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Puzzling is a new Lucy Worsley gameshow with a funky-coloured backdrop, so Channel 5 are clearly trying to give Only Connect a run for their money, also with having a nerdy female presenter (and nerdy is good, in case you think it’s not).
There’s also two teams with three contestants each, but here, they don’t know each other prior to filming.
This will be a preview, so no spoilers as to who wins – and that also depends on whether I understand the puzzle rounds, given that BBC2’s offering frequently makes me confused.Dom 😉
Later on, the contestants will have to turn against each other, because when it comes to the winner of each episode… there can be only one.
The first round, In Other Words, looks at language, and compared synonyms. Get the answers right, and you score two points. Get it wrong, and the other team get a chance to steal for a point. I’ll only give one example, for which the question was “Monotonous Ivory”, and the answer is “Flat White”, so a type of coffee. Already, I’m a bit lost 🙂
Round two is Pressure Points, which is a maths round. You get two similar images and an instruction, one example being a number of shapes, count the number of sides in total and subtract one sides total from another… it’ll make sense when you see it.
The third is Rule Breakers, which is all about lateral thinking. The test question given was the name of motorway service stations, and the clue was ‘M’, so which was the odd one out? It all depended on which motorway they’re on.
Round 4 is Picture This, so, a picture-based round, and for example, work out the symbol removed from the flag of the Lebanon… erm… The Human League? 😀
For the fifth round, it’s the Memory Bank. After an unfortunate, but timely, Titanic reference – given the missing submersible vessel that was announced today, 15 seemlingly random words are shown onscreen briefly. You may know the answers to the questions, but to do know under which number they appeared?
Last and not least, Divide and Conquer will take the winning team and knock them down to one winner, who will go on to the final show in the series.
Overall, I think 30 minutes would be enough, but each episode lasts an entire hour including adverts. Okay, so in reality, it’s 28 mins vs 44 mins, so not a massive difference. And it’s easier for commercial channels to fill an hour than 30 mins. For me, one episode is enough, but die-hard fans of Victoria Coren’s show will get a lot out of this, so it’ll work as a complementary show.
Thanks to our friends at Channel 5 for the screener for episode 1 prior to broadcast.
Puzzling begins on Thursday at 8pm on Channel 5, and it shown weekly. If you miss it, you can watch the each episode on My5 after transmission.
Director: Geraldine Dowd
Producer: Jason Hopkins
Writer: Ivor Baddiel
Presenter: Lucy Worsley
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.