c4countdown

Don't know if it's been mentioned already but this new quiz started today on BBC2. Countdown great Chris Wills was one of the contestants, if you missed it, see how he got on here at the iplayer site:http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... Episode_1/

Jojo Apollo wrote:Don't know if it's been mentioned already but this new quiz started today on BBC2. Countdown great Chris Wills was one of the contestants, if you missed it, see how he got on here at the iplayer site:http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... Episode_1/

SPOILER
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Wow. Chris was relentless. I'm so glad he won it at the end there. Quality. I shalln't be watching it again though until the finals!

I shall endeavour to avoid spoilers in the post, but I doubt many will read this thread before watching the show if they care about it.

I quite liked that - thanks for the link. It seems quite good mostly because it's primarily just lots of questions, something most 'quiz' shows of late don't like doing.

I did wonder in the penultimate round (when there were 4 of them and they could steal points off each other) that once the guy who went last got into the lead he should've just kept going for 1 point questions (not that he needed to). Also, the leaderboard seems a bit unfair - I didn't get too much of a look at it, but wasn't it based on the money you won and then the time it took to answer the questions? The presenter was a bit slow in reading them out (if you ask me), and I wonder if the penultimate round score might be a better metric (although that then has similar problems such as it depends on your opponents etc. etc.).

But yeah, that's one of the best quizzes I've seen of late. Shall probably try and watch more.

What I didn't like was in one round, if you passed your opponent could steal points whereas if you guessed and got it wrong they couldn't steal. What a stupid rule. If I went on I'd just say "orange" for any answer I didn't know to stop opponents stealing.

I only caught the tail end of this programme but recognised Chris and stayed with it. Thanks for the link so that I can now watch the whole programme on replay.

I must say that I was mightily impressed with his answer to the Jackpot question.

Well done Chris.

Kirk Bevins wrote:What I didn't like was in one round, if you passed your opponent could steal points whereas if you guessed and got it wrong they couldn't steal. What a stupid rule. If I went on I'd just say "orange" for any answer I didn't know to stop opponents stealing.

Yea I noticed that. You can see the graphics with the scores where people buzz in for that round, that also seems stupid because they get to hear all of the question regardless of how early they press the button. So essentially you just buzz in as quickly as possible regardless.

Very exploitable that round.

I thought that in the final round it would have been better to make it that if you get your question wrong your opponent gets the points to try and discourage high bidding (although that said, the level 5 questions I saw were laughable considering they were meant to be the super hard ones).

I got annoyed by the guy from Manchester Hansfording it up in the question about... oh I forget, was it Sinatra music?
Had to name a decade and he took all of five seconds answering what common sense suggests was basically just a multiple choice question if you think about it.

Matt Morrison wrote:I got annoyed by the guy from Manchester Hansfording it up in the question about... oh I forget, was it Sinatra music?
Had to name a decade and he took all of five seconds answering what common sense suggests was basically just a multiple choice question if you think about it.

Haha yeah - he was all "nine...teeeeeeeeen.... ... ... ... 50s?".

I was a bit worried today that Kirsty was doing an Anne Robinson - i.e failing to pronounce words correctly. e.g. "Mendeleev" was given as "mender-leave" rather than "Mender-lay-eff". Of course they could have given her the Mendeleyev spelling to make it obvious! But better/worse than that was the question about neon, "which has the chemical symbol Ne", which she pronounced "Nuh", instead of saying the two letters... But I guess if you don't know...

Quiz looks like fun, might have a bash at that some time.

Kevin

Kevin Thurlow wrote:I was a bit worried today that Kirsty was doing an Anne Robinson - i.e failing to pronounce words correctly. e.g. "Mendeleev" was given as "mender-leave" rather than "Mender-lay-eff".

She was probably confusing the pronunciation of his name with that of the element named after him, mendelevium. (Yeah, right.)

In yesterday's show, in the question about David Bowie, I (and probably every other Dead Ringers fan watching) was longing for Kirsty to say, "Ground control to Major Tom; ground control to Major Tom; take your protein pills and put your helmet on. More on that story later..."

Looks like they tweaked the penultimate elimination round which is good.

It's an nice interesting format for a general knowledge show I think.

Craig Beevers wrote:Looks like they tweaked the penultimate elimination round which is good.

What tweaking did they do?

I caught part of it today- some of the supposedly hard questions were rather laughable. Also, is it just me, or are the categories for some questions a bit random?

SLIGHT SPOILER


I mean, a Level 3 question on the Garden of Eden? To be honest, I'd like the contestants to pick the more random-sounding categories just to see what they're like!

Michael Wallace wrote:

Craig Beevers wrote:Looks like they tweaked the penultimate elimination round which is good.

What tweaking did they do?

Now they go to other contestants (if any have buzzed in) when a question is answered wrongly, not just when they happen to pass.

People who buzz in and get it wrong are frozen out for whatever is left of the 60 seconds, I think that's new - don't remember it happening in the first show at least.

Craig Beevers wrote:People who buzz in and get it wrong are frozen out for whatever is left of the 60 seconds, I think that's new - don't remember it happening in the first show at least.

I may be wrong, but I'm not sure anyone got a question wrong after having buzzed in in the first show, so that may or may not have changed.
For my two cents, it's not a bad show. Although I'm not really a fan of shows where the winner has to answer another question correctly at the end to win something, otherwise leaving with nothing. They've won the show, done the hard work, let them have the prize! It would be a bit like the winner on Countdown having to solve an extra conundrum to decide whether they could return the next day- it would be totally down to luck whether they could solve it.
Also it seems a bit silly to me that all the losing contestants come back the day after- that must take the pressure off quite a lot. I guess it depends on how many applicants they get. And is it my imagination or has there been more than one new contestant each day, instead of just the one new face they say there is? Maybe I'm seeing things.

What other countdown contestants have been in lots of quiz shows? I can seem to remember michael madonald-cooper (or whatever his name was) being introduced as a multiple quiz show contestant, but my knowledge of contestants isnt good enough to think of any others.

Jojo Apollo wrote:Don't know if it's been mentioned already but this new quiz started today on BBC2. Countdown great Chris Wills was one of the contestants, if you missed it, see how he got on here at the iplayer site:http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... Episode_1/

Very well done to Chris for a spectacular win.

I don't think I will watch any more episodes though, but will try to catch the final to see how Chris does.

Well in Chris, and excellent choice of specialist topic. I enjoyed it as the questions were pitched at a level where I knew the majority of answers without it being a total doddle, there didn't seem to be a great variation between a level 1 an a level 5 though.

Neil Zussman wrote:And is it my imagination or has there been more than one new contestant each day, instead of just the one new face they say there is? Maybe I'm seeing things.

I've only seen the pilot but wouldn't they need 3? 2 to replace the first round losers and 1 to replace the winner.

Paul Howe wrote:I've only seen the pilot but wouldn't they need 3? 2 to replace the first round losers and 1 to replace the winner.

I think they get to play again for the rest of the week. I think its every week, that they start with 8 new contestants.

Me dad's on it next week so I spose I'll have to watch it.

Holy crap, Magic George!! Where the hell have you been?

I got my leg caught in a mangle and couldn't reach the keyboard.

Well I'm glad you eventually pulled through.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... Episode_9/

Woohoo!!! Go Santa!!!

I see Chris Wills is now listed both for this show and for his Countdown appearances on the Internet Movie Database! http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2839651/

Derek Hazell wrote:I see Chris Wills is now listed both for this show and for his Countdown appearances on the Internet Movie Database! http://www.imdb.com/name/nm2839651/

I like

- Episode #1.1 (2009) TV episode (as Chris) .... Himself - Contestant

Michael Wallace wrote:I like

- Episode #1.1 (2009) TV episode (as Chris) .... Himself - Contestant

A bit of unnecessary pedantry, really, as although Chris (like the other contestants) was introduced by his forename only at the beginning of the show, they gave his full name at the end when he was shown in position 1 on the leader board.

The Grand Final of this was shown today, with Chris obviously returning as the highest scorer from the heats. It'll probably be available to watch online soon if you missed it, so if you haven't seen it, look away now...
Spoilers:
Chris was a bit unlucky to get knocked out in the round of 4 I thought. His questions (and the questions of Driss, the other guy who got knocked out at that stage) seemed a bit harder than the others. But I guess that's just the luck of the draw. It's all subjective anyway.
As I've said before, I don't think it's fair when the 'winner' has to answer another question in order to win the prize. At one stage, I didn't even think they were gonna give her the trophy! But they did, so it was all alright in the end.
Hopefully another series of this will be made, it was definitely better than quite a few of the other quiz shows about...

Here's the iplayer link for the Grand Final for those that haven't seen it yet:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... pisode_25/

Jojo Apollo wrote:Here's the iplayer link for the Grand Final for those that haven't seen it yet:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0 ... pisode_25/

Thank you for posting the link Jojo

Neil Zussman wrote:Hopefully another series of this will be made, it was definitely better than quite a few of the other quiz shows about...

Yea, miles better than the other dross around at the same sort of timeslot - plus it all seems to be genuine, intelligent and friendly, similar to Countdown in those respects.

Just watched this, was amused at how cheap they were being (only another £5k for winning the whole series?!). But yeah, is a good show, I especially like how watchable the 'small talk' between Kirsty and the contestants is, although admittedly this is only because she's so hilariously bad at it. Might become a bit mundane if the presenting improves, though.

I've finally got round to finishing watching this. Commiserations to Chris. He seems like a good-humoured chap and enjoyable to watch, and it would have been nice to see him go all the way.

The winning lady seemed very pleasant and modest though, so not all bad.

Right then, I'm filming for this in about three weeks. Anyone fancy chucking revision questions at me? I'm doing Leeds Rhinos in the Super League era (since 1996).

Ian Volante wrote:Right then, I'm filming for this in about three weeks. Anyone fancy chucking revision questions at me? I'm doing Leeds Rhinos.

1. How many tries did Eric Harris score in his Rhinos career (1930-39)?
2. True or False? Rhinos have won the Premiership and the Regal Trophy the same number of times.
3. On the 10th May 1992, Rhinos won at Wigan. What was the score, and what was significant about it?

Alec Rivers wrote:

Ian Volante wrote:Right then, I'm filming for this in about three weeks. Anyone fancy chucking revision questions at me? I'm doing Leeds Rhinos.

1. How many tries did Eric Harris score in his Rhinos career (1930-39)?
2. True or False? Rhinos have won the Premiership and the Regal Trophy the same number of times.
3. On the 10th May 1992, Rhinos won at Wigan. What was the score, and what was significant about it?

I should have clarified that Leeds only became known as the Rhinos in 1997 I think...but thanks anyway, I'll have a guess at these!

1. Probably about 340, the Toowoomba Ghost was quite the try-machine.
2. True, zilch I suspect.
3. Was that when we won 33-18 or something and gave them their first home league defeat in ages?

Ian Volante wrote:1. Probably about 340, the Toowoomba Ghost was quite the try-machine.
2. True, zilch I suspect.
3. Was that when we won 33-18 or something and gave them their first home league defeat in ages?

Answers:

1. 391
2. True - Twice each. Premiership 1974-75, 1978-79, Regal Trophy 1972-73, 1983-84.
3. 74-6. It was their biggest ever win.

Good luck on the programme.

Ian Volante wrote:Right then, I'm filming for this in about three weeks. Anyone fancy chucking revision questions at me? I'm doing Leeds Rhinos in the Super League era (since 1996).

Congrats, Ian. Good luck. I hoped to go on, but I didn't think I did well, and am not too surprised that I haven't heard anything. Having said that I did have my audition for Pointless earlier that same day, and it looks like I've missed out on that as well. Oh well.

James Robinson wrote:Congrats, Ian. Good luck. I hoped to go on, but I didn't think I did well, and am not too surprised that I haven't heard anything. Having said that I did have my audition for Pointless earlier that same day, and it looks like I've missed out on that as well. Oh well.

Not sure whose turn it is to make this joke, so all together now:

"You seem to be having a lot of disappointments with gameshow auditions lately, James. Maybe you should give Countdown a go"

Alec Rivers wrote:

Ian Volante wrote:1. Probably about 340, the Toowoomba Ghost was quite the try-machine.
2. True, zilch I suspect.
3. Was that when we won 33-18 or something and gave them their first home league defeat in ages?

Answers:

1. 391
2. True - Twice each. Premiership 1974-75, 1978-79, Regal Trophy 1972-73, 1983-84.
3. 74-6. It was their biggest ever win.

Good luck on the programme.

1 - aye, impressive.
2 - I'd forgotten about the \Premiership wins - nobody really cared about that trophy anyway. As for the Regal Trophy, we never did win that, it was the JPS Trophy until the mid-eighties!
3 - I thought it might have been that, but I was getting mixed up with the cup semi-final where the score was roughly the same the other way and Offiah scored ten!

James Robinson wrote:

Ian Volante wrote:Right then, I'm filming for this in about three weeks. Anyone fancy chucking revision questions at me? I'm doing Leeds Rhinos in the Super League era (since 1996).

Congrats, Ian. Good luck. I hoped to go on, but I didn't think I did well, and am not too surprised that I haven't heard anything. Having said that I did have my audition for Pointless earlier that same day, and it looks like I've missed out on that as well. Oh well.

Cheers. I think I got a bit lucky that alongside me in the audition there were a couple of middle-aged blokes who were very good and ripe for the chop for being in the wrong demographic - they made me look interesting and also made me look not so good at quizzing - I wasn't trying quite so hard either. I'm interested to see whether the curvy red-haired lass who answered sod all but was rather cute and chatty got on

Good work Ian - look forward to seeing you on the show.

When I was on AQoG in the first series, I found that I was able to perform very well in the early rounds just by being very good at Sport and Music, and scoring highly every time those categories cropped up. The only round which is tricky to judge is "...Pressure" (or whatever the round is, which is against the clock), especially if you're first or second to have your minute of questions. I got through that round twice, both times with remarkably low scores (8 and 9 points), but on certain other shows, scores well into the teens were necessary to get through.

Matt Bayfield wrote:Good work Ian - look forward to seeing you on the show.

When I was on AQoG in the first series, I found that I was able to perform very well in the early rounds just by being very good at Sport and Music, and scoring highly every time those categories cropped up. The only round which is tricky to judge is "...Pressure" (or whatever the round is, which is against the clock), especially if you're first or second to have your minute of questions. I got through that round twice, both times with remarkably low scores (8 and 9 points), but on certain other shows, scores well into the teens were necessary to get through.

I've no idea what sort of rounds will be happening this time as they've rejigged the format. I'll have to wing it on the day!