I occasionally watch the BBC2 teatime quiz show “Eggheads” and I partially enjoy it. It gives a good overview of a certain section of society: quiz buffs in the UK.
It rewards useless and obscure information, which I applaud; there’s nothing wrong with someone showing off their knowledge of 19th Century railways in my book. The problem for me with this program is primarily to do with the smugness factor of some of the Eggheads themselves.
Daphne comes across as a sweet, elderly lady but this hides a razor sharp mind, or at least a capacious memory, as well as a determination never to be beaten. I like her, she’s a proper English type you don’t see very often these days….a Miss Marple archetype.
Chris, the ex train driver (as he and the host often remind us) is another English type, the slightly boorish trainspotter/know all. He’s never satisfied with just giving an answer, he also has to give some related but unnecessary extra tit bit of information. I don’t particularly like him but he’s okay. When he’s beaten by a punter I take great pleasure.
Kevin is probably a bank worker or administrator somewhere. He’s very stiff on telly and always seems to me like he’s being interviewed by Jeremy Paxman about sodomy, such is his look of discomfort.
The posh woman I neither like nor dislike, I think her name is Judith.
Now, CJ, where do I begin? I really don’t like him. He rolls his eyes and feigns disbelief when one of his team mates gets a question wrong, even though he is far and away the least knowledgeable of the Eggheads and more often than not gets beaten by a member of the opposing team. He’s good on popular culture and that is about as far as his talents stretch. He’s a modern English type, arrogant, under informed and convinced of his right to a place in the higher echelon of society, in this case, the titans that call themselves “The Eggheads”
