You’ve seen one episode, you’ve seen them all?

[WomanStanleyWoman]

Inspired by the ‘Vera’ thread - what are the shows you can see once, then theoretically never see again without missing anything?

My vote goes to Location Location Location. As much as I love it, the formula is eternally predictable:

‘Steve and Samantha Deluded-Twats are looking for a spacious two-bedroom apartment in west London. They love pricey Chiswick, but only have £300k to spend. They’re hoping that, with our help, they can find an area nearby with an attractive high street with a villagey feel and lots of independent shops and cafés, even though they buy everything off Amazon and get their lunch from Tesco Express like the rest of us. Today, I’ll be showing them a one-bed in need of work opposite a condemned council estate now being used as an unofficial skate park and drug den. I REALLY hope they can see the potential’.

Share your nominations…

Thanks you lot, I can't be arsed to think of one but you've really cracked me up with these 😂

Erroneous quote there.

Don't know how that got in.

I didn't press quote as far as I know.

Changing Rooms. Its fucking tedious

I mean, it finished in 2004 so fairly easy to avoid

Any American (in particular) crime show, like Criminal Minds or CSI. They don’t know how to wrap up a series so they go on and on and on and on.....

Secrets of your supermarket shop;

They use E numbers and shit in your food dressed up as something else
Anything labelled ' natural ' really isn't
They skimp on the fruit content etc
Most things I buy I really shouldn't buy at all.
It's enough to make you cancel your next delivery of food. Almost

The National Television Awards Thing

.....and the winner is ........Ant & Dec. Again. For the twentieth year running. But nobody knows why.

Homes under the hammer - who wants this wreck? Get a skip out the front and paint everything white, stick it up for rent at 1200 PER CALENDAR MONTH.

Star Wars - Stars. Lots of running. Humans and aliens live sometimes side by side, sometimes not but the back story to this has never been explained. Is it set in the past or the future? Who knows! Why do you feel like you've seen this before? Because every film feels like it's exactly the same!

Eastenders.

Yes to Tattoo Fixers.

Victim: I've got this wee little drawing in a barely visible place.
Fixers: We're going to fix this by sending you out with a massive fucking coloured-in limb that's visible from space.

The Real Marigold Hotel, in India, Cuba, Japan etc,

Random group of old people you'd forgotten about and The Krankies go to the charming home of a local person. The room is too small, a darts player bounces on the bed, Jan Leeming helps to make the dinner.

Miriam Margoyles meets old people doing exercises in the local park, a Eurovision entrant from 1978 will go on a date with a local man.

The group become tearful and swear to come back and buy a retirement home there as they have had such a spiritual experience.

They all fly home and will never set foot in that country again.

Ohhh I’m feeling all touchy. I’m a massive East Enders fan

I love Friday Night Dinner but...

Roast chicken with veg followed by crumble, which is never eaten due to some kind of ridiculous event involving their neighbour and his dog and lots of running around.

The boys put salt in each others water.

Dad says 'hello bambinos' followed by 'shit on it'.

Mum calls them 'horrible boys'.

Dad takes his shirt off because it's boiling.

Say Yes to the Dress.

Bride wants loads of beading, enough satin to sink a ship, and lots of crystals, but only has a $2000 budget.

Meanwhile, across the salon...

Bride loves a dress, but when she shows her 'entourage', someone says she looks like an old lady/table cloth/prostitute, sad faces all round.

Plain dress is met with meh reaction, but with the addition of a beaded belt reduces everyone to tears.

Bride is jacked up.

Says yes to dress.

Original bride falls in love with Pnina Tornai dress, but can't afford it. Pnina magically appears from somewhere and says she can do it cheaper. She says yes to the dress.

@BreakfastOfWaffles

I still love it, but Death in Paradise is so comfortably formulaic.

It’s always the person who discovered the “body” They were not actually dead but the discoverer killed them when everyone else went to get help Or some others plot that relies solely on the time of death being wrong due to shenanigans by the murderer.

The X Files.
What is it to be - Monster of
The Week or Scully doesn't believe Mulder saw an alien?

@EmbarrassingAdmissions

You do realise he is just 'Iggle' to his friends? You don't need to be formal.

Iggle is Ignatius.

Iglesias is the Spanish cousin who doesn't accept contractions to his name.

My apologies to both Mr Ignatius 'Iggle' Piggle and Senor Iglesias Piggle.

[quote FlatteredFool]@Youdoyoutoday You obviously haven't paid attention to the lovely lieutenant Columbo as the opening scenes always show the murderer and murdered so we know exactly who did it but the fun is in watching Columbo figure out the exact how and why. There's usually one small thing that tips him off. It's a Sunday afternoon joy to behold. Especially when poorly and lazing on the sofa. I'll always have a place in my crime drama loving heart for Columbo. [/quote]
Me too. I love how he gets really excited by new technology like a reel-to-reel tape recorder, or a fax machine, or a video player.
Sheer wonder in his face when he says, “Will you look at that”.

Only Connect

Two teams of Pub Quiz bores are asked questions by a woman who unfortunately writes her own jokes .

Iglesias Piggle (page 3) still has me laughing now

you’re right about the farm shop, how could I forget that?! It’s either a farm shop or an organic shop where a bottle of shampoo/soap costs what the poor family
would usually spend on a week’s food shop

And the rich family who have only been given £50 for the whole week go do their shopping in the local corner shop where a tin of beans costs £3

@WorriedWishingWell

Every documentary about a rock band that is shown on BBC 4 9pm on a Friday night. Band gets together as young kids from the wrong side of the tracks in the 60's/70's/80's. After an initial struggle to be heard band becomes a huge commercial success. Band members embrace the sex and drugs rock and roll lifestyle fully. At least one band member suffers burnout and wants to quit and become a farmer. Another leaves for "artistic reasons" but really to pursue a solo career. Another has become totally dependent on heroin or alcohol and is hussled off to rehab before the adoring public notice All of them by now have traded in their original girl-next-door wives for ex glamour models. The band falls apart amongst bitterness and recriminations, even though they really "loved each other as brothers once." Several decades later royalty payments are drying up and the band decides to reform. The singer's voice has gone, the drummer has RSI in both wrists, and the bloke on bass who has always resented the lead singer's success with women plots a passive-aggressive revenge. But bolstering their pension and paying maintenance for their by now multiple ex wives is hugely attractive and enough to persuade them to do a tour and release their back catalogue. End of documentary.

So true.

@amillionmenonmars

Border Force Australia.

Despite massive posters and filling in a card in their own language passenger will be stopped for carrying in tea/ cooked chicken/ dried fish/ raw ginger. Passenger will issued with a fine, then get angry/ cry.

Cocky Brit/ American/ Aussie bloke will be found in possession of knuckle dusters/ porn/ laser lights. Will remain cocky until they are all confiscated and he is issued with a fine.

Passenger will deny even knowing the names of any drugs until the swap test shows traces of meth amphetamine/ LSD/ heroin. Passenger will then admit to have been near to people who have used it, and then eventually admit to have used it themselves recently. X rays show drugs hidden in shoe/ base of case.

Yep... and you'll always get told of what might happen, then adverts or cut to something else, then the initial story will be told again but before you find out what's happened, cut to some other incident or the ads, then go over the story again, then cut to another, then the original story evolves where they get fined for bringing in porcupine claws or dried molluscs. Perps are always from the same region of the world , are multiple wrong-doers and so it goes on.

Escape to the Country:

Retired couple want large country house with land, space for entertaining and five bedrooms for £500k, usually on the opposite side of the country from all their family and friends they're expecting to entertain,

In each house they're shown they will say "it's very airy". The wife will do all the talking, the husband will say nothing. She will say what she likes, and what he likes. He might nod. They will walk/squeeze through all the doors side by side while holding hands.

The presenter will engage in some lovely rural activities like weaving, making cider or being a blacksmith for a day.

The couple will not offer on any of the houses, but will say "you've given us lots to think about."

(Not seen: they will go back to their three bed semi in Bromley and remain there, enjoying all their family and friends being nearby and not 200 miles away.)

CSI Miami where they only ever investigated the murder of people who lived in mansions.

Homes under the Hammer

Presenters introducing the programme in the grounds of some stately home while freezing their socks off as the wind blows Martin Roberts' hair around.

Martin looks round 2 bed semi, points out there's damp, it needs underpinning and it has a horrendous 1970s kitchen (while "You'll always find me in the kitchen at parties" plays in the background) but as it's in London two local estate agents advise it could sell for £1.5m/as it's in Stoke on Trent it could sell for £70k (delete as appropriate).

Cut to auction room where purchaser becomes increasingly agitated at some fuckwit driving up the price and ends up paying well over the guide price.

Back to the property where purchaser is shown walking into room, looks round, and walks out again before Martin collars them:
Martin: So the damp and the underpinning didn't put you off?
Purchaser: We didn't read the pack so had no idea there was damp and it needed underpinning...
Martin: What's your budget and how long will it take?
Purchaser: Budget is £5k and some green shield stamps and it'll be done in 4 weeks.

Cut to Dion Dublin doing the same thing in another part of the country.

Cut back to a "recap" of Martin's property which is practically the entire first section of the show repeated again. New property has shiny kitchen, grey carpets and a paved garden. Cue sheepish looking purchaser telling Martin the 4 weeks turned into 6 months and they went substantially over budget. Martin asks two local estate agents what they think and they say the property has been finished to a high standard and could sell for a pre-tax profit of £15. Cut back to property owner trying their best not to look pissed off.

Cut back to Dion another endless recap...

Not sure anyone apart from me watched it but “Rosemary and Thyme” was the same every episode. Two gardeners (Rosemary and Thyme) are landscaping the gardens at a stately home- using only a trowel between them- when murder happens. Police are useless and it’s up to the plucky gardeners to find the killer!

Homes under hammer.
Bargain hunt
House
Would I loe to you
Escape to country
Wanted down under
Repair shop