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Who Wants to be a Millionaire?

Sunday 8pm on ITV (February 2018)

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SS
SuperSajuuk
Or maybe Challenge just didn't get or show it because it was a special Christmas episode and was for some reason handled differently to the other episodes, that has happened with other shows of their down the years, where they've skipped over Christmas and other special editions, even though they do exist.

You could be right. The Perry Poole one was a weird case of a special episode as well in which 2 episodes were broadcast on the same night although split by another programme being broadcast (something Cilla Black related i think, if my memory serves me correctly?).
NJ
Neil Jones Founding member
What do you mean "movie like"? Do you mean black bars top and bottom?

More likely they were 14:9, there wouldn't have been any real incentive to do any other ratio. At that time it would have 4:3 or 16:9 protected for 14:9. Note that YouTube uploads are almost always not a real indication of what went out, since people can and do do stretchyvision on non-widescreen material but anyway...

By movie-like, I mean that they were letterboxed in the filming style often used in movies, ie: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Letterboxing_(filming) (although the practice is used outwith movies, its where i commonly see it).


The letterboxing in film production is deliberate cropping to remove things like boom mics and shadows and so on - this is why when you get those "formatted to fit your TV" prints you could see all kinds of things that you wouldn't have seen in the cinema.

That's very unlikely to have been the case in TV production (particularly on a simple quiz show) of the era we're referring to (there was such a thing as Pal Plus I think it was called as it did appear on Channel 4 from time to time in the analogue days and even then it was only on selected things and the occasional film). It's far more likely the case the episodes were loaded into the playout system at Challenge wrong or somebody's screwed up the file transfer. Quite unlikely to be an intended effect I would have thought.
VM
VMPhil
I think we’re taking about 14:9 copies of 16:9 shows that used to be distributed to channels who couldn’t broadcast in widescreen, like UKTV. I know I’ve seen a 14:9 copy of Millionaire on Challenge recently, 14:9 copies still turn up on the UKTV channels from time to time too (such as Coast).
JA
james-2001
The former VMTV channels still seem to use the old 14:9 copies of stuff they made or acquired prior to 2008, even the shows they made themselves. They really don't seem to be bothered about re-aquiring or reversioning stuff, even when it's their own production.
DE
DE88
The Perry Poole one was a weird case of a special episode as well in which 2 episodes were broadcast on the same night although split by another programme being broadcast (something Cilla Black related i think, if my memory serves me correctly?).


Your memory does indeed serve you correctly - it was the first episode of the second series of The Moment of Truth. Wink Thumbs up

9 days later

CA
Castries
Last night's Celebrity WWTBAM in the US.
bkman1990, MarkT76 and DE88 gave kudos
DE
DE88
Of course, Laurence and Jackie Llewelyn-Bowen are the only UK celebs to have reached the £1 million question (and, of course, they were asked *two* such questions).
JO
Jon
Last night's Celebrity WWTBAM in the US.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tmkOI6bWKs

Very underwhelming, not even confetti. I can only think that restrictions on Covid-19 prevented that but it’s so low energy compared to the UK presumably recorded at the same time.
RD
RDJ
Interesting to see that the US is using the original graphics, albeit with the horrid Verdana font - ugh!
JO
Jon
RDJ posted:
Interesting to see that the US is using the original graphics, albeit with the horrid Verdana font - ugh!

From what I can tell, graphics are the same as the current UK ones albeit with different or the original colours and the additional ‘total prize money’ graphics at the end of a players run, which presumably would have said ‘Joe Bloggs - Millionaire’ if it had been a civilian player.
Last edited by Jon on 1 December 2020 9:19pm
SS
SuperSajuuk
I just watched that clip and yeah, that was ridiculously underwhelming. Even with covid restrictions, that just sucked. :/
BR
Brekkie
Looks like the most recent winner is on Mastermind Cymru this week.

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