Last Tango for the dancers?

Bring back the Balloon Era!!!

An era that encapsulated style and grace, with good views of UK landmarks. The music was subtle and perfect for continuity announcements unlike the current mess.

The current era of idents does nothing to help BBC One or the BBC! They are tacky and cheap. It could be any old channel - without the ugly red box you would never know!

Compare that to the Balloon Era - an era were you knew instantly what channel you were watching. The continuity announcers could be easily heard over the music - today that can prove difficult as there is too much noise!

Dust the balloon off and fire it up - or at least get rid of the Dreadful Dancers! A great end could come in the form of a 'Dancing in the Rain' Ident - this would feature all the dancers being electrocuted during a bad storm. Then the beautiful balloon could rise high above in the sky.

According to BBC1's Head of Marketing, plans were in place to film an ident at the Glasgow Science Centre. But this never happened - and after the first eight the location concept was abandoned. So, it seems, were the second batch of eight idents due to be filmed last May.

Now why would the Beeb plan eight more then abandon them? Why drop the locations? Sounds like they knew the dance theme wasn't working and decided to hold fire. Hence only three additions since March - Music Video, Bollywood and Tango. All studio based.

Incidentally, how far in advance of transmission were the new additions filmed?



Why not? This is the British Broadcasting Corporation after all. If we have to have dances, why not Morris men or a maypole dance? They're as much a part of multicultural Britain. as I was watching a gymnastic display last summer and immediately thought BBC1. And how about a performance from the Sylvia Young Theatre school? They're most talented youngsters in the UK; the school has produced many famous names - and their uniform is red!

Of course, the return of the globe would solve BBC1's identity crisis...

Another crappy ident from BBC1, it's only useful to see what knickers the lady was wearing!

While I dislike LH for any number of reasons, I sometimes wonder if these dancer things have come from her. Would one simple woman make such decisions? Surely the BBC is run like the government.... so such major decisions as the branding for the flagship channel would be made by huge bodies of people - how much say would LH have in this?

I have to say these idents are the worst the BBC have commissioned in a very long time. They may have a modicum of originality about them (something rip-off ITV might want to take note of) but as station idents they simply do not work. The concept I have no problem with (I don't like them especially, I feel indifference) but they just do not sit right.



I really don't know Larry. Mind you, I've never felt particularly "English" either. "Northern" for certain, that has a defined identity to it, but English, never. Sometimes I wish the southern half of the country would just sink or become part of France or something, it's just an annoyance to me