It's a Knockout (or Jeux Sans Frontiers)

[Rodgers]

I found an old BBC video this weekend - The Best of It's a Knockout (£3 from Morrisons!).

I'm sure the programme was rubbish in reality but I had a damn good laugh at some of the games and Stuart Hall's laughter had the same effect as those "Laughing Policeman" they used to have at the sea side.

Anyone remember this show? Especially any Europeans - was it popular in your country too? How bad an idea would it be to bring it back now?

 

[Pillager]

Very, very bad. I think it would be one of those shows that was OK at the time, but to watch it now would be just be disappointing.

 

[AVN]

I concur,
The program was fun at that time, but in the end it became boring.
So it shouldn't be repeated. It can become only worse.

 

[Rodgers]

I see - I'm too young to remember the show when it was originally shown so I wouldn't know how awful it actually was. On the other hand, Gladiators did quite well and that was pretty much the same thing.

Nonetheless, you have to admit that Stuart Hall's laughter puts a smile on your face after a while

 

[Pillager]

Stuart Hall's laughter - funny.
Gladiators - abysmal.

 

[Rodgers]

Well, I meant Gladiators did well in terms of viewers, not that it was something worth watching.

Stuart Hall - there's one bit on the vid where he literally cant speak and his laughter has gone beyond normal laughing sounds into a kind of howling/choking sound - I replayed that bit quite a few times

 

[Pillager]

Originally posted by Rodgers
Well, I meant Gladiators did well in terms of viewers, not that it was something worth watching.

I find that the more viewers a programme gets the less it is worth watching...

Stuart Hall - there's one bit on the vid where he literally cant speak and his laughter has gone beyond normal laughing sounds into a kind of howling/choking sound - I replayed that bit quite a few times

 

[Supernaut]

Stuart Hall was a true phenomenon of braodcasting. I vividly remember the old It's a Knockout programmes from my childhood. Very bizarre but there was something highly entertaining about them. But I don't think I'll be rushing out for the video.

 

[duke o' york]

I shan't be rushing out for the video either and I didn't enjoy the ooh, five minutes or so I saw of Channel 5's revival of It's a Knockout recently. I think that the very idea of the game stinks, and Stuart Hall had a lot to do with why people would tune it. I do know that Jeux Entre Villes or something has been incredibly popular on French telly and that one village were in a bribery scandal or something like that.
Good mention of Morrison's though! I know that those in the South are no doubt scratching their heads at this point and our fellow fanatics from further afield will be entirely lost, but it's a great shop! My girlfriend's brother has a hilarious joke apropos Morrison's that he delights in sharing with people from oop north:
"What's yellow and black and full of cr*p? - A Morrison's carrier bag!" Unlike everyone else present, he wasn't that impressed by my sturdy defence of populist grocery with the reply, "a constipated wasp!" but heck!

 

[Rodgers]

"But I don't think I'll be rushing out for the video." - too late I got the last copy - buried at the bottom of the bargain bin, it had obviously languished there for many years

Duke - I've heard that joke before but it was about Netto (another popular northern store ) carrier bags.

 

[Dralix]

Could someone enlighten me on this? Aside from getting that Peter Gabriel song stuck in my head, I don't get this thread