So Channel Seven, in their infinite wisdom, has finally done the right thing by agreeing to air specials on the watershed 2000 Sydney Olympics later this month, in a bid to fill the gargantuan, water polo-tinged void in the schedule that the postponed Tokyo Olympics has left. And that’s all well and good, but no retrospective on the Sydney games will ever be complete, or right, or just, without also giving flowers to the glue that held the entire Games’ broadcast together: The Dream with Roy & HG.
There’s no reason why Channel Seven should re-run The Dream come the end of this month. It’s bafflingly stupid that they haven’t announced this already.
Reports today confirmed that Seven has caved to incessant public demands and will air two collated specials on the Sydney games at the end of the month; one on the instantly iconic Opening Ceremony, and one on the best moments of the Games themselves.
And that’s fine. It’s a little convoluted. Definitely a bit naff. Certainly not anywhere near the demands we here at PEDESTRIAN.TV made for them to re-air the entire main feed from the Games across the entire two-week period. But whatever, it’s better than nothing, and I am fired up for it.
But also, they should bring back The Dream.
There’s no reason not to. What else have they got to put on TV? They were planning for an entire Olympics that isn’t happening anymore. What are you gonna do instead? Dust off the old All Saints tapes? Burn through a half year’s worth of Home & Away episodes in a fortnight? 90-minute prime-time specials of The Chase? Come on.
The Dream is right there. It is the best thing to come out of the 2000 Games except for, maybe, Eric The Eel.
For an entire fortnight we all stayed up bullshit late to watch Roy Slaven and HG Nelson recap and skewer the day’s events. Such was the runaway popularity of the show – a hit that even Channel Seven didn’t see coming – that they influenced the Olympic lexicon. “Battered sav” became an instantly identifiable gymnastics manoeuvre. So the the Crazy Dates (with optional Sparkle and/or Twinkle), the Hello Boys, the Flat Bag, and the quiet art of banging the flute into the floor.
The show even birthed an Olympic mascot: Fatso the Fat-Arsed Wombat became such a cult figure that the Battler’s Prince even managed to upend the “official” mascots Olly, Milly, and Dickhead.
Channel Seven doesn’t even need to put it on in prime time. In fact, it shouldn’t. It should be re-aired as it was originally: in the absolute dead-ass of night, in front of a nation of bleary-eyed lunatics all riled up on trap shooting and straight Aussie Gold.
You can’t tell me that there’s no space on any of Seven’s three digital channels to fit a full Dream re-run in. Who the fuck is watching The Goldbergs at 11pm each night. Fucking nobody, that’s who.
Layup decisions like this don’t come along very often. And if Channel Seven doesn’t leap all over it, that rates as a deadshit call worse than disqualifying Jane Saville near the finish of the 20km walk.
Do the right thing, Seven.
Give us The Dream.
