the Berlin film festival, and will air on France 2 after the Olympics. From what I can gather from his other work, Bornot is sort-of the French equivalent of Michael Cockerell.
This show was actually filmed on 14 April last year. It was presented by Tania Young, and the “test” had the stooge given one minute to memorise 27 pairs of words, with the subject appearing to administer shocks for incorrect responses. This much was, of course, a fake.
Re: Treasure Tag.
Is it filmed out in the open/on the street? Can you just turn up for a laugh or is it ticketed?
Ticketed via SRO.
Krypton Factor down to 2.4m (9.7% share) on Tuesday 16th, down from the 1st episode height of 3.2m. As the weeks have passed, so the rating has fallen by the odd 0.1m each week.
If anything, I expected this past Tuesday’s rating to increase slightly on last week’s 2.5m, being sandwiched between high-rating Emmerdale and The Brits.
I can’t say I’m surprised to be honest. I must admit I’ve not followed this series with the same interest and dedication as I did last year. The lack of Intelligence has ruined it to be honest.
I keep forgetting it’s on. I did it again this week.
The semi-finals begin next week.
Keep forgetting it’s on, forgetting it’s on Tuesdays now, etc, and wind up catching up with the Thursday repeat.
If there’s one thing to take from this week’s ep, that Mental Agility test was rock hard.
interestingly, i thought it was quite easy this week. yes certainly there was going to be less marks up for grabs than other ones, but i thought the players all made a bit of a hash of it if im honest, i think i outscored all but the female contestant.
Don’t forget you can try it online!
http://www.itv.com/thekryptonfactor, I imagine.
I got one 🙁
Gazongmk’s comment is clearly spam.
Oops – that aforementioned comment must have been deleted just seconds before I posted there.