Escape from Scorpion Island

Revision as of 17:02, 3 November 2008

Synopsis

Every year, CBBC makes a high-profile show for that dreaded week in September when its viewers have to go back to school. In 2007, this ratings banker was Escape From Scorpion Island, stripped every night for three weeks.

In the show, ten children were stranded on the mystical Scorpion Island (in reality, a clearing on the coast of Brazil.) The basic plot was that the adventurers would be dropped on the island by helicopter, and eventually ascend the nearby mountain to a waiting helicopter. Between arrival and departure lay three weeks of challenges. Week one split the ten adventurers into Sting and Claw, two teams of five; week two was taken up winning various advantages, and the final week used that assistance to gain time advantages.

"That's had money thrown at it, that has," was our first thought - the first week alone contained fire walking, helicopters and abandoned ships; later programmes had spectacularly large numbers of plastic balls coming down a waterfall, and getting the youngster to ride bicycles across a wobbly bridge. Repeated viewing brought out the flaws in the format - most obviously, it was very slow in places - both an "extra" show on the CBBC channel and a recap programme on BBC2 contained most of the previous show on BBC1. The rules to the competition seemed arbitrary - games would contain traps for the successful, the team line-ups were altered between the second and third weeks for no adequately explored reason, and the time advantage in the final game was one minute in an hour-long challenge. The ascent of Scorpion Mountain simply didn't work that well as a television spectacle, an injury to a player ensured that it was over as a contest before it had begun.

Escape once more

Though the first series had some rough edges, it was clear that this was a show that could be tweaked into something better. A second series was made, this time in association with Australian public broadcaster ABC. Hosts Caroline Flack and Reggie Yates were replaced by JK and Joel, and the shows were reduced in length. Rather than spread 40 minutes of action across 90 minutes of screen-time, the new series spread 45 minutes of action across an hour. Series two re-located to Australia, though continued to use the same computer-generated animated maps as the first run.

Just six adventurers were parachuted in on the opening day, the remaining ten were held in "Limbo", a camp where all the cameras operated without much colour. Thereafter, the days followed a pattern. Some or all of the Limbo contestants were selected to play that day's game. The members of the winning team were then offered as prizes to Sting and Claw, each could select only one player to join them. Sting and Claw's representatives then played the same game, but with an additional level of difficulty - playing giant-sized Kerplunk with their hands tied together, or riding scooters rather than pedal cycles across the wobbly bridge. The winning team won their player from Limbo, and sometimes gained an advantage for later use. In later weeks, the losing team had to return one of their players to the Limbo camp, where there were daily challenges to retain the basics of life.

The plot was actually more simple than it sounded, and regular viewers quickly learned the pace of the game. With less gratuitous messing about with the teams, viewers could pick their favourite competitors, estimate strong and weak players, or just enjoy the spectacular challenges.

In Britain, the series was moved from weekday evenings to hour-long programmes on Sunday mornings - its original slot had been swallowed by The Weakest Link. This series also aired in Australia, neatly cut into 30-minute segments to fit into the Rollercoaster afternoon strand. Viewers down under found out the final result three weeks before their counterparts in the UK.

A third series was also recorded during July and August 2008, again hosted by JK and Joel.

Theme music

Mr Miller and Mr Porter

Web links

BBC Press Office press pack for series 2, 2008

See also

Weaver's Week review

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