Quite Interesting
Friday, September 14th, 2012 11:46 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tourmalineThe first episode of Series J of QI was on TV a couple of hours ago. Good to have the show back.
Victoria Coren was this episode's newbie, and she was good, looking forward to the XL edition. There was some discussion on Twitter with Justin Pollard (one of the QI elves) about Series J guests, he tweeted about how there were more women on this series and how it's important to get more funny women on high-profile shows like QI. I agree, so long as they stick to properly funny women and don't start going downhill like HIGNFY or getting Davina McCall on as a guest.
However looking at the Wikipedia page for Series J, there are lots of people I've never heard of amongst the first-timers. Many of them are young, including one guy who's young enough to be my son (horror of horrors, I can deal with Olympians & Paralympians of that age but being a comedian should take longer) and there's a bunch of Australians and New Zealanders who were on a QI live show as panellists so they've been invited to the real thing. Some of these people have been bunched together on the same shows, but there are some shows with more stellar lineups - including one show with John Sessions and one with Professor Brian Cox. Overall, it appears that this series has the highest number of different panellists of all the series, though there's no Sean Lock or Rich Hall, which means Jo Brand is the only panellist to have guested on every series. There's also no Gyles Brandreth or similar weirdos to edge away from.
It also appears - and I recall tweets from Stephen Fry and/or Alan Davies - that in some cases there were two shows recorded on the same evening. This is new, will have to see if it's apparent that it's the end of a long recording day for some.
I've often tried to figure out who my ideal QI panel would be. Last time I tried, I got it down to about five shows' worth. Anyway, because no-one's asking, my favourite panellists are: Jo Brand, Bill Bailey, Sandi Toksvig, Dara O'Briain, Jimmy Carr, David Mitchell, Ronnie Ancona, Jack Dee, Ross Noble, John Sessions, Phill Jupitus, Sue Perkins, Andy Hamilton, Professor Brian Cox, Eddie Izzard, Robert Webb, Hugh Dennis & Liza Tarbuck. That's eighteen panellists whom I think are the best on it (Hugh Laurie was adorable but panel games aren't really his forte, he's better at acting, writing, directing and being a blues musician), plus there are others who are better depending who the other panellists are (Sean Lock is the most obvious example) who I'm quite happy to watch. And of course Linda Smith is missed. But eighteen panellists is enough for six shows, so there's a rich pool of talent there, I hope the new people appearing on Series J add to this.
Victoria Coren was this episode's newbie, and she was good, looking forward to the XL edition. There was some discussion on Twitter with Justin Pollard (one of the QI elves) about Series J guests, he tweeted about how there were more women on this series and how it's important to get more funny women on high-profile shows like QI. I agree, so long as they stick to properly funny women and don't start going downhill like HIGNFY or getting Davina McCall on as a guest.
However looking at the Wikipedia page for Series J, there are lots of people I've never heard of amongst the first-timers. Many of them are young, including one guy who's young enough to be my son (horror of horrors, I can deal with Olympians & Paralympians of that age but being a comedian should take longer) and there's a bunch of Australians and New Zealanders who were on a QI live show as panellists so they've been invited to the real thing. Some of these people have been bunched together on the same shows, but there are some shows with more stellar lineups - including one show with John Sessions and one with Professor Brian Cox. Overall, it appears that this series has the highest number of different panellists of all the series, though there's no Sean Lock or Rich Hall, which means Jo Brand is the only panellist to have guested on every series. There's also no Gyles Brandreth or similar weirdos to edge away from.
It also appears - and I recall tweets from Stephen Fry and/or Alan Davies - that in some cases there were two shows recorded on the same evening. This is new, will have to see if it's apparent that it's the end of a long recording day for some.
I've often tried to figure out who my ideal QI panel would be. Last time I tried, I got it down to about five shows' worth. Anyway, because no-one's asking, my favourite panellists are: Jo Brand, Bill Bailey, Sandi Toksvig, Dara O'Briain, Jimmy Carr, David Mitchell, Ronnie Ancona, Jack Dee, Ross Noble, John Sessions, Phill Jupitus, Sue Perkins, Andy Hamilton, Professor Brian Cox, Eddie Izzard, Robert Webb, Hugh Dennis & Liza Tarbuck. That's eighteen panellists whom I think are the best on it (Hugh Laurie was adorable but panel games aren't really his forte, he's better at acting, writing, directing and being a blues musician), plus there are others who are better depending who the other panellists are (Sean Lock is the most obvious example) who I'm quite happy to watch. And of course Linda Smith is missed. But eighteen panellists is enough for six shows, so there's a rich pool of talent there, I hope the new people appearing on Series J add to this.
