Shows that people forget or get lost in time

One from London, Thames Telethon, in 1980 and 1985.

Also, who remembers one from Channel 4, Nightsports with Imlach?

The later half hour networked episodes are more well-known, but the earlier London only series is lost in the mists of time.


It was an hour long on a Friday night and included a I've performance from a band in every episode and there were some other performers in sketches. The set was slightly different too

Some of the items from this first series were reedited and included in the second for the rest of the country to see. Some are easy to spot due to gaps in continuity - IIRC at least once I'm sure there's a band's kit on the floor behind Bob

Even when the first series went out the title was a bit of an old reference

Quiz Night, with Ross King. From the early days of 24 hour ITV. Actually, the sort of cheap programming ITV could do with during the night, rather than teleshopping, but that's only my opinion.

On the topic of quizzes, STV and Grampian had their own regional quizzes. Did any of the other ITV regions have their own quizzes that weren't networked?

And an obscure one from S4C, Jacpot.

Also including its would-be successor, "Virtually Impossible":



Ran for one series on CITV. An unfortunate change in controller meant that it never got a second one, and Knightmare itself never returned either.

Knightmare was due to have a ninth series and VI bombed in the ratings as it sat in the old Knightmare slot, Fridays at 4:40. Tim Child documented Knightmare's ending for Knightmare.com a few years ago:
https://www.knightmare.com/home/history?showall=&start=3

Many people remember Thames's This Week, even if only for the episode that may have cost Thames their franchise.

The same can't be said for the closest Thames's successors came to a proper replacement...



And it wasn't really all *that* close to being a proper replacement either, was it? Far more sensationalist in approach, with episodes on Michael Jackson, Harrods, Nazi hunters and violent chefs, as well as two on L Ron Hubbard's Church...

And the theme tune probably annoyed more than it impressed, as did the big cat in the titles.

Nonetheless, it ran for close to a hundred episodes over five series. Dermot hosted them all, and he really couldn't have been faulted.

Two decades on, however, it's pretty clear that The Big Story didn't leave The Big Impression - it certainly didn't leave one as big as those of This Week or World in Action. Meanwhile, Twenty Twenty now makes the likes of First Dates and The Davina Hour...

Under the Moon, early hours on Channel 4, late 90s.

Border TV had various regional quiz shows including a children's series "Topple" in the mid 60s, "Brain of the Border" and a longer-running series "Try for Ten". Other regional companies may have run their own versions of the latter.

TVS had a few. I mentioned one here some time ago.

I'm sure all the tapes and paperwork are easily accesable so those shows can be repeate..

.. Oh, wait a minute.

That was a revamped version of Nightsports with Imlach, as mentioned on the previous page, and initially devised as a spoiler for Channel Five's Live and Dangerous. There was an interesting article about it in The Observer a few years back, including Danny Kelly talking about how he once challenged a caller to a fight and actually went outside the building after the show to wait for him - https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2008/apr/06/sportfeatures.television



Well, Panorama has done shows on scientology, one of them is probably one of the most famous editions of recent years. And most of those subjects are relevant enough for a current affairs show, Panorama regularly interperses lighter, more populist fare in amongst the stuff on arms dealing and so on.

Anyway, The Big Story wasn't the only replacement for This Week, as while that was on all year round, The Big Story alternated with other current affairs shows, most notably Yorkshire's 3D and something called Storyline that didn't last very long. And it also didn't help that it was in the 7.30-opposite-'stEnders slot rather than the 8.30 slot This Week used to have. Which wasn't Carlton's fault.

I always got Under The Moon mixed up with Live & Dangerous. I was convinced at one point they were both on Channel 5 and one succeeded the other. This was of course back in the day when I was a youngster with a new TV in my bedroom and Channel 5 was not available here so I had to do a lot of trickery with a portable aerial and laces attached to the roof to hold it in a particular position which got me a snowy, but watchable (if you could put up with the dire quality) picture of Channel 5. We eventually got Sky and were able to get it that way.