Hitman was a quiz programme that was produced by Television South and aired on the ITV network for 1 series in 1989, the programme was hosted by Nick Owen. The program was based on the US version, which aired on NBC in 1983 and was hosted by the late Peter Tomarken
At the start of the show 3 contestants watched a film clip then after the clip they are asked questions about the clip, each correct answer earned the contestant a 'Hitman' the first 2 contestants to light 5 hitmen won through to round 2 while the remaining contestant was eliminated from the show but left with a consolation prize of a bottle of champagne and some caviar.
The 2 remaining contestants then watched another film clip and after the clip ended there were more questions about the clip but this time each contestant had an army of hitmen, 9 for the contestant who got into round 2 first while the other contestant had 8 hitmen, each time a contestant answered a question correctly they eliminated a hitman from the other contestant and it was the first contestant to wipe out the opponent's hitmen who played in the final round for a chance to win £3,000.
In the final round the winning contestant was faced with columns of hitmen but they did not know how many hitmen were in each column as the contestant was facing away from the board, the contestant had 60 seconds to clear 3 columns by answering questions based on the 2 clips that he/she watched during the show and each time they cleared a column they won £1,000 but if they cleared all 3 columns within the time limit they won the £3,000.
In these days of million pound first prizes, it is intriguing to note that £3,000 was, at the time, the absolute maximum allowable as a cash prize win on a TV game show (the limit had just been raised from £2,000. As such the first winner of the £3,000 prize (Paul Grimshaw from Wakefield) briefly held the UK record for the most amount of money ever won on a game show.
Series 1: 15 editions from 21 February 1989 - 30 May 1989