Only Connect with Victoria Coren
Discussion
Now, I quite enjoy the more intellectual quiz shows and chanced upon this programme last night. Apparently it's been on BBC4 for a while and has been "upgraded" to BBC2 for series 10.
Victoria Coren is usually quite watchable too, but this programme was just...weird. It looked fantastically cheap to produce, patently no studio audience, and Victoria Coren looked pretty bored throughout the whole thing. She did some strange links to camera which were just cringe-inducing, playing to an audience that simply wasn't there. They just died. For something in it's tenth series, it looked like a pilot gone wrong.
Anyone else see this oddity? It's on iPlayer http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b04gqn6c/only... if you want to see...
Victoria Coren is usually quite watchable too, but this programme was just...weird. It looked fantastically cheap to produce, patently no studio audience, and Victoria Coren looked pretty bored throughout the whole thing. She did some strange links to camera which were just cringe-inducing, playing to an audience that simply wasn't there. They just died. For something in it's tenth series, it looked like a pilot gone wrong.
Anyone else see this oddity? It's on iPlayer http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b04gqn6c/only... if you want to see...
PhilboSE said:
Now, I quite enjoy the more intellectual quiz shows and chanced upon this programme last night. Apparently it's been on BBC4 for a while and has been "upgraded" to BBC2 for series 10.
Victoria Coren is usually quite watchable too, but this programme was just...weird. It looked fantastically cheap to produce, patently no studio audience, and Victoria Coren looked pretty bored throughout the whole thing. She did some strange links to camera which were just cringe-inducing, playing to an audience that simply wasn't there. They just died. For something in it's tenth series, it looked like a pilot gone wrong.
I thought all that when I first saw it. Actually once you get used to the deadpan style and lack of audience response, some of the links can be pretty good. The questions are bloody hard though, I think there was one week where I didn't have a clue about any of them... but I normally manage at least a couple, and sometimes can sort the wall out before the team does.Victoria Coren is usually quite watchable too, but this programme was just...weird. It looked fantastically cheap to produce, patently no studio audience, and Victoria Coren looked pretty bored throughout the whole thing. She did some strange links to camera which were just cringe-inducing, playing to an audience that simply wasn't there. They just died. For something in it's tenth series, it looked like a pilot gone wrong.
Welcome to Only Connect, OP.
With those links, get ready for many references to drinking, Michael Portillo, and sometimes drinking and Michael portillo
.
The questions are silly hard, to the point that you feel all warm and fuzzy inside when you get one right, especially if the don't get it on the team, and shout at the TV when you can see a group on the wall that the team can't.
It's not just me that does that, is it?
With those links, get ready for many references to drinking, Michael Portillo, and sometimes drinking and Michael portillo
.The questions are silly hard, to the point that you feel all warm and fuzzy inside when you get one right, especially if the don't get it on the team, and shout at the TV when you can see a group on the wall that the team can't.
It's not just me that does that, is it?
Jobbo said:
HereBeMonsters said:
Victoria Coren completely miscast as the host. In fact, the show itself is just completely bizarre.
That'll be why it's on its 10th series, then? 
I'm not sure they're aiming for TG-sized viewing figures.Brilliant show. Proves that you don't need huge budget to get a decent program together. Doesn't need an audience (can you imagine it with whooping and hollering every time they got a question right??).
Try the Wall Game on the Only Connect webpage, great fun and there are several hundreds of them to try out.
Try the Wall Game on the Only Connect webpage, great fun and there are several hundreds of them to try out.
I enjoy only connect.
yes the links are tortured and the participants look like they don't usually see day light. But f
k me is it hard. If you get a run right it gets proper punch the air satisfying.
A few series ago they got criticised for being pretentious for using greek letters as the way of choosing the question (I agreed)...so to acknowledge that they changed it to the hieroglyphs. I though that was a pleasingly 'fk you' response to criticism.
yes the links are tortured and the participants look like they don't usually see day light. But f
k me is it hard. If you get a run right it gets proper punch the air satisfying. A few series ago they got criticised for being pretentious for using greek letters as the way of choosing the question (I agreed)...so to acknowledge that they changed it to the hieroglyphs. I though that was a pleasingly 'f
k you' response to criticism. It is very BBC4, and I have to say I love it. Maybe because I have the twisted geeky sort of brain that can get answers that teams can't (sometimes), and it doesn't need a photographic memory for football teams, Greek gods and all the usual tedious pub quiz stuff that gets wheeled out onto TV quiz shows. It is about thinking, not memory. I also get VC's dry wit, which probably explains a lot about me.
To slightly mis-quote JFK: We choose these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard. There has been a lot of dumbing down on TV over the years, but Only Connect proves that the BBC can still do the challenging stuff. It isn't intended to be glossy with an audience like 2,000 sealions applauding when someone throws them a fish, cranked out hundreds at a time, and many people won't like it, which is fine by me, there is BBC1 and (for now) BBC3 for the populist mass market stuff.
To slightly mis-quote JFK: We choose these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard. There has been a lot of dumbing down on TV over the years, but Only Connect proves that the BBC can still do the challenging stuff. It isn't intended to be glossy with an audience like 2,000 sealions applauding when someone throws them a fish, cranked out hundreds at a time, and many people won't like it, which is fine by me, there is BBC1 and (for now) BBC3 for the populist mass market stuff.
Zad said:
It is very BBC4, and I have to say I love it. Maybe because I have the twisted geeky sort of brain that can get answers that teams can't (sometimes), and it doesn't need a photographic memory for football teams, Greek gods and all the usual tedious pub quiz stuff that gets wheeled out onto TV quiz shows. It is about thinking, not memory. I also get VC's dry wit, which probably explains a lot about me.
To slightly mis-quote JFK: We choose these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard. There has been a lot of dumbing down on TV over the years, but Only Connect proves that the BBC can still do the challenging stuff. It isn't intended to be glossy with an audience like 2,000 sealions applauding when someone throws them a fish, cranked out hundreds at a time, and many people won't like it, which is fine by me, there is BBC1 and (for now) BBC3 for the populist mass market stuff.
This in spades; it's sort of QI for people who find Fry too populist. To slightly mis-quote JFK: We choose these things not because they are easy, but because they are hard. There has been a lot of dumbing down on TV over the years, but Only Connect proves that the BBC can still do the challenging stuff. It isn't intended to be glossy with an audience like 2,000 sealions applauding when someone throws them a fish, cranked out hundreds at a time, and many people won't like it, which is fine by me, there is BBC1 and (for now) BBC3 for the populist mass market stuff.
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