The Weakest Link Revival

It was recently suggested, after my post about “The Code”, that I should do a series on fondly remembered quiz shows that should be brought back. Being perverse, I’ve ended up writing this post about a quiz show which is being brought back, asking the question whether it should be or not.

I write, as I am sure you’ve figured out, about The Weakest Link, which is due to return to our screens on December 18^th, hosted by Romesh Ranganathan. Now, as I haven’t seen any of the revival yet, nor have I heard any gossip about it, I can’t comment on the quality of the reboot. I can’t help wondering how well the show will work in the 2020’s, though.

I’ll try to explain what I mean. In fact, mean is the operative word. All of this is just my opinion, and of course you must feel free to disagree, but it always seemed to me that “The Weakest Link” rode in on the zeitgeist of the new Milennium, in which not only was it okay to be mean, rude and personal to anyone who dared to put their head over the TV parapet, it was highly desirable. And you have to admit that “The Weakest Link” rode that zeitgeist very well throughout the noughties, with only the format of “WWTBAM” selling to more countries. I’m not sure whether the ratings were slipping at all when Anne Robinson came to call it a day in 2012, but the production team certainly said that they were going out while the show was still popular, because they didn’t think anyone could fill Anne Robinson’s shoes.

In case you are too young to remember the show, or have forgotten how it worked, these were the mechanics of the game. Each show started with 9 contestants. In the first round, questions are asked to each contestant in turn until three minutes have elapsed. Subsequent rounds are each ten seconds shorter than the previous. For each correct answer they add a link to a money chain. Before they answer, if there are any links in the chain they can choose to bank what has been earned in the chain so far, and the chain starts to build again. If they answer incorrectly, then the links are lost, so is the money and the chain begins again. If the chain is completed before the time has run out, then the round stops and the money is banked. Then the real fun starts.

After each round, the contestants have to write down the name of the player they want to eliminate, who is then dubbed the weakest link. After Anne Robinson has scattergunned disdain in all directions, then the weakest link is told to leave with nothing. Play proceeds like this until just two contestants remain. The final head to head is a straight shoot out, with the winner being decided by the best of five questions.

That’s it basically. Well, that’s the game play, but that ignores the part played by Anne Robinson. Like her or loathe her, I think you’d have to admit that Anne Robinson understood exactly what her role in the show was, and played it to perfection. It didn’t really matter whether a contestant had done particularly badly, sooner or later they were going to be the subject of a comment along the lines of “You have 4 A levels, Roberta. Are they giving them away with cornflakes packets now, then?” and “Are you old enough to remember when your hairstyle was in fashion?”, and man, many, many others of the “Do you have a braincell?” variety. I will not lie. Some of them I laughed at. In later years I did find some of them a bit strained, and sometimes Anne was obviously reading off the autocue. By the time that the show had been going for a year or two I’d say that contestants had no excuse for not knowing what they were letting themselves in for by applying, but the poor sods who applied for the first series must have left the studies feeling shell shocked, and maybe in some case needing counselling.

The show was mean-spirited, and it knew that it was mean-spirited and it was proud of being mean-spirited. You didn’t watch the show if you wanted to feel good about your fellow citizens. No. You watched the show to see ordinary people giving often silly answers to very easy questions, and then being verbally torn apart for the privilege. In many ways this made it a perfect show for the noughties. As an aside, I was sounded out on whether I’d be prepared to appear on a quiz champions’ special in the last week of the show. Of course I was – sadly they went with much greater luminaries than myself.

Will a perfect show for the noughties, the decade of mean, really cut the mustard in the 2020’s? In all honesty, I don’t know. The producers have made the probably wise decision not to replace like with like for the presenter. I have no idea whether they asked Anne Robinson – if they did I think she was right to refuse. She’s recently taken over hosting duties on “Countdown” mind you, and I have to say that this seems a bit of an odd fit to me. Her delivery is not quite what it was, and she seems rather stiff and uncomfortable to me. Still, I digress. I think we can expect a different style from Romesh Ranganathan. I think he’ll still have some pointed comments to make, but maybe with a little more warmth – to be honest it would be hard to do it with less warmth than Anne Robinson. They’ll all have to be careful though. Meanness seems to be out of fashion. Launching it with celebrity editions seems like a gentle easing back, but one can’t help thinking that a defanged Weakest Link might hardly be a Weakest Link at all.

Whatever the case, I’ll certainly be watching at least one of the revived series. Whether I will watch more than one – well, we’ll see. Watch this space.