BBC Two Rebrand and Onwards

I'm afraid you're a bit late! known as Chase Torches - I first saw it in the early hours of 13th August, so it's been around for at least a few months now.

I've not seen Chase torches before, I think the Chase idents are the best of the new '2' idents along with Zoetrope. They should lose the Sunroof one because it is just dull.

I agree totally. The Chase idents are the most interesting ones in the set accompanied by a quite strong soundtrack. Also I think all the different versions help improve the ident as there is an element of variety. That may also be one of the main problems of Sunroof as it's an uninteresting ident to start off with and there's no variety either.

Having only just seen the heroes idents, I do think they're very good. They aren't designed to capture the interest of people who haven't watched the show. They are lively and interesting.

Thats exactly how I feel, how can you criticise something when you haven't watched it or know about the characters and on here it goes in depth into essays of unnecessary panic over consistency.

Yes it's the music of the Chase idents that really makes them work. These ones are particularly clever as they have a hook and that is, the guy is being chased but we don't know why. They should make a few more of these to add to the intrigue.

As for Sunroof, it just doesn't work for me. I remember Roly Keating saying that the new 2 idents were beautifully executed pieces of film-making.' You what? I could say that about some of BBC1's new idents like Mission Control or Channel 4 idents like Dubai. But Sunroof!?! That looks like it was shot on somebody's camcorder on a day trip to Brighton!!

BBC2 is long overdue some proper new idents and not just a few 2dimensions films for Heroes. BBC2 used to lead the way with idents, but now they're getting left behind.

Does anybody have any info about the BBC2 Christmas ident and when will they start showing their Christmas trailers?

It's no longer a case of whether BBC2's identity has been or is being weakened; I would state that is certainly (and regrettably) the case now - it's more about how and why it's been allowed, so as to root out the problem - and most importantly, how it can be rebuilt in the near future, to not just stop the rot, but hopefully reverse it.

I can understand why the Chase ones are appreciated so (even by myself, to a degree at least) - despite them being a person-focused ident concept on a channel that used to thrive without such 'people idents', the idea has turned out to be the only real injection of character into a set that is otherwise near-devoid of personality.

That, then, is also the reason why I'm all the more disappointed we've completely left behind the sheer warmth and character of the previous lot - especially as it stood out so greatly amongst the other channels.

But as has been mentioned, for as long the Beeb stick with the window theme for the regular set now, they won't be able to enrich any additions with anywhere near as much of that quirky and lively style that should be defining the channel. Too, we've seen a good number of special symbols already, but as welcome as this variety is, the vast majority are honestly lacking the qualities of their equivalents of 15-odd years ago.


And that issue in itself makes me wonder: in this age where broadcasters arguably place more importance than ever on an identity that communicates their channel's brand values and output - more than anything else, how the hell did they give the green light to a core idea that all but kills-off any distinct element of wit or surprise, two very things that were identified as being key properties of the brand?

I think I've said before that I'm being hypocritical in not liking people idents but at the same time loving Chase but I think they are the best of a concept that promised much and seems to have ended up in a creative cul-de-sac. The problems with the 2 started when the yellow period came in. All of the previous great idents were just consigned to the scrapheap. I personally would have kept them all and just kept adding to them. Then when the yellow period was over the new controller thinks 'well we can't do what we did before let's do something different.' But instead they should have made about 20 new 2 idents in the style of the older idents and then gradually reintroduce the old ones. I believe that most viewers wouldn't have seen it as a stepback, more like a welcome return.

The 2 itslef didn't get a character until 1993 when the 2 stings were introduced and it wasn't until the yellow period that the 2 ident exhibited personality regularly. The 2 has taken a bit of a wrong turn in terms of presentation, but they can get it right if the next series of window idents are far more inventive than Sunroof or Tent.

However I would say that the 2 works better when it is the main focus of the ident rather than a 'window on the world' afterthought.

I'm starting to lose track of these BBC2 idents now - so are there four versions of Chase? I've still only seen two of them!

I think it's four now, two happening at night and two during the day. There's the one where he climbs up through the 2, this wasn't the first one shown even though when the new idents were previewed to the press this was the Chase variant that was shown. Then another one where runs through the 2. Then there are the two night time ones. One where he jumps down into a 2 shaped hole to hide and now the most recent one.

Also wondering about this...