BOREDCASTING on: Pointless

The title may suggest to unseasoned viewers that this show is one to avoid. However to assume this would be completely wrong. If like me, you’re forever avoiding work, then quiz shows are certainly the place to go and Pointless is the King of all.

For those unfamiliar the game, it goes like this: they ask 100 people to list things related to a certain topic. The pairs (four of them at the start, but one pair gets knocked out each round) must guess the answer that the least amount of people gave – the most pointless answer. It’s kind of family fortunes’ evil twin, with a bit of countdown thrown in (because host Alexander Armstrong get’s a trusty sidekick in a sort of dictionary corner, in the form of Richard Osman and his laptop).

Host’s Armstrong and Osman

The episode I’m mainly focussing on is Saturday’s Pointless Celebrities which came in the form of a Doctor Who special, although I would add that as a whole the show is pretty fantastic and worth watching every day (BBC One at 5.15 which gives you just about enough time to get back from a 4 o’clock lecture). The teams were as follows: Bernard Cribbins and Jaqueline ‘Jax’ King; Andrew Hayden-Smith and Nicola Bryant; Sylvester McCoy and Sophie Aldred; and Frazer Hines and Louise Jameson. From the offset I was rooting for Bernard and Jax.

I should probably add as a side-note here, that this was like a clash of my favourite worlds here, being doctor who fan. For those unfamiliar with the above names, other than Bernard, Jax and Andrew, they all featured in Classic Who as companions, other than Sylvester McCoy (most recently seen in The Hobbit as Radagast the Brown) who was the seventh doctor.

Round one saw the teams guessing the English for Spanish animals, where Bernard and Jax were already flying high and Nicola (sixth doctor’s Peri Brown) and Andrew (a guy with a gun for three Cybermen episodes in series 2….) were knocked out on 180 points after an obvious answer from Nicola and a wrong answer from Andrew.

The Guests on ‘Pointless Celebrities’ were truly pointless

Following this, the teams then had to name elements without the letter ‘I’ where Frazer (second doctor’s Jamie McCrimmon) and Louise (fourth doctor’s Leela) took the hit and left. In the head-to-head, Bernard and Jax went through to the final on a tense 2-1 win against Sylvester and his companion Sophie (Ace) by which point I couldn’t contain my excitement (I’m lying, I could). So far no teams had guessed any pointless (0 point scoring) answers but they’d given some low scoring ones, so I hoped for the best.

Bernard and Jax pulled it through. With the topic of Terrence Rattigan plays, they scored a pointless answer on their third try with ‘Flare Path’, meaning the £2500 jackpot went to their respective charities. Hallelujah.

I would have liked to have seen some more exciting guests to be honest, and I was slightly disappointed at the rounds not being who-themed (other than a Torchwood round in the head-to-head). Still, for a Saturday night, it wasn’t bad. I do prefer the shows weekday counterpart more, especially as ‘Pointless Celebrities’ seems to lack the humour of its weekday friend. Where you usually see frequent banter between host Armstrong and friend Osman, here you saw them as robotic as K9, who they’d wheeled out at an attempt at Who humour.

Pointless Celebrities therefore featured some truly pointless guests (Andrew Hayden Smith… come on BBC…) and some truly disappointing rounds but overall I still enjoyed it.

Next time I review BBC’s The Voice UK as it returns to Saturday nights. And Come Dine With Me as promised… eventually.

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