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The trend in modern quiz shows is to build tension by making the contestant wait for an extended pause after answering, before the correct answer is revealed.
In The Hardest Quiz Show In The World, there is only one question, it's extremely difficult, it's worth 10 million dollars, it's asked at
the beginning of the show, and the game's atmosphere is so tense with anticipation that the whole show consists of nothing but waiting for the correct answer to be revealed. During this time there is a faint, pulsing drumroll, eery music plays, the stage lights turn different ghostly colors, the camera pans above the audience's heads, the host sighs ponderingly, and finally, after the most dramatic 45-minute wait any TV watcher has ever experienced, the host announces that we will find out if the contestant's answer is correct . . . after these messages.
The best team ever on Uni Challenge
http://www.bbc.co.u...ery/340/scumbag.jpg [po, Apr 17 2007]
5:30 Man vs The Mindspool
http://www.tvgohome.com/ [zen_tom, Apr 17 2007]
[link]
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//The trend in modern quiz shows is to build tension by making the contestant wait for an extended pause after answering// - which is why "University Challenge" is still the best quiz show. |
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The question should be asked at the beginning of the series, with each subsequent episode showing nothing but facial close-ups of different contestants sweating (while playing a tension-building drum-roll type effect). At the end of the series, one of them is made to leap about screaming, is given a prize and told they're great. |
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//At the end of the series, one of them is made to leap about screaming, is given a prize and told they're great.//
Is this independent of the question answering? I'd like that, if, after six weeks of being locked in a dark tv studio with Chris Tarrant and one hundred or so increasingly piss-soaked competitior/spectators, hunger and the persistent drum-rolling discomfort gnawing at the collective sense of social responsibility, one of the attendees - perhaps someone who hadn't even been asked the question - is, as zen has written, made to jump about (possibly at gun point), is given a prize (a speedboat?) and is told that they are great. After that, Tarrant disappears down a trapdoor and the half-crazed competitors are left alone to drift off, bewildered, blinking into the sunlight. Art prank quiz show. |
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Come and have a look at what you could've won... |
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The quizmaster could be Tarrant (or Bowen) but in a balaclava. |
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And every now and then, the lights pointed in different directions, and dramatic music played, to keep the contestants thinking that they are just about to be asked the answer. |
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If anyone speaks, tries to sit down, or walk away, they are roundly pistol whipped and forced to adopt an uncomfortable interrogation-style stress position. |
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When the ad breaks come, kill all the lights and, for the duration of the break, play at ear-throbbingly loud volumes blasts of white or near-white noise, with the screams of children over the top. On the back wall, behind Tarrant's head, his eyes shining white and manic, framed in wooly black, flash queasily-colourwashed footage of chickens being slaughtered, as the host sings softly yet audibly "Is it raining, is it snowing..." |
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By the way, if you think it's expensive to buy commercial space during the Super Bowl, try advertising during that last-five-minute break. There will be enough funding for the game show to pay the prize, the host, and the producers a healthy profit. |
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Paxman's forte is tutting and deep sighing as though each wrong answer is completely ridiculous. |
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This is just a minor variation on those radio shows where they ask some question until someone answers it (usually "name that tune"). |
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I guess the limit of this is a show where the prize is infinitely large but you have to sit there for your entire life before you hear the correct answer. |
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This should actually be a series. |
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phundug: isn't that called Catholicism? |
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//Paxman's forte is tutting and deep
sighing// That, plus mis-pronouncing any
scientific word more complex than "atom".
The man is quite disappointing, and I'm
sure he'd sneer at anyone who mis-
pronounced the name of a Greek poet. |
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//after the most dramatic 45-minute wait
any TV watcher has ever experienced//
['undug] - would you honestly just sit
there and watch? Would you not just go
and do something else for 44 of those
minutes? |
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[MaxBuch] that's part of the fun. There'd be lights, dramatic pans, close ups, close downs, audience candor and other attractions. Perhaps live ...... Or maybe dead monkies are released sporadically. |
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If you need more convincing, read [calum]'s post. |
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Actually, even better: you never know when the answer will be announced. It could be after 41 minutes, 42, sometimes 39 -- and the drumrolls would get louder a bit just to tease you... believe me, you will be glued to your seat. |
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This idea is awesome. First class satire. |
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//There'd be lights, dramatic pans, close
ups, close downs, audience candor and
other attractions// Yes, but would there
be something to keep you watching while
all this was going on? |
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//First class satire// or is it parody? |
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[xaviergisz], keep watching - because we'll be revealing the answer to that question, very soon now... |
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Does Tarrant just sit there? Or does he have to stretch out the moment? As in, 45 minutes of |
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"So you're sure? This is 10 million, that's 10 mmmmmmmilllllllll -ioooooooooonnnnnnn pounds. Do you want to change your mind? Well, shall I tell you the real answer? Are you sure?..." |
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What if in order to win the prize the contestant not only has to answer correctly but get him to reveal the answer in the correct minute? They have to um and ah and sweat convincingly until the right time... |
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[bigsleep] how long have you been asleep? I'm guessing the reference is more from WWTBAM. |
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Mice: "Can you tell us the ultimate answer to life, the universe and everything?"
Deep Thought: "Tricky!"
Mice: "But can you do it?"
Deep Thought: "Yes. But it may take some time." |
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