Top Entertainment with Added Stimulation (Countdown)

Name: DavyMichelle

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Product:	Countdown
Date:	27/06/08 (71 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Challening, Entertaining, Easy Going

Disadvantages: None

If you've never seen Countdown then why the heavens not?! It's possibly the best quiz show style program ever to grace our screens. The lovely Carol Vorderman is a role model for women everywhere with her mixture of brains and beauty (instead of just the beauty for a change) and has been on the show since it first began over twenty five years ago. The original host was Richard Whitely but he sadly died a couple of years ago. The got Des Lynam in to take over from him as the host originally but he wasn't a popular choice and was quickly replaced by current presenter Des O'Connor.


The show is a game that features two contestants basically trying to outsmart each other. They start by having three rounds of the letters game which involves each contestant taking it in turns to choose nine letters (they just choose either consonant or vowel and it's luck of the draw what they get) then the clock starts ticking and they have to try to make the longest word out of the selected letters. What's great about this show is that's interactive for us watching at home so we can sit there trying to make up our words and compete against the TV or our family.


Next they have a numbers game which involves contestants picking six numbers at random. They can choose from small numbers (1 - 10) or a number of the big numbers (25, 50, 75 and 100). Then the computer selects a randomly generated target number between 1 and 1000 and the contestants have to try to make that target out of the numbers on the board. They can only multiply, subtract, divide and times and can't use half numbers or decimal points. Carol Vorderman graduated from Cambridge University and is a mathematical genius so she works out all the answers on the fly and nearly always gets the target even when the contestants don't.


Des O'Connor and Carol Vorderman work well together and share a few jokes throughout the show. There's also a dictionary corner where Suzy Dent and a featured special guest sit and work out long words using the dictionary and the letters selection and they're also on hand to check any dubious contestant offerings or spellings.


Countdown has long been a favourite show of my wife's as she's been home more often than me to watch it over the years. In recent times I've been watching it more and more though as I'm home at that time of the day (around 3:30pm on Channel 4) so I've been watching it a couple of times a week for a while now. The Mrs and I get quite competitive sometimes and often argue with each other about made up words! I like this show as it's both stimulating and entertaining at the same time.

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