The new Gardeners' World

Shame on me but I didn't see the first show from the new Gardeners' World so any comments I make would be speculative.

I can though point you in the direction of the Guardian today for an initial reaction from a group of respected bloggers who have given their opinion.

The Garden Monkey and Frankie from Veg Plot gave the programme a seven out of ten whilst VP of Veg Plotting, Martyn of Going to the dogs, Arabella of a Sea of Immeasurable Gravy and Victoria of Victoria's backyard rated the show around the five out of ten mark.

I do intend to watch the programme via the Internet and add my penny worth a little later.

Did you see the programme and what did you think?

Comments

[Jill Foxley]

I saw it and was disappointed too. It came across as being so dumbed down it was like watching 'Blue Peter' at best and 'Playschool' at worst. Not impressed! The ideas and delivery may improve as the run progresses - let's hope so!

[Bigyin]

Shame on you indeed Phil as I sent you a heads up on Skype (busy converting France into an allotment I expect).
It was so memorable I'm struggling to remember much of it.
I thought the idea was to break away from Monty's format, which some people apparently considered elitist, and go with a more realistic feel. Let's face it, you could never run an ongoing series based on the average back garden. So was it more real ? Hardly !! The starting point was a one acre playing field purchased to be converted into a film set for a series about your typical garden ? Nuff said. So what was the bill for the groundworks, and walls etc ?
The bloggers on the Guardian site made much of the shed, most of which was carved up to accomodate windows and doors from a reclamation site. And the cost of this ? None of the bloggers seemed to pick up on the massive, custom built, brick and red cedar greenhouse. I'd hazard a tentative guess that this would come out at a minumum of 10K. So how "typical" are we so far. ?
As to the presenter's personalities and styles well that's a matter of personal taste but the only one that comes accross as fairly genuine is Alys and I can't understand why she hasn't been brought to the front earlier. Probably didn't have an Equity card.
I could go on. They'll never replace Alan (despite his occasional references to the benefits of a wander through the "backwaters" of one's plot and his other "journeys") but I ask myself, has the Beeb been inundated in the past with demands for a change of format ? My (much laboured) motto is, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it. It's hard to see where the new format actually presents any actual improvements.
For what it's worth.

[Philip Voice]

Thanks for your comments Jill and Roger.

Unfortunately. BBC won't let me watch the first episode through IPlayer so I cannot comment.

The feeling generally I have gleaned through reading blog posts is that there has been a luke warm reception for the new format and I agree with Roger and these programmes rarely are in tune with the masses when it comes to costs.

Let's see what the next one brings.