James may new show - Man Lab BBC2

mike65

Sunday, October 31st, 2010
9:00pm to 10:00pm
The first of a new series that sees James May on a mission to save modern man - from themselves. From his Man Lab HQ, James and his team set out on a series of action-packed challenges that will help modern man relearn some of the vital skills, once cherished by his forefathers, that are now in danger of being lost forever. In this episode, we learn how to defuse an unexploded bomb, build a kitchen out of concrete, how to serenade a woman, transform a fishfinger sandwich, and create the world's first motorised picnic table.

'nuff said!

stoneill

Only saw the second part - looked good!

syklops

I have to say I was bitterly disappointed with this. It sort of forgot what it was meant to be doing after about 10 minutes. It wasn't simply that they ran out of ideas, but it ws that they forgot what their goal was. The original idea was to teach the 21st Century metro-sexual man how to be a Man. Fair enough, but in episode one the only thing they actually showed you how to do was defuse the bomb, they didn't actually show you how to install the trainset, instead just showed other people doing it.

In episode 2 when they built the bar. They didn't show you how to plumb the barrels in, something I would have been interested in seeing, instead they just showed other people building a Bar, and that was it.

The bit where they get celebrities to beat their personal best at doing something is IMO just lame. Getting Alexander Armstrong to do a 5 minute segment with his tips on putting together flat pack furniture could have been fun and interesting, instead it was meant to be funny and witty, but wasn't. It looks to me to be too similar to the 'Star in a reasonably priced car' segment from Top Gear, but just not as fun.

Along with the DIY type stuff, there is an awful lot of fluff. Like the grade one Orchestra stuff which I had no interest in. I watched the episode online and ended up fast forwarding a lot of that.

Navigating the boat using a dog was silly, and instead of giving us an actual crash course in maritime navigation, something which James May could easily do and do well, it just came across as filler..

Episode four I will skim through but I'm not expecting much, and doubt I will bother with 5 and 6. It had a hell of a lot of potential, but sadly didnt deliver.

positron

+1 - I was expecting some real geeky stuff from James May and he thought it would better tv to pretend to mess around and waste everyone's time - bad influence from Clarkson and Hammond I think. Could have been so much better.

syklops

When you compare it with James Mays Top Toys and Toy Stories, you have to wonder has something changed on the production team. I am going to have a look at the credits and see if there are any obvious differences.

I recently watched some of James and Oz's Wine adventure, and that was quite entertaining as well. So why is Man Lab such pants?

Outkast_IRE

I think the name is bad "man lab" reminds me of that other show hammond was hosting "brainiac" , to be honest both are pretty trashy tv