Worst Irish TV ever

Night Flight

Note that "Upwardly Mobile" made the billing...

The worst Irish TV shows EVER!

Damian Corless is spoiled for choice when it comes to compiling the Top 10 worst Irish TV programmes, with gems such as the 'Calor Gas Housewife of the Year' and 'Quicksilver' A new edition of The Penguin TV Companion pays special attention to the worst programmes ever to air on the networks of Britain and America. The compilers of an 'Irish Worst List' would be spoiled for choice, but the following shows would all be worthy contenders for a place in the top ten.
Calor Housewife Of The Year Gay Byrne hosted this annual 'Lovely Girls' triathlon for the mature Irishwoman. The finalists' first task was to rustle up a meal. That done, they were given a dab of make-up and wheeled back out to tell how they trapped their man. Having established their desirability in the kitchen and the bedroom, they closed with a party piece that might be a song, or a jig, or a poem in Irish.
In the '90s, the contest was dropped amid complaints that too many women working outside the home were taking part. The morning after what turned out to be the final show, a caller phoned RTE to protest that most of the finalists "would never get down on their knees to scrub the floor".
Leave It To Mrs O'Brien Twenty years after it ended, this dismal sitcom about two priests and their housekeeper (originally entitled The Good, The Bad & The Clergy) remains a by-word for plodding ineptitude. Mrs O'Brien was played by Anna Manahan, but RTE didn't see the need to use a professional writer, and series one was scripted by a Dublin housewife. She was jilted for series two, with Montrose promising "more character depth" and "more reality". Instead, they brought in plots involving mysterious sacks of swag and showbiz intrigues.
One TV critic wanted those responsible "thrown on the dole and given lousy references". The makers finally raised a belly-laugh with the hilarious defence that their target audience were kids and oldies, and that it was RTE's public service remit to satisfy the low expectations of these undemanding viewers.
Going Strong Bunny Carr made his name hosting Quicksilver, a quiz show famous for its poor prizes (they started at one old penny) and poorer answering. Q: "What was Ghandi's first name? A: "Goosey-Goosey." Q: "What was Hitler's first name?" A: "Heil!"! The musical clues of organist Norman Medcalf have also entered legend. Once, to suggest the answer 'Meath', he played Meet Me In Kentucky.
In 1975, Bunny moved to Going Strong, an afternoon sop to senior citizens which made Quicksilver look like the Apollo 11 moon landing. Going Strong had regular features on knitting, shrubberies and mushy foods; no episode would be complete without an elderly farmer recalling the time he was chased by a bull. The annual highlight was a Grandmother Of The Year pageant.
Play The Game In any other country, Play The Game would have been scheduled in mid-morning to find its target audience of students, alcoholics and nursing home inmates. In Ireland, this charades-based charade ran as prime-time entertainment several times weekly for 10 years. The format involved Derek Davis, Ronan Collins, Twink, two sofas and a procession of 'special guests' who were so low-profile that carpet burns were an occupational hazard.
Upwardly Mobile This series about a skanger family that win the lotto and move in beside snooty neighbours, took a classic sitcom set-up and bludgeoned it to death. Joe Savino played the male lead, while Hilary Fannin was the female star. The theme song originally went: "'So it's goodbye to old J Arthur, and it's hello to fine Chablis". This was changed when RTE discovered that the J Arthur in question was not Guinness, but movie mogul J Arthur Rank. J Arthur is rhyming slang for something rude that sounds like Rank. That was as funny as this got.
Murphy's Micro Quiz-M/Winning Streak In 1984, computers were poised to take over the world and RTE responded with a gimmicky quiz show, featuring lots of whirring sounds and flashing lights. Host Mike Murphy wore a space suit and greeted each special effect with an awestruck gasp of "Gawd, would you look at that". He later admitted he hadn't a clue what a 'Quiz-M' is.
Mike moved to Winning Streak, which makes Micro Quiz-M look like Mastermind. The Lottery-funded Winning Streak cannot involve any element of knowledge or skill and relies entirely on the "Aw! Jaysus factor". An RTE source revealed: "Viewers love to see people win money. It makes them go 'Aw! Jaysus'."
The Spike This 1978 ten-parter set in a tough secondary school was effortlessly funny. Sadly, it wasn't meant to be. The briefest glimpse of naked flesh in episode 5 outraged the chairman of the League Of Decency, who suffered a heart attack while making angry phonecalls to newspapers. The Spike's producer bizarrely claimed the intent had been "to examine the attitude of pupils and staff to nudity".
On the day that part 6 was due to air with a story of a schoolboy bomber, RTE axed it. The remaining episodes remain locked away.
Ryantown This dog's dinner was the low-point of Gerry Ryan's TV career which has never hit the heights. Gerry had a dog and it was disobedient. That was the show's main running gag. Someone from Fair City would drop in and casually start cooking spaghetti bolognese. Brenda Donoghue would doorstep householders with a roving camera and there was an identity parade called Who's Married To Who?. Ryan later admitted it was all horribly "half-baked" and "should have been taken off the air after a few shows".
Extra, Extra, Read All About It In recent years, RTE has squandered taxpayer's money on two fabulously bad comedies. A sitcom about swingers, Fergus's Wedding, was as funny as a tax audit. And The Cassidys was so cringe-inducing that one member of RTE's top brass publicly disowned it.
However back in 1993, RTE served up a comedy so deeply unfunny that the station tried to pretend that it wasn't actually a comedy. So dire was Extra, Extra, that a joke went around Montrose that it had been commissioned solely to make Ryantown seem less awful.
Hilary Fannin, who also starred in Upwardly Mobile, played the female lead in Extra, Extra, which was written by comedian Morgan Jones who also starred in the series.
Introducing episode 1, the announcer described it as "a new drama". Nobody had told this to the engineer who'd tacked on gales of histrionic canned laughter. Midway through the first instlment, the entire cast (supposedly staffing a newspaper office) began dancing a hornpipe to the tune of HMS Pinafore.
The Lyrics Board The Japanese devised a show called Endurance where a panel of volunteers suffer cruel tortures to entertain viewers at home. Giving this formula an ingenious twist, the Irish invented a show where a panel of volunteers entertain themselves by inflicting cruel tortures on viewers at home.
The Lyrics Board is stunningly simple. You just need two pianos and two panels of people who may or may not be able to sing, but who are willing to belt out songs they may or may not know in front of a demented audience. It's every bit as good as it sounds and, to prove the point, it's been franchised out to 21 countries.-

http://www.independent.ie/unsorted/features/the-worst-irish-tv-shows-ever-75727.html

Mr E

Great read... thanks!

Some true turkeys there alright....

mike65

Harsh Ron harsh.

Play the Game was tip-top Friday evening entertainment esp for fans of slightly decrepitudinous MILFs.

Mike.

Toto Wolfcastle

In fairness, we could probably fill a top ten with some of the tripe RTE have created over the last 5 years or so!

I loved Upwardly Mobile as a child!

youcancallmeal

A lot of those were before my day but still a fairly humorous read

SuperGrover

What about 'The Box', presented by Keith Duffy?

Surely the most pointless piece of tripe ever to grace our screens.

Some bad calls, how he nominated Murphy's Micro Quizx M which was very popular, and yet failed to think of the dire Rapid Roulette with Maxi telling people to 'leeeeeeeeeeeeeeave the table'.

mike65

Ah jebus! I'd forgetten that ever existed.

Mike.

jester77

You have to give RTE credit, it takes some effort to come up with the amount of crap they have produced over the years!

I seem to have missed that Upwardly Mobile series, don't suppose it's on DVD?

There are some others that are not on that list that spring to mind. There was that truly horrendous game show presented by some guy with a dickie bow. It was so bad I have thankfully forgotten what it was called and what it was about.
There was also the Gerry Ryan program with school kids *shudders*

Mr E

SuperGrover wrote: »

What about 'The Box', presented by Keith Duffy?

Surely the most pointless piece of tripe ever to grace our screens.

That work of art was TV3.... if it was RTE it would have been near the top of the list...

EamonnKeane

What about Gridlocked, a quiz-show-slash-board-game so confusing that not even the host (a certain D. Mooney) or the competitors could understand it.

WindSock

Is fair city on that list?

Mossy Monk

There was that muck a few months ago that had the creators on here defending it. I can't remember the name of it but I did call it ****. Not that I am complaining.

SuperGrover

Mr E wrote: »

That work of art was TV3.... if it was RTE it would have been near the top of the list...

Does it have to be RTE? Why? irish is Irish, no?

jester77

But in fairness, if they took away the muck there wouldn't be much left to watch and we'd be left looking at...



So which is better

Toto Wolfcastle

WindSock wrote: »

Is fair city on that list?

Fair City is on the 'So bad it's good' list.

tbh

Murphy's Micro Quiz-Em (to give it it's original title) was pretty good for it's time. Remember the round when the kids played each other at computer games?

Ruu_Old

Our school was on Gridlocked, haven't a feckin' clue what it was about! I don't think the contestants new either.

humanji

I somehow think it'd just be easier to make a short list of the good ones.

Nolanger

The Roaring Twenties.

Toto Wolfcastle

I'd be of the opinion that The Cassidys should be high up on that list.

Night Flight

This speaks volumes.....

http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/title/408781

Chardee MacDennis

i used to enjoy upwardly mobile as did my parents, but i cant remember a bit from it. although my parents like Fair City so maybe it was crap.

KnifeWRENCH

I used watch Upwardly Mobile when I was small, but I can't really remember it much now.

I used to like Gridlock too - I even understood it! *beams with pride*
Unfortunately it ended long before I was old enough to take part

Worst Irish programme for me has to be the shite attempt at a sketch show that was STEW. Naked Camera was terrible too, although I like Maeve Higgins.

Night Flight

square_igloo wrote: »

Worst Irish programme for me has to be the shite attempt at a sketch show that was STEW.

That probably was the all time low.

D-Generate

I was disappointed that Stew wasn't named. Guess it is too recent or else it was so bad that the author of the article would need regressive psychology to bring it back to mind.

gixerfixer

Anything on TV3.That is all

jill_valentine

Ruu wrote: »

Our school was on Gridlocked, haven't a feckin' clue what it was about! I don't think the contestants new either.

Yeah, I know a couple of people who were on it. I asked them to explain it, and they ended up arguing among themselves. I have come to the conclusion that there is literally nobody on earth who could understand Gridlocked. In fact, I suspect they used to just arbitrarily invent new rules all the time, just to keep people on their toes...

darkdubh

What about Bull island.

darkdubh

darkdubh wrote: »

What about Bull island.

Oh.

Jesus.

I had forgotten it. It was vomit.

Hrududu

Surely people havent forgotten "The English Class" already? Just when you think RTE cannot get any worse.

Night Flight

Hrududu wrote: »

Surely people havent forgotten "The English Class" already?

Must be trauma induced amnesia.

JP Liz

Glenroe should be included

BopNiblets

Does that Irish guy on MTVs Sweet 16 count?

The Horror.

KnifeWRENCH

darkdubh wrote: »

What about Bull island.

I loved Bull Island! One of the best things RTE did imo.Anne Doyle wearing the cutlery....c'mon! :pac:

Ruu_Old

darkdubh wrote: »

What about Bull island.

Some of the best telly ever I thought. Charleth and the gang.

Toto Wolfcastle

I loved Bull Island. The fact that it was axed is just proof that RTE has no idea what good tv is, especially considering some of the horror that followed.

D-Generate

D-Generate wrote: »

I was disappointed that Stew wasn't named. Guess it is too recent or else it was so bad that the author of the article would need regressive psychology to bring it back to mind.

The author of the article was the writer of Stew. Just found that out now. Oh irony heaped on irony, though to be fair I did like one sketch on that show with the fellow going 'I'm not proud of it, but I'm not ashamed of it either'. The Fast Show done badly.

JerryHandbag

Expose anyone!?

"Hi I'm Lorraine Keane"....yes I think we know who you are thank you

Green Hornet

JerryHandbag wrote: »

Expose anyone!?

"Hi I'm Lorraine Keane"....yes I think we know who you are thank you

She drives me nuts...........in a bad way! She is sooooooooo false. Stupid false laugh :mad::mad:.

D-Generate

I just don't understand how RTE can't produce comedy even matching something BBC would put on at 2 a.m on a Tuesday morning. Sure they don't have the budget to have production values the same as BBC or to make a sci-fi show but it doesn't exactly cost a lot to put pen to paper and come up with something that makes people chuckle. Its a real shame that RTE are stuck in the dark ages which thinks the epitome of comedy is to have a larf at the German guy in Killnascully for being "ze German" and then have the gall to show an advertisment about promoting equality and anti-racism during the ad break.

brettmirl

How did "Talkabout" not make it onto the list?

Or Garda Patrol.

grenache

Stew, The English Class and Upwardly Mobile are definitely my worst three

Others that deserve a mention are 'Saturday Night Live: with Pat Spillane' and Bosco.

pickarooney

Boards should write a sit-com. It makes me laugh all the time.

Jerichoholic

mick_irl wrote: »

How did "Talkabout" not make it onto the list?

Or Garda Patrol.

:)Talkabout!!!!

"Talk about......SPOONS!!!"

"Ehspoons, eh spoons, eh eat them, eh dinner eh oh spoons, eh oh God, eh silver eh oh eh spoons"

Talkabout was horiffic, I remember they had a contestant dressed as Groucho Marx to somehow prove he was funny, good god he was wrong.

I absolutley hated that zig and zag show where they thought they were black and were somehow part of the hip hop scene - 2 phat.

There was no irony in it whatsoever, it was just PAINFUL to see where the "jokes" went.

Awful, awful muck.