So with comic and actor Stephen Merchant announced as the host of the one-off revival (a name incidentally we probably wouldn’t have considered, but on reveal pretty much immediately thought “yes that’s quite good”) I thought it would be fun to look at some parody as the show is ripe for that sort of thing.
The earliest one would probably be the Punt and Dennis “making a cup of tea” game:
Meanwhile Tony Robinson wrote a spoof into an episode of kids show Maid Marian and Her Merry Men. Here’s actually the entire script, but here’s the relevant video.
Adam Buxton and Joe Cornish frequently did take-offs of popular TV shows with Star Wars models for their TV show. “The pony trekking holiday in Ullswater will be mine!”
My personal favourite is The Crystal Muck from Dick ‘n’ Dom In Da Bungalow, one of many gameshow-based endgames they played out. Dave Chapman giving it everything, “CORRUGATED IRON and PIPING.”
Finally the most recent and probably the best observed, this from Cardinal Burns a few years ago:
My favourite thing about Crystal Muck is how they play the same sting over and over again for way too long. Mostly all of the Creamy Muck Muck Grand Finale’s were fantastic, another great one being Muck or No Muck.
“Don’t hurt little Noel-y!”
I literally could spend all day watching their Creamy Muck Muck Finales, although I’d happily watch the rest of D and D as well.
I’ve got a soft spot for Strike It Mucky.
Oh my lord Strike it Mucky is incredible “I’m on a horse!”
Makes me sad thinking of all the Grand Finale’s we could have had: Mucky Connect, Muckless, 1000 Muckbeats, The Great British Muck Off etc.
They are considering a reboot – https://twitter.com/SteveRyde/status/740115592146001920
I watched Muckety Muck not so long ago after David Walliams was announced for the ITV Christmas revival. It was just as you’d expect, far from being in a bad way.
Melvin Odoom always seemed like a pseudonym to me…
Unrelatedly: an episode of Bullseye being repeated tonight had some unusually weak darts players. A round two just finished with scores of 7 to 30 to 32, the darts players combining to hit the 20 segment (let alone the treble 20) twice out of nine throws. (The 32 thrower wisely decided to cut his losses and aim non-specifically for a side of the board with his third dart.)
Speedboat on standby…
SPOILER: The team who scored 30 won overall and kept their prizes from Bully’s Prize Board. The team who scored 7 finished second and gambled a little under £300 against the star prize; the non-darts player scored an ideal 41 and the darts player a whopping 26. A caravan was not won.
Did anyone watch and enjoy Die Kirmeskönige on RTL last weekend. Think it was a one off – based at a fairground and teams played games based around this – some on the fair eg holding beer glasses full of water around a rollercoaster or putting on clothes on a spinning ride etc. Other games in the studio such as tin can knocking and test of strength etc. Thought it was quite fun!
Had no idea about this but will try and look up tonight as I’m a sucker for that sort of thing. Thanks!
After Nick told me you mentioned it, I will give my thoughts as well, though they are basically the same.
I didn’t see it live and the RTL on demand thing is terrible, thus I skipped between parts and didn’t watch the entire thing. Many critics say it’s basically the closest thing to harmless 90s private telly fun we’ve had for the last couple of years. Which is probably mainly down to the hosts: Hugo Egon Balder (the only one who has ever created and hosted a succesful comedy panel show (Genial Daneben) in Germany) and Hella von Sinnen hosted this show, they have hosted basically everything fun for RTL in the 90s and their last show was a drunken talk show on a niche channel.
The hosts are joined by 12 celebs in 4 teams, each with a distinct colour and a name based on a fairground ride (e.g. Geisterbahn = Ghost Train).
This all takes place in a tent with a small audience. There is a big screen where they show the scores and sometimes “randomly” draw the contestant from each team for the challenges. They are all seated in tiny lounges (a bit like the green room in the Dusseldorf ESC) and on the right are ten strong men standing around, waiting to be picked. The reason: they are the points. Whenever a team wins, they can choose one of them as a helper in the final game. Some strong men are ripped, others are more big than muscly, but you can hardly say who has the biggest advantage in the end game. The big finale is a rotating disc on the floor, that spins quicker and quicker until the last one is standing (or rather sitting right in the middle). His or her team is declared the winner and they are made Kirmeskönige (Fairground Kings).
The rounds themselves are quiet nice and inventive. They are all being played on rollercoasters and are hosted by Nina Moghaddam (she used to do childrens television and then hosted Pop Idol Extra here). She is very calm and a great addition to the other loud hosts.
I enjoyed what I saw, end game was meh, but in other regions of Germany this is an iconic attraction, so I probably didn’t have an emotional connection to it.
If you want to watch it, it’s just available for free until tomorrow (RTL has a strict 7 days rule) and you can watch it on rtlnow.de or tvnow.de
It’s definitely worth to take a look, but I don’t think it could sell anywhere, so not definitely a much watch.
One more thing: the fairground was genuinely open when they shot it and you don’t feel it at all in the show, which is a bit of a shame really.
I’m about an hour into this and I like how visual it is, but the challenges feel a bit light and drawn out.
Holding onto jugs of water whilst on a rollercoaster my fave game I think. Kentucky Derby could have done with a decent overhead camera. Actually I quite liked the bumper car Mario Kart battle as well.
And the beerglass curling.
Basically the second half quite a bit better than the first half.
I am watching this as I type and i am thoroughly enjoying! What’s there not to like? A game show set in a fun fair? The only thing I am not enjoying is Hella – she’s a bit much!!!
Apart from Die Kirmeskönige, another interesting show aired last Saturday: Die beste Show der Welt.
This was the second episode of it and it saw once again Joko and Klaas pitch four formats each against one another to see who would have the best ratings (decided by the studio audience).
Unfortunately very few of those formats would work as a show on their own, but I wil try to recall as many as possible.
Show 1 was Klaas’s My Idiot Friend. It saw three celebrity friends of Joko answer questions on how he would react in candid camera moments. The winner would be able to sign a restriction order (not sure, it’s Einstweilige Verfügung in Germany and means you can’t approach or contact that person). That joke wasn’t really funny, but the game itself was solid.
Jokos first show was backwards football. He and three others (one of those was in the first show of Klaas, so Jokos reactions in the first format weren’t that authentic, I suppose) formed two teama of two. They played football with VR Glasses on, which showed what cameras on the backside of their heads were filming. Joey Kelly (from every Raab event) was part of this game and said he trained four hours, but it didn’t show at all. This format was boring and no one really thought this was a good show.
The second of Klaas’s shows was Cooking in the Dark. No it wasn’t really, but Klaas was blindfolded and had to cook a dish with the help of famous star chef Frank Rosin (he has one or two Michelin Stars), who was only allowed to sit on a tennis referee chair and watch and shout at him. In the end a married couple had to judge the dish and they thought Frank Rosin was the cook who had to fight other star chefs. This show was hilarious, it made great telly, though it dragged a little, but basically it was everyone’s favourite of the evening.
Joko’s second show saw the entire studio audience compete for a car by getting as close as possible to it (or the line in front of it) but without going over. Unfortunately no ine made a TPIR reference here. It started with the entire audience making paper planes and throwing them from their seats. The best four then rolles aluminium foil rolls with one push as close as possible to the car. The three best contestants then had to blow a feather as close to the car (they were allowed to walk along with it) without it touching them or the floor. And the last two has office chairs with fire extinguishers as a ‘motor’ to get as close to the car as possible, while being blindfolded. This was the only interesting game and the audience gave a pretty bad rating when they all lost their chances to win the car.
I can’t remember Klaas’s third show, but Joko’s thirs show didn’t have a format at all. He was just showing several meh physical experiments without explaining them, though it was called “Faszination Forschung” (Fascination Research). He had a little helper and whenever the rating was close to ending his show, he promised a bigger experiment and tried to save it. He succeeded, but it was boring anyway.
The best format was a bit of an early 2000s game show: Klaas’s fourth show Hart aber Unfair (wordplay with well known German political debate show Hart aber Fair). It saw six audience members as contestants, all of which said they were very judgemental and outspoken people. They introduced themselves and the rest of the audience then voted on one question at a time, four in total. The 6 contestants had to guess correctly who that person was going to be, otherwise 1,000€ were taken from the 10,000€ jackpot. But the person voted by the five contestants was eliminated immediately. I only remember the first question “who is the dumbest?” and then there was “who has the least humor?”. The other two questions I don’t remember. But the contestants weren’t really mean enough for that format and they only had little time to accuse themselves of being dumb etc.
The last two then had a modified prisoners’ dilemma: They could take the 8,000€ left in the jackpot, or share and take 2,000€ each. Instead of saying “let me take it all and we can share afterwards so we each have 4,000€” one player was shafted and the ‘winner’ was booed all the way out of the studio and even had to defend himself out on the streets the days after. That was the last of Klaas’s show and the ratings dropped a lot after the result. Although this seemed like an actual format.
Joko’s last show was based on a Das Duell um die Welt stunt Klaas had to do some years ago where Klaas wouldn’t be able to dive ten meters in the Norwegian arctic. Klaas had to answer multiple choice questions and sit under one of four buckets representing the answers. He then had to pull a string to get ice water poured over him, if it was the wrong answer. Turns out all the buckets were filled with ice water (what a surprise). The final round was the chance for Klaas to win the entire game. He had to dive ten meters through ice water just like back then (they even brought his coach from Norway). He tried and tried, but couldn’t do it, because he was properly scared. In the end Joko made it and thus got great ratings, winning the entire show (although it wasn’t really a format).
I like the show, but I always watch it afterwards, so I can skip the bits where the formats are dragging. You should be able to watch it for longer than Die Kirmeskönige on 7tv.de (I think).
Don’t forget about that one scene in the Dungeons & Dragons movie with Richard O’Brien.
Actually, no.
Do forget about that one scene. And the entire movie, for that matter.
Move along, no comment to see here.
Lithuania’s Worst Driver premiered yesterday on LNK Lithuania. It looks like it does not follow the British format, with giving away cars to all non-worst drivers. The format was not even explained in the show, so we don’t know the prize, neither structure of the season. Although, after the contestants arrived at the course, their driving licenses were collected and locked into host’s safe. Maybe if they win, their license will be returned? We don’t know. However, the show was surprisingly good.