So…Gladiators is back…

[Pete Part Three]

And it sucks. How have Sky One managed to make a TV show that has less spectacle than a show that was made 15 years ago? The studio is cluttered and makes the whole thing resemble Run the Risk. The National Indoor Arena was far superior.

Alan Parry; a reasonable football commentator but poor substitute for John Sachs.

4 Events?; how about you cut the waffle and the ads and squeeze in 5 like the good ol’ days?

Ian Wright; manages to make John Fashnu seem like a competent presenter.

And don’t get me started on what they’ve done with the Eliminator. Drop the water; it doesn’t work.

Fail for me. Only plus points were Kirsty Gallacher, John Anderson and the Super Mario Galaxy ads with Saracen.

Topic

[Andrew]

Oh dear.

Dominic Byrne should have been allowed to do the VO…

[Smeg4Brains]

It isn’t on till 10.

[Jonsmad]

You can always watch virgin which is showing the old ones.

Takeshi’s castle is far more amusing.

[John Hoare]

INCREDIBLY irritatingly, I’ve been looking forward to this for ages – and I can’t watch it because I’m on Virgin, which now doesn’t carry Sky One! Gah. I’m sure I’ll catch it at some point, but bear in mind the following is said without having watched the fucker:

And it sucks. How have Sky One managed to make a TV show that has less spectacle than a show that was made 15 years ago? The studio is cluttered and makes the whole thing resemble Run the Risk. The National Indoor Arena was far superior.

I was really worried about this before broadcast, to be honest. It’s easy to forget that ITV’s Gladiators was a high-budget show – it’s one of the best-produced Saturday night entertainment shows ever made. (And it shits all over the original US Gladiators – the wonderful NIA as you say, instead of a shitty small studio. We took what the Americans did and – for once – did it better.)

There’s NO chance that Sky will have been able to put the same money into it – hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if ITV couldn’t these days, either. So whilst I’ll reserve judgement, it doesn’t surprise me at all that it’s less of a visual spectacle – the budget would never have allowed it.

Ian Wright; manages to make John Fashnu seem like a competent presenter.

The really odd thing about Gladiators is that a show usually lives or dies by how good the presenters are. And yet Fashnu and Johnson are TERRIBLE – some of the worst presenters I’ve ever seen – and yet the show managed to be great. It’s probably the fact that the Gladiators themselves were so good which made it easy to ignore the sheer incompetence of the presenters. So if the Glads are good this time round, I probably won’t mind, as excerable is Ian Wright always is…

It isn?t on till 10.

It was on at 6pm, wasn’t it?

[Smeg4Brains]

> It was on at 6pm, wasn?t it?

Was it?…my apologies.

[Pete Part Three]

Yeah, the 10pm screening is a repeat. I’m not sure how far ahead the episodes are recorded so I doubt they’ll be able to iron out the flaws anytime soon rendering this “missable”. Back to Challenge and Virgin 1 with my sorry behind.

Sky have been hyping this up relentlessly for weeks so I thought they’d actually put some effort in. A missed opportunity.

[Tarka Dal]

New Gladiators = Dissapointing
Ian Wright = Stupid shouty voice and face I want to punch.
New Water Gimmick = Mission fail. We had the return of a crappy event like Hit N’ Run just so we could see contenders get knocked in the water.
New Gladiators = Mixed bag. Oblivion should clearly just be called ‘Chav’. The red head looked like her make-up had been applied by a cement mixer. Panther (the old one already had a Panther) was easily the most kick-arse. Also was Predator Duane Ladejo a former british 400 metre runner?
4 Events = The first series of ITV Gladiators actually had SIX events plus the eliminator. I guess this has to be put down to more ad-breaks nowadays.
Kirsty Gallacher – Well she just has to get pushed into that pool at some point doesn’t she?

Also the water just made me wish they had remade this instead.

http://tinyurl.com/4yogxr

[Tarka Dal]

Oh I forgot, Gladiators sponsered by Wii. Surely they have to bring out a Gladiators video game for Wii? Possibly with Jet and Zodiac as unlockable extra characters which I could then do rude things to with the Nunchuk.

[Pete Part Three]

Incidentally, it’s filmed at Shepperton.

[Joey TORDFC]

Yeah and we applied for tickets WELL in advance and missed out. Rubbish.

How do I watch it if I don’t have Sky?

[Ian Symes]

The arena’s rubbish. It’s big enough, but they seem to have laid out all the games for each show alongside each other, rather than using the full arena space for each game and swapping round for each game. This makes everything feel smaller and more insular, especially as the crowd seems so much smaller if you can only see a handful of them. It somehow makes the show seem more disjointed than it was when there was a half-hour redress between each game! I know why they’ve done it – to make each show quicker to record, which vastly reduces the cost. A shame – you need to put as much money as possible into a show like Gladiators to make it work.

The games seem to have been rejigged to make things easier for the Glads too – the platforms for Duel, for example, being much smaller and closer together than they were before. I suppose this is necessary given that the new Glads are a bunch of models instead of actual athletes.

Agreed about the water as well – gimmicky and shit. What’s the fucking point of those cotton reels on the Eliminator?

[Ian Symes]

Just remembered the most annoying thing about the show – one of the female contenders had a big worthy sob story as part of her profile vid. FUCK FUCKING OFF. This isn’t The X Factor, we don’t need to know these things. Whether or not the audience is rooting for the contender should come down to how good they are at beating the Glads, not whether their dad’s got cancer.

[Pete Part Three]

>What?s the fucking point of those cotton reels on the Eliminator?

God alone knows. They get on them…then they’re supposed to fall off them. Or something.

>This isn?t The X Factor, we don?t need to know these things.

Quite. If they got rid of this kind of waffle they would have had enough time for another event and we could judge her on her athletic ability rather than a recounting of a personal tragedy.

Another horrendous bit of time-wasting was when Wright introduced the male Gladiators for Powerball, the show took a commercial break…and then he introduced the Gladiators AGAIN.

If THIS show had been screened in the early 90’s, there’s no way any one would have been keen for a revival 15 years later.

[Dave]

>not whether their dad?s got cancer

Is Cancer one of the new Gladiators?

[Phil]

I love you.

[Tarka Dal]

Regards the Cotton reels, I’m guessing someone in the production staff has been watching Ninja Warrior on Challenge. Given that all four contenders fell off them it does make you wonder if any actual testing went into any off the new ideas.

The problem is I really didn’t want this to be shit, but now the chances of any similar type shows being revived or created for mainstream TV have probably been further reduced because of this being a bit of a shambles.

[Tarka Dal]

Off the wiki:

Legends Special

Sky One and Shine have announced 3 additional ‘special’ Gladiator shows that are due to be recorded. Gladiators – The Legends will see classic UK Gladiators Hunter, Saracen, Lightning and Scorpio return to the arena as special Contenders facing the might of the brand new team.[4]

Nice!

[Somebody]

http://forum.gladiatorszone.com/YaBB.pl?num=1209883889/15

So I can confirm that Hunter, Saracen, Lightning and Scorpio have all left the show.

Scorpio felt that they had left on good terms and actually wished the production team every success with the new show…

[…]

In essence, the legends left the production for the following reasons: –

1) The legends were anticipating the new show to be “bigger and better”, but they did not feel that it was either and that it did not do justice to the great show that they were a part of.

2) Concerns over safety – the legends had some concerns over the safety of some of the equipment, in relation to their own personal safety.

3) Insurance – the legends were not happy with the arrangements in place regarding insurance, in particular that previous injuries would not be covered by the insurance. The legends could not afford to put their personal incomes at risk for the show.

4) Personas – the legends were told that they could not use their Gladiator names and would be contenders, wearing contender style costumes. The legends did not want their final appearances on Gladiators to be as contenders. It was never about being a contender for Scorpio – she was an original Gladiator !

So there were a variety of reasons for them pulling out, all of which are understandable.

[Daff]

Well all the events are taken straight off the new US version of Gladiators, the eliminator is identical apart from the ropes halfway up the travelator on the US version (although it is set to evil speed levels). Still not worked out who is more annoying, Hulk Hogan or Ian Wright.

It would also be interesting to see what order the shows were recorded in, this one seemed far to polished to be a first episode, Although I did read an article (I think saturdays Guardian supplement) where they were refilming stuff like the contenders getting out of the water several times.

[Tarka Dal]

That was polished!?

[Seb Patrick]

I downloaded this, had a skim through it, but following comments pretty much everywhere and from what I was able to gather, didn’t think it worth actually watching the whole thing. They didn’t even use the proper theme music! The Glads all look rubbish – as someone has pointed out, while a couple of them are bodybuilders/athletes, they’ve mostly clearly been chosen for “looks”. I do find it amusing that they’ve practically cloned Hunter, though. But it does look small-scale and cheap compared to the original (!), and the “water” gimmick is clearly just designed for… well, let’s just say we know what it’s there for, and that it would have made more sense with the likes of Jet and Lightning than with the current crop.

[Jonathan Capps]

Would anyone like a fairy cake?

[John Hoare]

The arena?s rubbish. It?s big enough, but they seem to have laid out all the games for each show alongside each other, rather than using the full arena space for each game and swapping round for each game. This makes everything feel smaller and more insular, especially as the crowd seems so much smaller if you can only see a handful of them. It somehow makes the show seem more disjointed than it was when there was a half-hour redress between each game! I know why they?ve done it – to make each show quicker to record, which vastly reduces the cost. A shame – you need to put as much money as possible into a show like Gladiators to make it work.

This sounds bloody awful. You need the whole arena, dammit.

I need to see this fucker, but UK Nova deleted my account with no warning. Even though I had a high score, and it was less than a month since I last logged in. Bastards.

[Tarka Dal]

The Arena seemed big enough, as Ian pointed out it’s just been laid out on the cheap so they don’t have to move the set around. For example they use the pyramid in the eliminator and you could clearly see the wall in the background of the first episode.

I don’t think the new Glads are all bad. Atlas looked an okay Hunter clone, Spartan with his skirt had a gimmick. Panther and BattleAxe looked pretty hard. Unfortunately there just isn’t enough character. Most of the old Glads were pretty sporting and charismatic too. In the new one they just mouthed off and gloated. One Wolf is really all that’s needed.

It’s the music that’s really spoiled it for me. The old theme and event scores were cheesy, but that was what made them so enjoyable.

[Ian Symes]

I really love the music cue they used in the old show whenever they ran a pre-recorded interview with the contender or a Gladiator – the one that sounded like the Grandstand teleprinter sound effect, but with a bassline.

[Seb Patrick]

Okay, I know it’s a bit wrong, but I kind of quite fancy Inferno…

[Phil]

Inferno’s the black guy?

[Tarka Dal]

I watched a bit of the repeat of this. It’s not all bad, it’s tried to copy the old format a fair bit. It just hasn’t accomplished it that well.

[Smeg4Brains]

…..I like it…..

[peas_and_corn]

Just saw the Australian version- it seems to be more close to the original than the UK one. There is four events, and they change the entire arena, like they did originally- mainly because it’s too small to fit everything in! The eliminator was almost the same- except they have a ladder where there was the cargo net, and the water fountain instead of the paper thing they would crash through. It’s all right- a little hammy, but that’s what Gladiators is all about!

[Tarka Dal]

They have a water fountain! How does that work?

[peas_and_corn]

Well, more of a wall of water spraying down that they go through as they swing on the rope over the finish line. It’s… a good idea when on a diagram.

[Pete Part Three]

So…Gladiators is axed…

(And, rather wonderfully, I get to revive a thread that hasn’t seen any action for exactly a year).

Hopefully another network can revive it in a couple of years and put a bit of money behind it so they can do it properly.

[Ben Paddon]

Nah.

[J_Spaced]

Maybe they could bring it back with the proper bread and circuses feel. Take the padding off everything, sharpen up the sports equipment.

“I’m here with the support of my family! They’re the ones up there, holding the “Daddy please don’t get gutted like a fish” banners.”

[NoFro]

^I’d watch that^

[Author]

Replies