Children in Need

It has moved a week earlier sometime in the past few years as it used to almost always be the Friday before my birthday.

Probably, though the line-up for I'm a Celeb this year is so bad, they should have clashed this time.

Lets be fair here, CIN some major overhauls to at least bring it back to a proper since of greatness from years ago. A number of people in this thread has grasp some of the troubles around CiN but there don't go far enough. The only three highlights this year has been Tom and Jerry, Ghost of Ian Beal, and S Club 7. Nothing else stood out.

Lets start with the Whole Day, CiN day Ie Friday. Its poor, very poor. and since CBBC left there has been no proper build up to the main event. IT does not help either the BBC has no live shows anywhere in Day time any more. ( really nothing)

* All the idents on Friday should have Pudsey in them.
* Nearly all the shows should be CiN connected, Pointless could have easily been a CiN special.
* The one show needs to be scraped on Friday and CiN restart at 7pm.
* During the day Live report should broadcast IE

* 11:45 CIN Live: - Give a look at whats coming up tonight, plus out and about with people fundraising
* 12:15: Bargain Hunt - special Children in Need edition of Bargain Hunt.
* 13:00 BBC News
* 13.30 Local news, - Extended with CiN news form the local area.
* 14:00: Doctors
* 14.30: Daytime filler:
* 15.15: CIN Special: A look at Cin Funds have been used over the past year, and all the good cause it has helped pay for.
* 16.15: CIN LIVE: Simcast on the CBBC channel to help promote the day etc
* 17.15: CIN Pointless special
* 18.00 BBC news:
* 18.30 Local news
* 18.53: Scotland, Wales and NI ONLY CIN, From your local area
* 19.00 CIN Starts.

Main start 7 - 10pm
* Terry wogan and one two other presenter, ( there is a reason)
Main studio will have a seating area etc, ( this should be brought back) Everything from the One show will now be put back into the main show over the over this three hours.

Terry and other Co will be in the main studio standing or hopeful using the seats while other presenter is else where like the EastEnders set of else where interview people etc

Scotland, Wales and NI, All three will opt out at 19.30 - 19.45 and again 20.25 - 20.45, where there can give more in depth stuff and do local interviews and games etc. Local news areas will only opt out for 9min on each time but the remaining time will be filled with Song plus a Showcase of whats been happening else where.

With the interviews taken place aswell it help to stream line the show,

22.30- 1.30am ( 30mins cut off)
Terry plus Two new youth presents have a more edger but still clean show, Not sure how this will be covered.

Last night I watched BBC Children In Need 2014 live until about quarter past midnight. This morning I saw the rest on DVD, and have just got to the end. What an amazing evening of entertainment it was. My favourite bits I saw live last night were:

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
Grease Enders (cast of EastEnders performing Grease songs)
Strictly Come Dancing
The short Tom and Jerry cartoon
Children's choirs around the country singing together
Children In Need single 2014 "Wake Me Up"
Boyzone "I'll Be There"

As for what I saw on video this morning, I liked the recap of the night and The Kinks - "Sunny Afternoon" just before the final total was announced. An excellent way to round off a night of entertainment.

The final total was £32,620,469. Amazing! Well done to all who helped raise that colossal amount.

ITV get the daytime build up correct with Text Santa, but than only air a three hour show.
The BBC still put in a lot of effort across the board, the problem for me this year was how it was scheduled. Things were billed incorrectly, and the atmosphere was allowed to fizzle out through the link. There seemed to be some director or autocue problems last night so the presenters were left to pause before giving a written throw back line. It made it very clunky.

In previous years and especially under Terry and Gaby I remember that they were always introducing an act - even if it was a pop star performance that many people used to complain about - this then gave way to some ad libbed questions before asking the guests to read the number and handing to a film.

As nice as it is to be at Elstree, I'm not a fan of the use of the Eastenders set. I echo what has been said about the One Show as well. i don't understand why it has been used in recent years, especially as they throw straight to the studio, and the big fundraiser doesn't get a big introduction just thrown to like a one show VT.

The problem is that it still pulls in the number in terms of money and audience, so probably don't feel they need to improve the offering.

They could do with some better content, as other than the Ian Beale bit, it was rather poor. On what I watched, there wasn't any sketches, less musical performances and away from the night, no DIY SOS special. Indeed, over the last few years, they do seem to have reduced the number of specials away from the night, mini episodes on the main show, other TV show cast performances and they also used to do Celebrity Scissorhands.

Part of the problem is that now Comic Relief is annually, there is less opportunity for Children In Need to stand out and most of the quality sketches go to these rather than CIN, as the comics are more likely to do the comedy related telethon.

Also, it does seem that the commercial partners are increasing each year, which is probably how they keep the figures up.

I wonder if there should do a Special CiN Graham Norton live special during the night maybe 20mins segment around 11pm?

What was broadcast during its last hour? 1am - 2am?

I do get the feeling Text Santa could end up being a 4 hours show ie 7pm - 23pm,

It is far from perfect but it definately is going in the right direction - doesn't feel so much like an endless promotion for Christmas albums now. It just needs more content (whether live or pre-recorded) as that is what hits the mark entertainment wise. I know it's become kind of tradition now but dressing up trailers for the Christmas epsidoes of Doctor Who and now Call the Midwife and trying to pass them off as something special just doesn't cut it.

I suspect one problem the show has compared to the 90s is the same that means Christmas Day looks exactly the same every year on the BBC - there just isn't a huge number of shows to pick from to do specials, especially comedies. Back in the 90s the BBC probably had two family sitcoms airing most weeks - nowadays they barely have two running over a year and they're not big enough to warrant a special.

Overall though regardless of what those in charge of the show produce the British public always deliver. Perhaps they're taken for granted, or perhaps we're just setting out standards a little too high.

I do think that they could pull on their resources a little and ask some of the indie companies to contribute maybe to have the likes of Alexander and Richard come into the studio to a live shortened version of pointless, Graham Norton as suggested, and a few sketches added in. Stand up to cancer did this quite nicely this year which helped to keep the pace going a little.

Text Santa should air for a little longer - the problem with Text Santa is that it's aired on the Friday before Christmas, commonly know as 'Mad Friday' as it's the busiest night for Christmas parties therefore a lot don't see it. In a year such as this with Christmas falling late in the week it could do better airing on the Sunday or even Monday evening.

I suppose for Children in Need the problem is that twenty years ago it was the only annual telethon with comic relief being bi-annually, and now it gets compared to Comic/Sport Relief, Stand Up To Cancer and Text Santa with three of them airing within 10 weeks of each other.

BBC Scotland has its own edited version of Highlight show this evening going out at 18.10- 19pm. instead of everywhere else at 16.30 - 17.50.

Mind you it seems it only selection from the main show, including One direction and ( I dare say Tom and jerry will reappear). Local content repeats included Still game in River city, another song from the kids choir.

From what I just seen its alot tighter than the network version..

Lets change this, this anit NO highlight show this is brand new content!! Which really should have went out last night. We now have gold medal winner form the games doing stuff...

I would highly recommend to anyone to to look in on the BBC Scotland CiN Special from this evening.