University Challenge: My Thoughts on the BBC era so far

Before we start, a quick disclaimer: any criticism of specific series made in this blog refer to technical aspects of the series in question, and are not directed at the contestants.

OK, so the actor Michael Angelis died last weekend. As someone who grew up on Thomas the Tank Engine, his voice will always be synonymous with my youth, and I was very shocked by his sudden death at a relatively young age by these days' standards.

Around the same time he started narrating Thomas, BBC2 did a special 'Granadaland' night of programmes, basically a night of shows filmed in, or connected to, the Granada TV studios, and he was the continuity announcer for the whole night. One of these programmes was a special edition of University Challenge, which, at the time, had been off the air for five years, hosted by Bamber Gascoigne, and pitting a team from Keble College Oxford, winners of the final ITV series, against a team of noted celebs who'd appeared on the series, captained, of course, by Stephen Fry. A while later, the BBC announced that the show was returning for a brand new series, with Jeremy Paxman taking over as host (only agreeing to do so after Bambi gave him his blessing).

That was 26 years ago now, and, while, in many ways, the show hasn't really changed since that first episode back in 1994, when an Aberdeen side captained by serial quizzer Roderick Cromar of Inverurie beat a Birmingham side that Iain Weaver of Weaver's Week unsuccessfully auditioned to be on. But, in many other ways, the show has changed, quite a bit. Let's take a look, shall we...

In order to do this, we must divide the 26 years of the BBC run into four separate eras (although one is more or less two smaller one bridged by one series that doesn't quite fit into either).

The first era, The Peak Era, runs from the first BBC series of 1994-95 to the 2001-02 series won by Somerville College Oxford after the best grand final of the BBC era. This is, comfortably, the best era of the BBC series. Unfortunately, very little of it is online for us to watch at the time of writing, but what little there is demonstrates why this is the best era.

For starters, it's a lot quicker paced, with very little conferring on the starters allowing a lot more questions to be asked. Those questions are about on a par with those on the original Fifteen-to-One, mostly easy enough if you know your stuff, with even the harder ones not that hard to take an educated guess on. Even in the two grand finals from this era on YouTube, 1995-96 and 1999-00, the questions are still very much of this standard. They're also a lot shorter.

As a result, the teams generally rattle through lots of questions, racking up very high scores, and both teams breaking 200, while still quite rare, still happened a reasonably large number of times.

The teams also weren't as fussed about buzzing early and having a guess as most are nowadays. Almost all of the episodes from this era available see numerous instances of players buzzing in early and guessing and quite often losing five as a result. For example, one episode, the last 1996-97 QF, only the first ten minutes are online, but those ten minutes alone see four penalties, more than most matches nowadays get in a single game.

So, that's the first, and best, era of UC on the BBC.

The second era is the one that's really two smaller ones and one series that doesn't quite fit either; I call it The Era Where the Show Declined Somewhat Before Gradually Getting Better Again. And we start with a quote from a Weaver's Week review of a low scoring 2012 edition of the show:

"...the producers have repeated the claim that the quizzing is a bit more difficult every year. This used to be a regular refrain from Granada, but we've not heard it in about ten years. Ten years ago was about the time we found the quiz to be a bit too difficult for its contenders, and made poor viewing."

It was during these two series, 2002-03 and 03-04, that the show began to noticeably slow down. The questions became longer, harder and 'swerve questions' became a lot more commonplace, ie questions that appear to be heading in one direction, then suddenly go off in another right at the end. Example:

Paxo: "Founded by Jack McB. in May 2012, the blog..." buzz

Contestant: Jack's Online Writings.

Paxo: No, you lose five points. "... the blog Jack's Online Writings specialises in reviews of which BBC2 quiz show?"

It was during these two series that those sorts of questions became more commonplace. In addition to getting longer, the teams also became more inclined to take longer conferring. As a result, the overall scores seemed to dip a little bit during these two series.

Then, after a slow start, the 2004-05 series started to improve in the second round onwards. And then, over the next three series, the show slowly started to recover from these two rather slow series without ever really hitting any real highs or any noticeable increase in the rather average scoring. In fact, during these six series (2002-03 to 07-08), there were only three matches where both teams broke 200, compared to the numerous times this happened, or came close to happening, in the first eight.

Which brings us on to the 2008-09 series, or the Gail Trimble series as we tend to call it. The Corpus Christi Oxford captain's virtuoso buzzer performance of 15 starters in the QF against Exeter is a record that will likely never be beaten in the BBC era, and really brought the show to the public's attention. Of course, we all know what happened a week after the final aired, and we just don't talk about that anymore; we've all said all we need to, and you can easily look it up if you need reminding. (On the plus side, it gave us the classic blooper of a BBC reporter repeatedly saying 'Manchester UNITED' instead of 'University' while reporting on it!)

Weaver's Week claimed that series took the show from "schedule filler to cultural hit", and it's hard not to disagree, although I do think the similar media attention levelled at Alex Guttenplan a year later played some part in it too.

Anyway, these two series together started the third era, which I call The Second Peak Era, where the show never quite hit the same highs as it did in the first eight series, but had definitely improved from the second. The questions started to shorten again, swerve questions became less common, and the aggregate scores began to rise (the 2010-11 series saw four matches where both teams broke 200, the most in years).

Which brings us to probably the all-time best match of the BBC era, the 2011-12 play-off QF between Manchester and Clare College Cambridge. To call this an 'absolutely brilliant' game, like I did on LAM at the time was, as Des Elmes pointed out, doing it an injustice. This was Peak BBC University Challenge. Two superb teams going flat out for half an hour, answering all but a few questions correctly, the lead changing hands every few minutes or so, anyone's game until literally right at the end. The final score was 270-250 to Manchester; Clare's score is the highest losing score of the BBC era, another record that will likely never be beaten.

I'll include the 2012-13 and 13-14 series in this Second Peak Era too, mainly because, at the time, the rather low scoring 2012-13 series felt more like a blip rather than a decrease in quality, and the 2013-14 series is probably the best of the eight I've covered on here; a great series with loads of close matches, lots of 'shock' wins, and one of the very best finals of the BBC era.

Which brings us on to the final era, the Current Era, which runs from the 2014-15 series won by Gonville & Caius College Cambridge (with Mr Loveday's 'Hapax Legomenon') to the present day, and is still going as far as I'm concerned.

Now, the six series we've had of this era so far have all been perfectly good series; even the low scoring 2015-16 series still has plenty to go for it. That series and the 14-15 series, however, saw the start of quite a few of the problems the show seems to have developed in the past decade.

Starters began to get longer again, quite often reaching a natural question mark, only to carry on afterwards with an extra info sentence. And on top of that, TPTB began to get a lot stricter about interruptions, with penalties for buzzing wrongly just as the question is literally just finishing becoming, maybe not commonplace, but definitely a lot more noticeable.

You'll know I go on about these a lot, and I'm as tired of highlighting these as you probably are reading them. I'd maybe be a bit more lenient if this had always been the case. But then, last weekend, I came across some episodes from the very first BBC series (link to one of them is on my Twitter feed), and I spotted at least one occasion where someone buzzed wrongly just as the question was literally just finishing, and no penalty. (In contrast, there were a couple of occasions where Paxo wrongly fined five points for a wrong buzz that wasn't an interruption, though he did quickly correct himself)

The point is, ever since these two series, contestants interrupting to guess has become a lot rarer, with most, if they're not sure their answer is right, waiting until they're absolutely sure the question is finished before buzzing. And because the starters are generally longer these days, with the extra sentences, this slows the show down, and, with a handful of exceptions, matches these days are generally a lot lower scoring than the two Peak Eras.

That's not to say this era has been bad, the six series we've had have all, as I said, been great in their own way, especially the double knockout quarter-finals, which have really come into their own these past few series. Especially compared to the 14-15 and 15-16 series, where, four times across both series, the format led to rematches that were nowhere near as good as the initial meetings. The four series since, however have seen only a couple of rematches, and things have been a lot better for it IMO.

I'm still not keen on the format though; teams getting knocked out after a win and a single defeat still doesn't quite sit right with me. However, I think Only Connect Series 13's format, which ensured this never happened, demonstrated how complicated things could get if we tried to over complicate things just to sort out this relatively minor quibble.

So, I've no problems with the show continuing with this format for the time being. The other quibbles, however...

It's not just UC that has been suffering from its questions being too long. Mastermind seems to have started suffering from 'extra sentence syndrome' as well. During the recent final, won by Dave McBryan (I believe only the second person to win both Mastermind and Fifteen-to-One after Kevin Ashman); in his general knowledge round, there was a couple of occasions where he knew an answer and was visibly frustrated when John Humphrys read out an extra sentence to the question before he could answer.

I can understand why they add these extra sentences to questions, to provide extra information to increase the chances that the contestants will get the answer. However, in quizzes like Mastermind and UC, which are against the clock and where it's in the contestants' best interests to get through as many questions as possible, I just don't feel we should be having them. Or, at least, not too many.

Another common issue people have with UC and Mastermind are their hosts. To be fair to Paxo and Mr Humphrys, following on from Bambi and Magnus Magnusson, God rest his soul, was always going to be hard, and, as neither will ever be as good as their predecessors, I honestly think comparisons are unfair, and we should judge them on their own respective merits.

I mean, I've only ever known Paxo as the host of UC (I was born the same year the BBC revival  began), so seeing him in charge week in week out seems like second nature to me. Compare that to the older generation, who still tune in expecting to hear Bambi's name read out at the start and get caught out momentarily when Paxo's is instead. (My grandparents in Cheshire say they still do)

That said, he won't be hosting the show forever, and we will eventually need a new host. I wouldn't want them to replace Paxo with somone too like him, but, on the other hand, I wouldn't want them to go the other way and hire someone too similar to Bambi either. In my opinion, the next host of UC should be someone who is similar to Paxo and/or Bambi in enough ways that we're familiar with, but still individual enough to be their own person. I can't think of anyone off the top of my head, but others will no doubt have their ideas.

Were he not of too similar a vintage to Paxo, I'd say Angus Deayton would be a good replacement. He did a good job of hosting the two Comic Relief specials from the mid '00s, one of which he introduced thusly:

"Qualifications for hosting this show include self satisfaction, a superiority complex, and contempt for anyone who disagrees with you. Unfortunately, [Tony Blair] couldn't be here tonight, and Jeremy Paxman is apparently hosting the new series of Have I Got News for You [which he'd  just been sacked from, though Paxo wouldn't make it to that show's hot seat for another fifteen years!]..."

Going back to Mastermind, I think UC can take a few lessons in how to improve itself somewhat. After a few series of unnecessarily footering with the show's setup, ie having the contestants walk onstage instead of being there from the start, Mastermind went back to basics as far as that's concerned, and the last series was all the better for it. I'm not saying UC needs a complete overhaul, but there are a few minor tweaks that could be made to improve it overall.

Most of these tweaks would, on the whole, consist of moving the show back towards the Peak Era, with shorter and easier questions. I'm not saying the questions should suddenly become overly easy, as then the show would face the dreaded accusation of 'dumbing down'. But a move back towards the standard and length of questions from these earlier series would be beneficial for the show as a whole.

And, of course, go back to the old penalties rule.

Another big problem that needs eradicating from the show nowadays is the Press' covering of it. I've gone over this before, but I'll say it again: not all University Challenge contestants will be comfortable with being the centre of attention. Unless they are openly comfortable with being in the media spotlight, like Messrs Monkman and Seagull, or Brandon and Mr Wang from the series just finished, they should be left well alone, and not be subject to articles asking if they're 'the hottest University Challenge contestant', or words to that extent.

People ask me why I don't apply to be on Mastermind and other quizzes. Well, apart from personal reasons I'd rather not go into, one is that I'm not sure how I could/would handle snide comments online about my appearance/performance. A poster on the Deal or No Deal forum once said he wouldn't apply to that show for similar reasons, remarking "I think whatever you do you'll upset someone (even if you get [the most money from the game] some people will say its a fluke".

I mean, look, I've nothing wrong with the Press covering the series final, or matches where something actually noteworthy happens (like a single player getting a large amount of starters right, or a team winning by a massive margin), but articles when someone wears a leather vest on the show? I'm sorry, no.

That said, nothing will ever top the all time biggest UC newspaper controversy: when the Observer leaked the result of the 1998-99 final the Sunday before it aired. Sue Mitchell of the victorious Open University team has written an account of this and her team's series run here, so I advise you to read it for more info.

In the meantime, I'll summarise...

University Challenge, and Mastermind too for that matter, are both good quizzes capable of making great television, and both are here to stay, but a few minor tweaks to the way both shows are setup, in particular the length and difficulty of their questions, could be called for to improve them further.

And so, finally, to the future of the show. And this blog.

Normally, the new series of UC would be beginning in around a month's time. Whether that will be the case in the current circumstances remains to be seen. The show would normally have been recording around the same time the current lockdown was implemented. Brain of Britain managed to get six heats in the bag before the lockdown, and is now on indefinite hiatus.

I have no idea how much of the next series, if any, they managed to get in the bag before indoors gatherings were banned, but a tweet from Roger Tilling claiming they'd find a way suggests to me that they maybe managed to get some in the bag.

So, until we know for sure, I'll assume University Challenge will return, in some form, in about a month's time. And when it does, I will be covering it. But not in the form of a complete review.

Instead, I shall be starting a new blog covering all of Quizzy Mondays, giving shorter but still reasonably detailed review of the show, including team details (for the first round, at least) and stats. When Mastermind and Only Connect come back, if they do, and in whatever form they do, they shall get covered similarly.

Finally, thank you very much to all who have read and supported this blog for the past eight years; much appreciated, and I hope you continue to do so as it enters a new era.

So, until we next meet, sayonara.