They’ve been around a while, but these last ten years have seen the panel show concept boom beyond belief and out of control. There are now panel-based, parlour-game style quiz and debating shows to cover every single topic. From news quizes to general and useless knowledge, from gardening to cookery, from sport to music – every topic has a panel show to cover it.
But which is best? And which is worst?
Help us out here – you know the drill! We want your thoughts on what the ‘noughties’ has brought us in the panel show genre. Has QI taken Have I Got News For You’s place as the number one panel game format?
Were you a You Have Been Watching man or a strict follower of As Seen On TV?
Has Mock The Week been axed yet?
We want answers! So give them to us – below!
*end of football comment*
33 Comments
Best – HIGNFY
Worst – take your pick. Especially 8 out of 10 cats, and that one hosted by John Sargeant.
That is all again, byee
Argument is the pits. Buzzcocks tops.
Good morning…
buzzcocks is good this season.
HIGNFY is good but utterly reliant on t’host in a way that buzzcocks arguably isn’t.
anything with jimmy carr in it is unmitigated and self-satisfied and poo-filled shit. yes, poo-filled shit. i hate violence and i hate him violently.
argument is a good idea done badly.
what’s that dara o’briain thing? ruined, that, by trying too hard.
xfactor is a panel show, innit? s’got a panel on it.
I used to like They Think It’s All Over until it got shit. My vote for number one would be HIGNFY, predictably.
Shooting Stars?
That’s a good ‘un, yes.
I wouldn’t agree that HIGNFY is ‘utterly reliant on the host’. There have been some awful hosts, but the show’s still been funny thanks to Hislop et al.
Armstrong should do it full time…
In the past ten years, with-out doubt, the best panel show is Shooting Stars.
I’m going to go out on a limb here and suggest Mock The Week for worst because it takes all thats good and rightous about the panel format and shits all over it..
I dunno, Mr. Green. Remember It’s Only TV … But I like It? That was pretty bloody awful. And then there was that rot Never Mind The Full Stops, hosted by Julian Fellowes.
Oh … and I forgot to call you a ‘jizzard’, Mr. Green.
JIZZARD!
Toss up between Buzzcocks, HIGNFY and QI.
Gonna go with Buzzcocks.
I don’t think Mock the Week is that bad. 8 out of 10 cats is worse, though i’ll watch any old shit when i’ve had a few.
8 out of 10 cats for the worst then, unless someone reminds me of a worse one.
Hello,
Just been getting presents for all the family. Got to love Poundland.
Best – HIGNFY,
Worst – A Question of Pop – Jamie Theakston hosted and Suggs and Noddy Holder were the team captains. It was like a Question of Sport but… y’know… about pop. Dire.
oh God, i’d tried to forget about those…
I have another suggestion for worst though. It’s Only A Theory has to be the most tedious thing i’ve ever seen, and i’m not sure why. Take 2 comedians (Andy Hamilton and Reginald D. Hunter, equally funny in their own right), add a guest panelist and mix them into what should be a very interesting and humorously debatable subject. Somehow it was shit…
I agree, Mr Green. It’s Only a Theory SHOULD be good given the people involved - I even gave it four episodes to see if it got into its stride. But it really is rubbage.
I’ll see your ‘Jizzard’, Napoleon, and raise you a ‘Grot Trotter’
though I don’t actually want to see your jizzard…
Jamie – fair play for getting through four! I barely made it thorugh two and a half.
I can’t understand why it was so terrible. It just goes to show a winning formula is a hard thing to come by in the world of panels.
It’s ‘grot trotter’, is it? That’s the game you fancy playing, eh?
DICK SHITTINGTON!
Right!
CLUNGE GRUMBLER!
Bastard!
BUM-DANGLING WANK SPIDER!
I’m not sure if it’s worth commenting unless I develop tourettes?
Celebrity Juice with Fearne and Holly for the worst. Although the one with Jason Manford was pretty dire.
HIGNFY every time!
Wank…spider? That just poses more questions that can be answered by a sane mind.
I agree about HIGNFY Naps – if it’s a crap host, they get mileage taking the piss, and if it’s a good host (generally is) then, y’know, all good. I think it vies with QI for the best though. Although that is more dependent on the guests. My dream team? Thanks for asking! Davies, Rich Hall, Bill Bailey, Sean Lock.
Worst? Question of Sport. The doddery grandfather of panel shows, trying to sex itself up, hopped up on Viagra and Sue Barker’s racy new bob, which should be euthanised for its own good, yeah?
Pilch?
*is on tender/tenter hooks*
I don’t mind Question Of Sport. Preferred Beaumont and Hughes, obviously.
I can’t believe they’ve ditched the what happened next round. That was the only entertaining thing ever on it.
I remember the Beaumont and Hughes days being a festival of bad knitwear…
I hate a question of sport but i dunno if it’s crap or not, i can’t make head nor tails of this sporting malarky.
HIGNFY gets the DINLT vote for best panel game of the decade, and perhaps last century as well.
Worst after careful thought was Ask the Family remake. It was so crap that it has been obliterated from everyones memory. Really anybody who had anything to do with that show should be ashamed of themselves.
Hello all! Back again with some more entries.
Best: Shooting Stars, HIGNFY, Buzzcocks, QI, Call My Bluff, Win, Lose or Draw.
They Think It’s All Over (could go either way),
For discussion: I’m sorry I Haven’t a Clue, Just A Minute (brill but obviously on radio, so probably null and void as entries), Room 101 (a very small panel of 2)
Worst: Mock the Week, Would I Lie to You? (crashed and burned a bit, didn’t it?), Argument, Through the Keyhole, Loose Women (does that count? It’s a panel of witches talking about shit), Big Fat Quiz of the Year, Question of Sport.
Buzzcocks! For the eight years they had a presenter, I don’t think the guest presenters work as well.
Worse would be Argumental, as any of the six people that actually watched it would say.
WORST = Argumental. Like being sober at an open mic night in the comedy store.
BEST = HIGNFY. The longer the run, the less the show can do wrong.
1.The 100th year of the 20th Century and last year of the 2nd Millennium was definitely and indisputably 2000.
2.The 1st year of the first decade of the 21st Century and of the 3rd Millennium was definitely and indisputably 2001 – obviously. The clue is in the number ‘1′.
3.The 10th and last year of the first decade of the 21st century will be 2010 – obviously. The clue is in the number ‘10′.
4.The last day of the first decade of the 21st century and 3rd millennium will definitely and indisputably be December 31st 2010.
There is an ongoing concerted and fraudulent effort by the BBC and other major media players to deny these facts for cynical commercial branding and packaging purposes. This is an abuse of their position of information stream control domination.
Clear thinkers will ignore them and respect and express true and honest chronological facts and conventions.
1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,one more to go…
Rage Against The Machine!
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