This article was originally published in The Courier on 21st April 2018.
THE BUTTON: Friday, BBC One
HOME FROM HOME: Friday, BBC One
WANNABE: Friday, BBC One
In
the competitive realm of TV game shows, the simplest formats reign supreme. The
only exception to this rule was the inscrutable 3-2-1,
which managed to survive for ten years despite no one ever knowing what the
hell was going on.
The
canny minds behind cult Dave hit Taskmaster
know a good, simple idea when they find one, as they proved yet again with
their new BBC bauble THE BUTTON.
A
literal manifestation of fun for all the family, it involves five broods
from around the UK undertaking various challenges at exactly the same time from
the comfort of their own living rooms. The winning family earns a large cash
prize, the losers get nothing.
They
receive their instructions from a shiny plastic box crowned with a
mushroom-shaped button. When the button – or rather, The Button; he’s a
character voiced by comedian and series co-creator Alex Horne - turns red they
must spring into action. Once they’ve completed the round, they press The
Button again. The quickest family to do so wins.
That’s
all there is to it, but it makes for cheerful, undemanding viewing.
Challenges
in the first episode included building a free-standing tower from cans, books
and pillows that was taller than the tallest person in the household (this led
to the depressing spectacle of one contestant shrieking, “We don’t have any
books!”), bouncing a ping pong ball into a cup, reciting the entire alphabet
backwards without saying any of the vowels, and stuffing a mound of huge
inflatables into their homes.
This
harmless bit of fun benefits from a refreshing lack of cynicism. Horne never mocks
the contestants, and even when they get to watch and sometimes laugh at their
rivals in action, it’s all done in a spirit of friendly competition.
Pre-watershed
game shows are notoriously hard to get right – the grim animatronic spectre of Don’t Scare The Hare still looms large –
but the BBC have probably got a hit on their hands here. You can
guarantee that children up and down the land will be urging their parents to
apply.
It
will also lead inevitably to the TV-eating-itself weirdness of the families from
Gogglebox watching the families from The Button. We’re through the looking
glass, people.
BBC
One’s new Friday night schedule continued with a pair of debuting sitcoms. The
first, HOME FROM HOME is a
class-based comedy set in a Lake District holiday park.
The
presence of Johnny Vegas suggests that it might have some bite and bitter pathos.
It doesn’t. It’s a gentle gust of nothing in particular. Despite offering Vegas
another opportunity to riff on his lovable sad-sack persona, the mild scripts
by Coronation Street writers Simon
Crowther and Chris Fewtrell are beneath him.
The
supporting cast, which includes Emilia Fox as a snooty neighbour and Susan
Calman as a conspiracy theorist, also do what they can, but Home From Home is a featherweight waste
of their talents. It’s means no harm, but it doesn’t raise
so much as a titter or indulgent smile. Still, lovely scenery.
It’s
slightly better than WANNABE,
however, which follows a selfish, deluded and bitter ex-member of a forgotten girl
band who decides to make an unbidden comeback.
Although competently
performed by Nicholas ‘Nathan Barley’
Burns and co-writer Lily Brazier, this mean-spirited confection leans far too heavily on Gervais-esque tics and his worn-out themes. It’s the pointless David Brent film
starring a middle-class mum. No one needs this.
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