Survivor

Reviewing series 3 which is presented by Joel Dommet and has been picked up by the BBC and I am really enjoying it, We are currently 4 episodes in and I'm hooked, I love all aspects of it, there is action, tension, drama and humour to it, from the competitive nature of the physical tasks which are entertaining to watch and emphasises peoples strengths and weaknesses, to the psychological aspect of game playing and such you then see in camp where people attempt to form alliances and divisions and sway others on who to vote out, Joel does a great job presenting it and brings comic relief at times, but is also able to add to the tension and drama when required.

A poor version of an iconic tv series... just leave it to Jeff Probst! Even though classic phrases are reused by the host - they lack a presence and passion for the game. The tribes start the game with opportunity to take food with them back to camp (potatoes, pineapples - has the production team even watched the original Survivor series?), which seems a huge unfair advantage.

The concept itself of surviving on a remote island for a cash prize is a nice draw. However what keeps the audiences attention is the interpersonal relationships and strategy of the individuals to ultimately back stab and manipulate the players to become the sole survivor. The original American version carries the the tag line "outwit, outplay, outlast" giving the players 3 clear arenas to compete in to win the prize.

The uk version seems to missing this, and for some reason hasn't replaced it with anything, leaving this version lacking in interest and gameplay.

I mean maybe they can learn from their shortcomings and improve in the seasons to follow. Who knows.

Long story short - Jeff Prost the American version producer and host created the show and has so much passion for the project it's pointless having anyone else.

Come on, own up - who asked for this?

Probably nobody, knowing the BBC. Some boffin probably looked at an algarythm and decided that the numbers/data proclaimed that this show needed, positively needed, to be darkening our TV screens again. It was such a big success when ITV had a go with it back in the day of course...

No it wasn't - it crashed. This version didn't do much better, despite 'Strictly' giving it a massive leg up as its lead in show, and it being mentioned seemingly every two minutes through promos.

It's not very good, the host isn't very good, and overall it reeks of the BBC trying to play to the numbers and a young audience who don't watch TV anyway.

I hope it doesn't survive.

I've seen every English language Survivor season. This is horrible.

It's as if it was made by people who never watched the show and certainly don't understand what makes it popular.

The players aren't interesting or people you want to watch.

The host, Joel Dommett, is annoying. His little voice is like fingernails across a chalkboard. And unfortunately, he really likes to talk. To make matters worse, they have him doing voice overs to narrate and explain things.

Instead of using the typical Survivor instrumental music, there are CONSTANT vomit inducing pop songs and cover versions of pop songs.

The paper they vote on looks like cheap toilet tissue that has seen action.

From the big things to little things, this UK series is horrible and should be marooned on an island and left for dead.

Well, the U. K ..ie my home finally got round to doing another series of Survivor after many, many years and they seem to have paid a bit of attention to other franchises and basically gone back to early days of the U. S version because that really was the best. (With acknowledgment to Australian version where I'm convinced that at times they're out to kill them) What they haven't done is gone wildly politically correct or at least they haven't smashed it into our faces they've just a shown us Brits as we are. They have done a pretty good cross representation of us Brits...from the posh Toff to the not so posh working class with everything in between. And our nations and regions are shown. And they actually left the survivors with nothing initially, old style, earn your stuff the hard way !

Even Joel isn't as annoying as he can be. My only real and constant gripe is the background music. It's far, far too loud. It's intrusive, relentless and infuriating. On U. K TV we suffer from 'whispering' where for some reason the broadcasters seem to think we don't need to hear the words that are said...they are either drowned out by background music or the voices are so quiet you struggle to hear. Many folk leave subtitles on permanently...it really can be that bad.

So BBC do us all a favour and tweak the sound levels...it spoiling a good programme.

Give it a whirl....these survivors mean business, just like they used to.