Fifty 50 reaches its LANDMARK 31st episode and Lewis Murphy and Daniel Peake have a natter about Schlag den Star, Million Pound Drop and that sort of thing.
Also features the INCREDIBLE RETURN of 21 Questions Wrong. And it’s another cracker. How do we do it? How do we do it?
I’m going to talk about new US reality game Whodunnit? This will be spoileriffic, so I’m going to hide it under a cut.
Spoiler whinger ninja’s gone? Good.
I really really really really wanted to like Whodunnit? but unfortunately it’s not quite as good as I hoped. The setting is great and I quite like Giles the Butler for for me it sits rather uncomfortably between two stools, like it ought to be more serious or more light hearted.
Murder mysteries are all about the who, what and why. Whodidit, what they did and why they did it. Here we found out what they did about fifteen minutes in (oh they find a musket shot in the back of her neck! It’s just like CSI. Mystery solved.) with a further twenty minutes of extraneous activity (some of which involving an admittedly clever but admittedly out of place puzzle). Who is doing it isn’t going to be revealed for weeks on end and it doesn’t really seem to matter if any of the contestants work that out anyway (the butler did it, you mark my words) and as to why, the reasons are rather spurious and unclear, and why the contestants don’t just ring the police after the murder I will have no idea.
It’s not quite devious enough.
But. But but but but. I will stick with it, because like The Murder Game and Murder in Small Town X which also had issues but were fun to watch, I’m hoping there’s going to be a proper plot arc over the next nine weeks to suck me in. I quite like the little world the show created (I’d quite like to read the prequel book that’s come out in the US), but I really hope the procedural becomes a little less procedural.
If a naughty link to episode 1 becomes available, will someone post it here? Ta.
I’ve discovered that goggling “Vidbull X” where X is the name of the show usually reaps dividends, although watch out for pop-ups.
Thanks, this one proved successful:
http://vidbull.com/7ltladfroht4.html
It’s on Youtube for now
[SPOILERS HEREIN] Hmm, well I think it’s actually not too bad, all things considered. Even the editing wasn’t too annoying. But it really is CSI:Fisher Price in the way the ‘puzzle’ works. There’s only one element of the solution that wasn’t already spelt out several times by the contestants, and while that was quite clever there was ultimately no Columbo-like ‘aha’ moment that made it hang together. And one could argue that the business with the lamp cable was somewhat extraneous – surely the killer wouldn’t have been relying on the tank conveniently smashing some moments after the shot?
Obviously they’ve got a lot of ground to cover in a first programme, and I think they did that well. But a bit more meat on the bone in future would be nice.
I presume the point the cable was to give another potential cause of death for the contestants to consider, although the whole business with the round in the back of the neck pretty much ended any other potential avenues to go down and it would have been nice for them to give more of an explanation as to why the bared cable was there. I did enjoy the show though although it did felt like it could do with a little more depth. I do especially like the ‘reveal’ of the elimination.
I’ll tell you what, the murderer has to be a bloody *great* shot.
Well We’ve certainly come a long way from Mrs Peacock in the Study with the Antique Sword, haven’t we?
Having just watched Ep one on youtube I am instantly loving this.
OK it’s camp, and it’s typically overacted, but it’s fun and the murder reenactments are just the sort of thing a Cluedo fan WOULD love.
I cannot wait to see what other “murders” they have lined up for coming weeks.
Good start, but really don’t see multiple series of this.
I really really love this show, probably my favourite reality competition yet.
There are just some things, I would have changed. I think it would have been better, if there was more staff in the house that could be murdered and everyone of the contestants had something (e.g. a “cryptex”) that would be important in the finale murder, which would be taken away when they performed too bad instead of them all being murdered. They could still investigate and be helpful (or *hopefully* not), but wouldn’t have a chance on the grand prize. Otherwise there will be problems with finding teams to investigate since they will all be murdered and a single person can’t go to all three sections of the investigation (I think the winner of the episode should be able to go to 2 parts in the next episode as a bonus for winning)… I also think that a bigger staff could be more interesting for the plot and you would be able to have more suspects. I thought Giles had all ready said, he was the executive for the murderer, which is what we were actually looking for (at least the murderer isn’t a murderer then)…
Anyway this all might sound confusing and I am interested in the way the show will progress. I hope the audience will grow and grow and it will be sold to the UK (Richard O’Brien could be a great butler) and Germany soon. Could be lovely… Really looking forward!
a couple rumours from Italy:
RAI is testing Secret Fortune, host unknown probably Max Giusti
Paolo Bonolis is willing to host the “I promise it’s the absolutely positively very very very last season” of Ciao Darwin. honest! yeah
Cluedo meets Estate of Panic meets Jonathan Creek.
I really enjoyed this, especially given that it was a first episode. It moved along ad a decent pace without feeling rushed. There were a couple of moments that showed the contestants using a bit of ingenuity like the steamer and the unexpected wound in the neck of the victim.
I’d be interested to know exactly how the scoring was done I imagine there were certain key words or phrases that had to be said. The deciding factor in this episode seemed to be recognising that the shot was the killing blow, not the water or electricity. Although I wonder how many got that the pane of the window was removed prior to the shot.
Love the idea of Richard O’Brien as the butler for a UK version,
There was an exam, it’s stated in the credits, and the piece to camera was for television.
Forget RoB, surely it’s got to be Tim Curry, like in Clue?
Oh, the depressing magic of television! Actually Tim Curry could be a great choice, if he was allowed to present it in a properly quirky British style. I think the rather manic style from Clue would suit the viewers, but not the public. It might work quite well if we was part of an ensamble – why not a cook and a maid; and of course we’d need to see him reading the first note and setting up the character.
Hopefully next week in the time we’re not taking on introductions we can have an extra round of investigation, rather than a round of video diaries.
Mark my words – it’s Ulysses. He was far far too happy and excited at all the murderage (although watch me miss the killer like with WiDM this year!)
Also, fun fact: the stunt double used for “Dontae”‘s murder/fire run was female, and shaved her head for it. She also had to be set on fire four times – ABC told me so!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=PtHHMqknV_c
Cube (France) opening – starts next Monday on France 2 19:30. Aaaaand it seems they’ve thrown away the music package from the UK ver., which is not neally good news.