The cold, hard fact of the matter is the best TV game shows offer precisely zero monetary prizes. No glitzy holidays, no Suzuki Jimneys, no fabulous array of home appliances courtesy of Betta Electronics. In the best game shows, the winner gets an arbitrary prop at most, meaning the main thing on the line is glory and pride. It’s what makes Hard Quiz so good; you’re not getting prize pigs hoping to come on down, you’re getting pure quiz nuts thirsty for competition. And in that grand genre, no show in the annals of Australian TV history was better than Letters & Numbers.
Though it’s been off the air for around 9 years, whispers this morning suggest that the cult favourite SBS maths and spelling show is in-line for a stunning comeback.
Per an exclusive report from industry blog TV Tonight, SBS is reportedly in the process of rebooting the hugely beloved series with a view to shifting it from its erstwhile after school timeslot into the glitz and glamour of weekend primetime.
The report states that the new version of the show will feature Triple J’s own Michael Hing as the host, sitting in the chair made famous by the often imitated/rarely duplicated Richard Moorcroft.
The quiet word is that SBS plans to drop the show into its Saturday evening lineup, hinting at a move away from the five-nights-a-week format the show carried during its original run. With this, and Hing at the helm, the assumption there is that the show could be moving towards something more along the lines of the 8 Out Of 10 Cats Does Countdown crossover format that the show’s UK source has deployed to great effect over the years, with comedians stepping in to take the place of ordinary contestants.
It’s not known at this stage whether the rest of the original cast – including word analyst David Astle and maths wiz/cult icon Lily Serna – will be returning to the new format. Although logic suggests that if Serna doesn’t make an appearance at bare minimum, the show’s rather rabid fan base may riot.
The original Letters & Numbers series ran from 2010 through 2012, producing some 450 episodes. One of which just so happened to feature a young Author Of This Article who a) couldn’t afford a haircut at the time, b) was put in one of the most godawful shirts you’ve ever seen by the SBS wardrobe department, and c) got his ass handed to him by a badminton umpire named “Trevor,” in a moment of public shame I am yet to live down. Fortunately enough you can relive this public self-dunking I bestowed upon myself thanks to the episode – which again I stress is very real – being currently available on SBS On Demand.
SBS has yet to publicly confirm whether or not the reboot is going ahead. But if they are indeed, consider this my public plea to be cast on an episode, if for no other reason to absolve the sin of playing a word with two Es when the board only featured one.
And also just to have an opportunity to absolutely kick the living piss out of Trevor.
Round two, bitch. Ding ding.
