LOVE Island ratings are falling because ‘hot morons in a villa’ may have run its tawdry course. These shows staggered on long after their natural deaths:
Only Fools and Horses (1981-2003)
A sitcom about a chancer’s doomed schemes became a soap opera about finding love, a shift so large and unwarranted it’s like finding out the Fast X sequel focuses on Hobbs battling inoperable bowel cancer.
Love Island (2015-ongoing)
To paraphrase Auden, ‘They thought that tits + arse + bikinis + abs + sunshine = £££ would last forever: they were wrong.’ There’s a limit to how entertaining morons talking shite can be, with only the odd super-dense highlight like ‘How did trees evolve into people?’
Catchphrase (1986-2004 and 2013-ongoing)
Amazingly shit even by low-brow quiz show standards. It staggered on for 18 years, filling some TV liminal space on Saturday afternoon, before a visionary ITV executive thought ‘Why would anyone care about at a picture of a robot with a bird in his hand standing next to a further two birds in a bush?’ and the fatal gunshot rang out. Still on, still dead.
Question Time (1979-ongoing)
Not actually cancelled yet, but with a tiny audience and hated across the political spectrum, it can’t be far off. It’s been going for a staggering 44 years, but for the last five it’s basically been The Brexit and Immigration Show as politicians fearfully give cagey non-answers that won’t upset delicate racists.
Top of the Pops (1964-2006)
TOTP reached the 1970s and evolved no further. By the 1990s you half expected Nicky Campbell to say: ‘That was the Stone Roses with Fools Gold, and next up Mud with Tiger Feet!’ After not updating it in decades the BBC decided it was old-fashioned and cancelled it. Ever since, no-one has a clue who’s in the charts except Sheeran, Styles and Swift.
Last of the Summer Wine (1973-2010)
It’s amazing Roy Clark squeezed two series out of these ageing Northern twats. It was still going 37 f**king years later. The only explanation is that the untaxing, bathtub-related humour provided a respite from modern life, the equivalent of Michael Jackson deciding to unwind with some propofol.
Poirot (1989-2013)
David Suchet’s definitive Belgian detective circled the schedules like a Ringwraith, threatening to make you watch when there was f**k all else on. It was cancelled after 13 series of strip-mining, at which point Hollywood said: ‘Hey! Let’s make them all again, forever!’ Hope you’ve pre-booked your tickets for A Haunting In Venice.
Brookside (1982-2003)
Brookside produced years of plausible small new-build close storylines like murders, cults and bombings, but as the ideas ran out it went insane. A cat died in a drive-by shooting and Brookie closed with the cheerful community lynching of a drug dealer.
