Imagine a world where all you did was fight with remote control robots. A world that is so brutal that only the strongest will survive and everyone else, well, breaks into little pieces. Imagine no more - that world is this and that time is now. It's time for Robot Wars!
Robot Wars puts 36 robots through their paces in an attempt to become Robot Wars champion. There are 6 heats with 6 robots in each one, the winner going through to the final.
Round 1 is The Gauntlet. It's an assult course with three routes - The Maze (slow but safe), the Ramp (Quicker but more dangerous) or for the really daring, they can try and get past the house robots:
Sargent Bash- The leader with a circular saw and a huge flamethrower.
Dead Metal - A scorpion with two ginormous metal pincers which could crush.
Shunt - A pushing machine with a deadly pick.
Matilda - A dinosaur with a bad temper and a chainsaw tail.
Each robot is allowed one go and ninety seconds to get as far as possible and hopefully to the end of the course. We are given a short interview by the designer about what is so great about their robot mid-game. The robot who does the worst is out. After the loser is announced, there is only a short goodbye from Phillipa Forrester in the pits (and the chances are that JEremy Clarkeson would have said something along the lines of 'Well, thankyou very much for coming here... but now you can go home' in his own inimitable style).
Round 2 is the Trial. Each week there was a different game for this part which is a GOOD THING and should be positively encouraged. Games included a race over a figure of eight course, robot football with Dead Metal in Goal (the last robot to score a goal being out), the Labyrinth (A 5-robot race through a maze defended by the House robots), Robot Snooker, Robot Sumo (each robot tries to stay in a ring as long as possible with Shunt) and Robot British Bulldog. In all cases the Robot who did the worst or the last to finish was out, again picked on mercilessly by Mr Clarkson.
We then go back in the pits to find out who's been drawn against whom in the Semi-finals and the reaction of the various contestants when they find out, followed by the introduction to the fights.
Each robot must attempt to immobilise the opposing robot by any means whatsoever. If any of the robots venture into any of the 'patrol areas', the house robots start beating them up as well just to add to the 'fun'. If after a length of time the robots are still running, three judges make a decision based on style, driving, power and aggression. The winners of the semi-finals go through to the final without much time to patch up damage from the last round to fight it out between them. The winner gets to go to the Big Final at the end of the series where all 6 of the winning robots have one giant scrap until there is only one winner.
Or at least, it should have been.
The final could have been really great, except not much damage seemed to be done and it was stopped after 90 seconds. WHAT! THIS IS THE BLOODY FINAL FOR GOODNESS SAKE!!! It shouldv'e been a fight to the death and it wasn't. The Final also seemed rushed, tacked on to the end of the last heat without much thought going into it seemingly. A big shame, because if it had been any better the show would have been excellent and whilst the show was still entertaining, I felt a bit short changed after following for six weeks. It's an excellent show (even if too many of the one-on-one fights were ended by one robot being pushed onto a grille) which is excellently presented by Jeremy and Phillipa. But the final brings the mark right down. Oh well, maybe series two in the Autumn...
Verdict - 5 - Would have done so much better if it wasn't for the big final (a 7 for goodness sake!)
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Other trials...
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