The Generation Game on a Sunday night? That's sacrilege! Episode 1 review
When it comes to the Easter revival of The Generation Game (BBC One), hosted by Sue Perkins and Mel Giedroyc, one’s first response should be to say something scathing about the BBC’s so-called commitment to new and original programming. I mean, we all appreciate that BBC bosses have been panicking WIA-style over what to do with Mel and Sue since The Great British Bake Off was pinched from under them. But do they have to stuff them into every dusty old bit of gameshow that they can lay their hands on?
My own first thought about this particular resurrection was: “The Generation Game – on a Sunday night? That’s sacrilege!” Because if The Generation Game wasn’t Saturday night television at its purest, nothing else ever was. And if the BBC doesn’t think a revival is potentially good enough to beat the Saturday night competition on ITV, then it has no business reviving The Generation Game in the first place.
As for the show itself, there’s little to say other than that it was a shameless carbon copy of memorable moments from The Generation Game of the Seventies or Eighties. There was sausage stuffing and plate spinning. There was pottery and dancing. And the conveyor belt, of course. Mel and Sue channelled the anarchic spirit of the late Sir Bruce Forsyth (and Larry Grayson and Jim Davidson after him), with an extra sprinkling of truly dire puns.
To be fair, they did their best with the material to hand. And perhaps this was only supposed to be a fun-filled trip down memory lane. But in that case why make two episodes instead of just the one? And why go to the effort (if you can call it that) of updating the creaky old format with a pointless “celebrity panel” comprised, aptly enough, of Pointless question master Richard Osman (another “talent” the BBC doesn’t know what to do with) and Lorraine Kelly? Even they didn’t seem to know what they were supposed to be doing there.
Further proof of the BBC’s lack of confidence in The Generation Game’s power to entertain a 21st century audience was a final leg that threw pretty much everything but the kitchen sink at the show (including a bemused looking Martin Kemp and a spurious walk-on by Towie stars Gemma Collins and James “Argh” Argent). The ensuing chaos was mildly entertaining, but not in any way you couldn’t just as easily have improvised yourself by drinking too much and throwing your least favourite crockery at the walls.
In terms of what we should expect from prime time Easter television, this fell well short of the mark. And it focuses the mind on what we should be saying to those responsible for entertainment at the BBC: stop trying to revisit the past. Go away and think up some original ideas.
