Weakest Link

Weakest Link was a television game show which first appeared in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 14 August 2000 and ended on 31 March 2012 when its host Anne Robinson ended her contract. The original British version of the show still airs around the world on BBC Entertainment.

History

The format was devised by Fintan Coyle and Cathy Dunning, and developed for television by the BBC Entertainment department. It has been licensed across the world, with many countries producing their own series of The Weakest Link. As with the original British version, all of the hosts wear black clothing (or sometimes dark colours with black). Most versions also have disciplinarian female hosts, again similar to the British original (with notable exceptions of Fausto Silva (Brazil), Eamon Dunphy (Ireland), Edu Manzano, Allan K. (both Philippines), Shiro Ito (Japan), Tseng Yang Qing (Taiwan) and George Gray (United States)). Recordings of the show commenced from BBC's Elstree facility, but were switched in 2009 to Glasgow and the BBC Pacific Quay studio centre.

Not all the international versions share the title The Weakest Link. The format is distributed by BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the BBC. Australia was the first country to adapt the BBC show, and versions have also been produced in Argentina, Armenia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Belgium, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Georgia, Germany, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Lebanon, Macedonia, Malaysia, Mexico, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, Norway, Panama, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Singapore, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, Udmurtia and the United States.

In Croatia, in May 2010 the quiz reached its 1008th episode, and with the British original, is the only version to have reached as many episodes.

The Weakest Link franchise is the second most popular international franchise, behind only the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? franchise, which also originated in the United Kingdom.^[1]

Format

The original format features a team of contestants who take turns answering general knowledge questions. The object of each round is to create a chain of consecutive correct answers to earn an increasing amount of money for a communal pot within a specific time limit. The number of "links" in a chain are equal to the number of the contestants at the start of the show. An incorrect answer breaks the chain and loses all the money accumulated up to that point; however, a contestant can say "bank" prior to their question being asked, the accumulated money is stored, and the chain resets to zero.

Money not banked is lost at the end of a round. The round ends if time expires, or if the team successfully banks the maximum amount for the round before time runs out (if the team already has one chain banked and then banks the target in the next chain, the bank is augmented to the target amount). If a host is in the middle of asking a question when time runs out, the question is left uncompleted; however, if the host completes the question when time runs out, whether the contestant is able to answer correctly or not, the host gives the correct answer.

In some versions, as a contestant gets eliminated, they are sometimes interrogated about their job or in reference to a wrong answer the contestant had given in the round; such as "The team has found you guilty and I hereby sentence you to the walk of shame" in reference to a contestant who is a lawyer, or "The team is Hungary for money but you've slipped on Greece" in reference to a contestant who incorrectly answered a question about Europe.

As contestants get eliminated, each round gets shorter (anywhere from 10 to 15 seconds shorter than the previous round), and unlike the first round, where the person whose name is first alphabetically starts (in the United States, it was the person positioned in the leftmost podium), the previous round's strongest link is first to answer a question. If the strongest link was voted off, then the second strongest link starts.

Strategy for banking money

In a New Scientist blog article, Erica Klarreich argues that there are only two sensible strategies in The Weakest Link (the U.S. edition) when it comes to banking money. Either players should choose to bank after every correct answer, or after six straight correct answers to maximize the pot. The correct strategy to take will depend upon the skill at answering questions of the members of the team. For all but the weakest teams, the optimal strategy is to raise the pot six straight times without banking. But since this happens so seldom on the show, Klarreich argues, the dominant strategy will usually be instead to bank after every question. The common practice of banking after just three questions would only outperform the strategy of banking after every question if a team maintained a success rate of over 67%.^[2]

Voting and elimination

At the end of each round, contestants must vote one player out of the game. An announcer reveals to the television audience which player is statistically the strongest link and who statistically is the weakest link. The players themselves, however, are not given this information as they vote (though the host may occasionally reveal this after voting). The votes are revealed one at a time, after which the host customarily interrogates some or all of the contestants about their votes as well as their progress during the round. The player who receives the most votes, regardless of statistical data, is declared the weakest link and is dismissed from the show. (In the event of a tie, the statistical strongest link gets to cast the deciding vote.) The dismissed player leaves the stage in what is called "The Walk of Shame", and a short interview with this contestant is shown before the next round begins.^[3]

Strategy for voting and elimination

The strategy for eliminating players changes as the game progresses: eliminate weak players in the early rounds, but strong players in the final rounds. In the first rounds it makes sense to eliminate bad players since the jackpot grows only when correct answers are given. In later rounds the strategic incentives are flipped. The value of building the jackpot is now outweighed by each contestant's desire to win the jackpot. It's easier to do that if you eliminate the other good players. So, roughly speaking, the typical contestant will vote to eliminate the worse players in the early rounds and the better players in the later rounds. In the British version, the presenter, Anne Robinson, declares "You are the Weakest Link, goodbye!", to the player who has been voted out; this is also used on international versions in the country's native tongues.

The statistical strongest link can be determined by:

• number of correct answers in the round.
• questions answered that are of high values.
• most money banked for the team.

Conversely, the statistical weakest link can be determined by:

• number of incorrect answers in the round.
• questions answered that are of low values.
• least money banked for the team.
• most money lost for the team by answering questions of high values incorrectly.
• time spent/wasted on answering a particular question.

Final two rounds

When only two contestants remain, they work together in one final round, identical to previous rounds except that all money banked at the end of the round is doubled, tripled or quadrupled (depending on the country), and there is no elimination: the game moves to the head-to-head round instead.

For the head-to-head round the remaining two players must each answer five questions (or three as in the United States syndicated version) in a penalty shootout format, with the strongest link from the previous round choosing who goes first. Whoever has the most correct answers at the end of this round wins the game unless there is a tie; in which case the game goes to Sudden Death.

In Sudden Death, each player is asked a question in turn indefinitely, until one gets a question right and the other wrong (in some countries this round is edited down to only one question each for airtime reasons). The winner of the game takes home all the money accumulated in the prize pool; the loser, like all the other eliminated players, goes home with nothing.

International versions

Legend:      Currently airing        No longer airing        Future version  

Country	Name	Host	TV station	Top prize	Premiere	Finale
Arab World	الحلقة الأضعف Elhalka Eladaaf	Rita Khoury	Future Television	US$16,000	2002	2003
Australia	Weakest Link	Cornelia Frances	Seven Network	A$100,000	February 2001	April 2002
Azerbaijan	Zəif Bənd	Kamila Babayeva	Lider TV	AZN9,000 (Formerly AZM 45,000,000)	2004	2006
		Solmaz Süleymanlı			2012	present
Armenia	Amenatyum qnam ayrik	Siranush Mheryan	Arm2 tv	AMD 800	2007	2009
Belgium (Dutch)	De Zwakste Schakel	Goedele Liekens	VTM	2,000,000BEF	2001
Brazil	Ponto Fraco	Fausto Silva	TV Globo	R$1,000,000	2001 (Pilots rejected by BBC)
Chile	El Rival Más Débil	Catalina Pulido	Canal 13	CL$40,000,000	2004
China	汰弱留强·智者为王	Chen Lu Yu	Nanjing TV	CN¥200,000	2002	2004
	智者为王	Shen Bing
		Xia Qing
Czech Republic	Nejslabší! Máte padáka!	Zuzana Slaviková	TV Nova	Kč1,000,000	2002	2004
Croatia	Najslabija karika	Nina Violić	HRT1	kn 90,000	2004	2010
		Daniela Trbović
Denmark	Det Svageste Led	Trine Gregorius	DR1	KR200,000	2001	2002
Estonia	Nõrgim lüli	Tuuli Roosma	Kanal 2	500,000 kr	2004
Finland	Heikoin Lenkki	Kirsi Salo	MTV3	€15,000	2002	2005
				€16,000
				€18,000
France	Le Maillon Faible	Laurence Boccolini	TF1	150,000F	2001	2007
				€20,000
				€50,000
Georgia	სუსტი რგოლი Susti Rgoli	Nino Burduli	Rustavi 2	ლ10,000	2005	2007
Germany	Der Schwächste fliegt!	Sonja Zietlow	RTL Television	DM50,000	19 March 2001	March 2002
				€50,000
Greece	Ο Πιο Αδύναμος Κρίκος O Pio Adynamos Krikos	Elena Akrita	MEGA	₯5,000,000	2001	2003
				€15,000
Hong Kong	一筆OUT消	Carol Cheng	TVB Jade	HK$3,000,000	20 August 2001	18 January 2002
Hungary	A Leggyengébb Láncszem	Krisztina Máté	TV2	3,000,000 Ft	2001	2004
	Nincs Kegyelem			6,000,000 Ft
India	Kamzor Kadii Kaun	Neena Gupta	Star Plus	Rs.2,500,000	2002	2003
Ireland	Weakest Link	Eamon Dunphy	TV3	€10,000	2001	2002
Israel	החוליה החלשה Halulia Hahalasha	Pnina Dvorin	Channel 10	₪100,000	2002	2004
		Hana Laszlo		₪90,000
Italy	Anello Debole	Enrico Papi	Italia 1	€15,000	2001
Japan	ウィーケストリンク☆一人勝ちの法則	Shiro Ito	Fuji Television	JP¥16,000,000	2002
Macedonia	Најслаба алка Najslaba Alka	Zivkica Gjurcinovska	Alfa TV	420,000 MKD	2010	2011
Malaysia	Weakest Link	Sekilara Kiramila	RTM	RM80,000	200?	2009
Mexico	El Rival Más Debil	Montserrat Ontiveros	Azteca Trece	MX$200,000	2003	2008
		Lolita Cortés			27 July 2013	7 September 2013
Moldova	Veriga Slaba	Andrei Gheorghe	Kanal 1	10,000,000 MDL	200?	2009
Netherlands	De Zwakste Schakel	Chazia Mourali	RTL 4	€10,000	2001	2004
New Zealand	The Weakest Link	Louise Wallace	TV One	NZ$20,000	July 2001	March 2002
Norway	Det Svakeste Ledd	Anne Grosvold	NRK	KR200,000	2004
Philippines	Weakest Link	Edu Manzano	IBC	PHP1,000,000	2001	2002
		Allan K.
Poland	Najsłabsze Ogniwo	Kazimiera Szczuka	TVN	27,000 zł	2004	2006
Portugal	O Elo Mais Fraco	Julia Pinheiro	RTP1	€10,000	2002	2003
		Luisa Castel-Branco
		Pedro Granger			2011	2012
Romania	Lanţul Slăbiciunilor	Andrei Gheorghe	Pro TV	lei50,000	2001
Russia	Слабое Звено	Mariya Kiselyova	ORT	RUB300,000 RUB400,000 RUB350,000 RUB1,000,000(celebrity editions)	2001	2005
		Nikolai Fomenko	Channel 5	RUB350,000	2007	2008
Serbia	Najslabija Karika	Sandra Lalatovic	BKTV	RSD5,000,000	2002
Singapore	智者生存	Cui Lixin	MediaCorp TV Channel 8	S$100,000	2002	2003
	Weakest Link	Asha Gill	MediaCorp TV Channel 5	S$1,000,000
Slovenia	Najšibkejši Člen	Violeta Tomič	SLO 1	2,400,000 SIT (€10,000)	2003	2005
South Africa	Weakest Link	Fiona Coyne	SABC3	R50,000	2003	2008
				R100,000
Spain	El Rival Más Débil	Nuria González	TVE1	€7,200	2002	2004
		Karmele Aranburu	TVE2
Sweden	Svagaste Länken	Kajsa Ingemarsson	TV4	100,000 kr	2011	2013
Taiwan	Weakest Link 智者生存	Belle Yu	STAR Chinese Channel	NT$400,000	2001	2003
		Tseng Yang Qing
Thailand	Weakest Link กำจัดจุดอ่อน	Krittika Kongsompong	ThaiTV 3	฿1,000,000	2002	2003
Turkey	En Zayıf Halka	Hülya Uğur Tanrıöver	Show TV	TL100 billion	2001	2002
		TBA	Kanal D	TBA	2014
United Kingdom	The Weakest Link	Anne Robinson	BBC	£10,000 (Daytime)	14 August 2000	31 March 2012
				£50,000 (Primetime)
United States	Weakest Link	Anne Robinson	NBC	US$1,000,000	2001	2002
		George Gray	Syndicated	US$75,000	2002	2003
				US$100,000

In popular culture

Anne Robinson's catchphrase "You are the weakest link. Goodbye!" has made several appearances in pop culture, including a reference from Family Guy, Scary Movie 2 and The League of Gentlemen. In the first season of the 2005 revival of Doctor Who, character Rose Tyler appears on a futuristic version of The Weakest Link, hosted by an "Anne droid" voiced by Anne Robinson, where eliminated contestants were supposedly disintegrated. The "Anne droid" began a special Doctor Who themed version of the real show, with actors from the series playing for charity; the real Anne Robinson, however, unplugged her droid counterpart and continued the show herself.

References

External links

• Official website
• UK Gameshows Page: The Weakest Link