Gunge
Encyclopedia
Gunge as it is known in the British Isles
, or slime as it is known in America
and other parts of the world is a thick, gooey, runny substance similar in consistency to paint. It has been a feature on many children's programmes for many years around the world and has made appearances in game shows as well as other programming. While gunge mostly appears on television, it can also be used as a fundraising tool for charities, youth and religious groups. Gunge tanks have appeared at nightclubs and Fun Days. The British charities Comic Relief
and Children in Need
, supported by the BBC
, have used gunge for fundraising in the past. In most countries, being gunged is seen as a forfeit with the aim to cause embarrassment. In contrast, being slimed in America can be a good thing as well as a bad thing. Overall the main point of being gunged or slimed is to cause mess.
the popular BBC show Not Only... But Also
featured a closing sketch called "Poet's Corner" in which that week's guest would be challenged to an improvisational poetry contest against Peter Cook, with Dudley Moore acting as referee. Each contestant would sit at the corner of a square tank of "BBC Gunge" on a rigged seat that could be triggered so as to catapult the occupant into the tank. The referee would sit at one of the other corners in a similar chair. Any use of repetition, hesitation or deviation from the challenge theme would precipitate the offender into the tank. The sketch always ended with all three personalities in the tank, chest deep in slime and reciting poetry.
used the concept of gunge in abundance. Having already established messy slapstick humour through custard pie
s and buckets of water being thrown over presenters and guests, Tiswas had taken to locking up adult volunteers into a cage. Once inside the cage, the inhabitants would normally be soaked with buckets of water at random points in the show. Where gunge became involved, was thanks to the tin bath perched on top the Cage. Through a handle, this tub could be tilted, dropping its messy contents onto the people below, While famous for its custard pie humour, it would not be unusual for Tiswas to have buckets of food and imitation mud/horse manure poured over people. Custard and baked beans
were popular choices.
, a Canadian
children's show popular on Nickelodeon
, routinely subjected its characters to gunge when they said, "I don't know.", or any other phrase related to slime, the colour, or pies. It became a staple of the show where other actors would try and encourage their peers to say a phrase to get them "slimed". This aspect of the cult show later became iconized in Nickelodeon's slime logo, and live events where kids would be offered the chance to get "slimed" or publicly humiliated.
In Britain
and Europe, in the early 1980s, children's gunge-based game shows were the norm. Particularly shows like How Dare You!
on ITV and Crackerjack on the BBC ensured that the gunging element featured on shows for the decade to come. On How Dare You!, one of the main games was 'Teach Them a Lesson', where children got the opportunity to drench their teacher or representative from their school in gunge while sitting above a knee deep filled gunge tank. After this game the teachers were sometimes knocked off their perch by one of show's presenters and into the gunge tank. On Crackerjack, the two weekly celebrities would compete against host Stu Francis
in a gunge based gamed called "Take A Chance" to try to win points for their child contestant. Usually the ladies (not always) got away with it but the male contestants were always gunged along with Francis who would cop it at least once per show.
Later in the 1980s, the BBC launched Double Dare, based on the US style format, but much sloppier than its U.S. counterpart. Also, gunge started to appear on mainstream shows such as Game for a Laugh
on ITV and Noel Edmond's Saturday Roadshow on the BBC.
Other countries in Europe also started to have gunge elements on mainstream shows. Un Dos Tres on TVE in Spain
often had contestants throwing buckets of gunge at each other. Also, Donnerlippchen, a television show in Germany
, had many messy games; the climax of the show was dunking the team's suited boss in a dunk tank and pouring custard down inside every team members pair of boxer shorts.
New Zealand children's show What Now
has used gunge over the years since its launch in 1981. As of 2010 the show is still broadcasting on channel TV2. Various segments of the show using gunge include, tank of terror, gunge on the run, flushed away, frog in the bog and brain freeze.
, the public often voted to determine which celebrities on the television show would be gunged in the Gunge Tank. In later years, the Gunge Tank became the Gunge Train, and celebrities were forced to take a ride on the train and were covered in gunge throughout their journey. Celebrities usually returned with their suits ruined and faces unrecognizable. Sometimes audience members were gunged on the show for reasons of revenge
by family members or friends.
The entertainment factor attached to the process of gunging was realised by the producers of the charity event Comic Relief, who held an event, in cooperation with the Guinness World Records
at the National Exhibition Centre
, Birmingham
where an attempt to set a record for the Most People Gunged Simultaneously took place on March 12, 1999. 184 gallon
s of gunge was splattered over 731 people.
All across Europe television producers were ordering more gunge segments to be fitted into mainstream television shows due to its popularity with viewers. In Germany, on Sat.1
, Halli galli, Glücksritter (RTL)
, Glücksspirale, plus the German version of NHP - Gottschalk's
Haus-Party, all involved a high dose of gunge. Halli Galli had audience members plucked out of their seats and sent down a messy gunge slide and into a pool. Likewise, Glücksspirale and Glücksritter had contestants plucked out of the audience and gunged in the most spectacular ways.
Towards the end of the 1990s, with the demise of Noel's House Party and the dwindling audience figures for other European shows, the gunge segment in many mainstream shows started to fade.
Throughout the 1990s, gunge became a focal feature in many children's television shows. Teenagers and celebrity guests are often seen competing in quizzes on Live & Kicking
, and are gunged if they lose. Celebrities Lee Ryan
, Ben Adams
, Katy Hill
, Lesley Waters
, Katherine Merry, Heather Suttie
and Victoria Hawkins
were gunged on this show. Many other shows used gunge throughout - Fun House, Get Your Own Back
, Run the Risk
and Double Dare.
From 1996 to 2001, The Dutch television show Droomshow featured gunge.
sometimes featured a gunge tank on his Channel 4
shows. The ITV
reality television series I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here! which ran throughout much of this decade regularly contained gungey elements in its "Bushtucker Trials". The Graham Norton Show featured Sploshing when the show was on BBC TWO
. Gunge featured on other shows on an irregular basis, but despite the loss of mainstream appeal gunge continued to feature on children's Television.
In 2000 a BBC
children's game show called Insides Out featured gunge throughout the programme, most notably pulling items out of a gunge filled nose and a tug of war involving intestine-like ropes over a pit of gunge. The final game, which consisted of an inflatable assault course representing the digestive system, during which gunge would drop at unexpected points while the contestants were going back and forth to pick up body pieces. The most regularly watched show containing a gunging was the Saturday Show
, in which a child and an adult, normally Simon Grant
, would compete. If the grownup lost they got gunged and they would remain in the gunge tank the following week, while the child took home prizes, however if the child lost they got gunged instead and took home with them a certificate stating "I Got GUNGED On The Saturday Show".
Other kids' programmes such as Xchange
, Best of Friends and Diggin it also featured gunge or messy activities from time to time. Dick and Dom in the Bungalow and Holly & Stephen's Saturday Showdown
(previously Ministry of Mayhem) featured messy segments throughout the programmes, and a while ago Toonattik featured a gunge quiz known as "make em squirm". In 2006, S4C introduced a kids' show called Waaa!!!
where kids are sat on a chair that moved along rails over tanks of gunge and foam and failing to answer a question correctly resulted in then being dropped into the gunge or foam. In 2007 there was a programme on CITV
called Scratch and Sniffs den of doom featuring gunge, where children fall in to a vat of gunge similar to the Gunk Dunk on Get Your Own Back
. Gunged has also appeared on Prank Patrol and Globo Loco. Throughout the second season of the CBBC
show Hider in the House
, in order to claim prizes, the adult who had been tricked in that episode must have gunge dumped on them. This was known as Push the Pedal.
New Zealand children's show What Now
has retained a gunging element over the years. Modern day games involving gunge involves "Flushed Away" and "brain freeze" where two children sit under a giant gunged filled brain and every time a child gets a question wrong they are gunged. Recently there has been "Frog In The Bog" where a child wearing a wetsuit and flippers enters a pool of gunge with a frog spewing out gunge in to the pool. while in the pool the child has to collect items in the pool while being timed and deposit them into a nearby bucket. The idea is to collect as many items as possible before the time is up. "Brain Freeze" succeeded "Frog in the Bog" where two children sit under a giant brain and are paired up with a caller answering questions - for each wrong answer a child under the brain is gunged. The Tank of Terror was a big cylindrical tank, see through, and like a bath, it was quite big, and it would fill up with gunge, to about the chest of the person, who was seated.
The 2008 remake of Swap Shop
(Basil's Swap Shop
) features gungey games. "Question Line", a game where children ask the celebrity guest questions and if the celebrity chooses to answer it the child does not get gunged. If however, the celebrity chooses not to answer the question the child asking the question slides in to the gunge tank (a pool of gunge similar to the one on Waaa!!!). The children move as they are sitting in or lying across a rubber ring on a ramp with their legs hanging out on the "gungeulator" a red and white travelator. If the child does slide into the gunge tank then they have to move over and sit in the gunge tank until the game is over. Another game called Dunk Beds, is where there are 3 teams of 2 children, 1 is on a bed attached to a platform and the other child is off the bed. The child off the bed pushes the bed off along the platform, where along the platform are scoring zones. Up to a point, the points are negative then past a certain point, the points become positive until finally off the scale. If the bed goes off the scale the child on the end of the bed slides into a tank of green coloured water. 0 points are awarded if the child gets dunked. Each child from each team is on the bed once during the duration of the game. In the final Game, the final two children, left over from the previous game, play on a moving platform called the gungeulator collecting objects, avoiding obstacles, to get them back to the start of the "gungeulator". If a child falls then he or she is automatically gunged and the child that is left continues the game. However, if the child left wins then prizes are awarded to both the children but if both children are gunged the game is over and no prized are awarded. These gungey games meant the return of gunge to Saturday morning children's television in the UK. In the second series, broadcast early 2009, The "question line" and "gungeulator" segments no longer featured. The "Gunge Gallery" along with a tweaked "dunk beds" featured instead. The "Gunge Gallery" is five gunge tanks in a row in which children (members of a karate club, football team, etc.) sit in and after a swap has been completed a child is gunged. The gunge used was either very watered-down gunge or custard.
The end of August 2009 saw a new gungey gameshow on CBBC
on BBC One
. Wait for it..! sees four children trying to avoid being dropped in to the goo portal, a large orange pool of gunge. The idea is similar to ITV's Scratch and Sniffs Den of Doom. The twist is that the longer the children take to answer the questions, the more points are awarded. The person with the least number of points in the first round, "wait" is dropped from a "drop zone" into the goo portal. The second round, "watch and wait" sees the children the player is given a category and the player has to estimate many seconds of clue is needed to be said to be able to answer. Again, the more time, the more points will be won. If the player loses, another player can win the points if they can work out the answer with more of the clue being said. Another player falls into the goo portal via their drop zone if they have the least points. The third round, "wait and see" a head to head round and the player has to guess when the oppolment will come in with their answer. The player has a selection of times to choose from and a point is rewarded is the oppolment answers within the predicted time. Again the player with the least points enters the goo portal via their drop zone. The final round, "wait a minute" sees the remaining contestant try to win prizes on offer by trying to cross the goo portal in less than a minute. The player is asked questions which are descriptions of an object and for each correct answer the player is able to step across smaller drop zones. If the player makes it to the end within the 60 seconds, he/she wins the prizes (a star prize is awarded if the player crosses within 40 seconds) — if not the player falls into the goo portal when the platform which the player is standing on collapses.
During Autumn 2009, three new CBBC
shows called Planet Ajay, Keep Your Enemies Close and School of Silence launched with gungey segments. Playet Ajay has two gungey segments. The first being called "Under Pressure", where three kids sit under a gunge tank and they are "curried" in order to relieve the planet's pressure winning prizes in the order in which they were gunged. The second game called "Beat Badjay" is where a child goes head to head with Badjay over a dunk tank of gunge, answering general knowledge questions, If the child has the lowest score he/she is dunked in the gunge, or if Badjay has the lowest score he is gunged. In Keep Your Enemies close, the final round sees two groups of two children in mining carts playing along a track. Here questions are asked — a letter on the giant board and a category and the child must give two answers beginning with the letter for the question. The team the furthest along the track before it merges into a single track is the losers and the winning team pulls a lever sending the losing teams cart through the "clag barrier". There is an overhead machine with three pipes filled with gunge or "clag", as the teams cart moves along the track the clag is released from each of the pipes as the cart passes under them. Finally, School of Silence features messy games some involving gunge. There was no gunge tank, instead challenges such as gunge boot, where a child had to stick his/her foot into a Wellington boot of gunge.
returned minus the gunge gallery but introducing a new game with a western theme called Gold Rush. In this game, the two winning teams from the previous game (dunk beds) take part in the game set in a mine shaft where the aim is to fill up tubes with liquid sludge by tipping buckets with the slop into the tubes which are hidden (so the children do not know who is winning). At the end the four kids take cover in the now shuddering mine shaft. The winning team then receives gold (yellow gunge) while the losing team were initially covered in brown sludge however later episodes they remain dry. In New Zealand
kids television, What Now
introduced a new gungey game the big breakfast and Splat Cave
Autumn 2010 saw Fe Fi Fo Yum, a show about giants launch on CBBC, a round challenge saw two children go barefoot into a bowl of gunge (Similar to TMI) to collect objects for their team mates such as letters/numbers or other items. The final game also makes use of the gunge bowl, where the last part involves wading in the pool and up a ramp in order to release their captive team mates. A second series was launched in May 2011. In addition, the spin-off from Horrible Histories
, Horrible Histories: Gory Games
involved a physical challenge involving gunge. The three children in the quiz running barefoot across an inflatable collecting "poo" and depositing it in their tanks at the other end. Above the inflatable are three containers - one for each lane of the inflatable, storing gunge which is released at points in the game.
British Isles
The British Isles are a group of islands off the northwest coast of continental Europe that include the islands of Great Britain and Ireland and over six thousand smaller isles. There are two sovereign states located on the islands: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and...
, or slime as it is known in America
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and other parts of the world is a thick, gooey, runny substance similar in consistency to paint. It has been a feature on many children's programmes for many years around the world and has made appearances in game shows as well as other programming. While gunge mostly appears on television, it can also be used as a fundraising tool for charities, youth and religious groups. Gunge tanks have appeared at nightclubs and Fun Days. The British charities Comic Relief
Comic Relief
Comic Relief is an operating British charity, founded in 1985 by the comedy scriptwriter Richard Curtis and comedian Lenny Henry in response to famine in Ethiopia. The highlight of Comic Relief's appeal is Red Nose Day, a biennial telethon held in March, alternating with sister project Sport Relief...
and Children in Need
Children in Need
Children in Need is an annual British charity appeal organised by the BBC. Since 1980 it has raised over £500 million. The highlight of the Children in Need appeal is an annual telethon, held in November. A teddy bear named "Pudsey Bear" fronts the campaign, while Terry Wogan is a long...
, supported by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
, have used gunge for fundraising in the past. In most countries, being gunged is seen as a forfeit with the aim to cause embarrassment. In contrast, being slimed in America can be a good thing as well as a bad thing. Overall the main point of being gunged or slimed is to cause mess.
Composition
The gunge which is widely used on television is an industrial powder thickener called Natrosol. In the UK the two main suppliers of gunge are Gungefactory and Fundraising Supplies. Alternatively, other items can be used for "gunge", for example eggs, sauces, as well as other messy items, but Natrasol remains the official ingredient of gunge. In most cases, the gunging occurs in a gunge tank, a transparent booth with a means for storing and releasing the gunge. Today gunge or slime features on many television shows around the world; however, since the 2000s the focus has changed from mainstream shows to children's and teenager's television programmes. In addition to be used on television and as a fundraiser, nightclubs sometimes feature a gunge tank. Youth groups such as church groups and scouting movements also make use of gunge to "gunge the leaders" as well as the children. Due to Natrasol having industrial uses as a food thickener, this makes gunge safe to eat, provided the colouring is also non-toxic.The 1960s
In BritainUnited Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
the popular BBC show Not Only... But Also
Not Only... But Also
Not Only... But Also was a popular 1960s BBC British television series starring Peter Cook and Dudley Moore.-History:The show was originally intended as a solo project for Moore, called Not Only Dudley Moore, But Also His Guests...
featured a closing sketch called "Poet's Corner" in which that week's guest would be challenged to an improvisational poetry contest against Peter Cook, with Dudley Moore acting as referee. Each contestant would sit at the corner of a square tank of "BBC Gunge" on a rigged seat that could be triggered so as to catapult the occupant into the tank. The referee would sit at one of the other corners in a similar chair. Any use of repetition, hesitation or deviation from the challenge theme would precipitate the offender into the tank. The sketch always ended with all three personalities in the tank, chest deep in slime and reciting poetry.
1970–1979
The UK Saturday morning children's show TiswasTiswas
Tiswas was a Saturday morning children's British television series which ran from 5 January 1974 to 3 April 1982 and was produced for the ITV network by ATV Network Limited....
used the concept of gunge in abundance. Having already established messy slapstick humour through custard pie
Custard pie
A custard pie is any type of uncooked custard mixture added to an uncooked or partially cooked crust and baked together. In North America, custard pie commonly refers to a plain mixture of milk, eggs, sugar, salt, vanilla extract and sometimes nutmeg combined with a pie crust...
s and buckets of water being thrown over presenters and guests, Tiswas had taken to locking up adult volunteers into a cage. Once inside the cage, the inhabitants would normally be soaked with buckets of water at random points in the show. Where gunge became involved, was thanks to the tin bath perched on top the Cage. Through a handle, this tub could be tilted, dropping its messy contents onto the people below, While famous for its custard pie humour, it would not be unusual for Tiswas to have buckets of food and imitation mud/horse manure poured over people. Custard and baked beans
Baked beans
Baked beans is a dish containing beans, sometimes baked but, despite the name, usually stewed, in a sauce. Most commercial canned baked beans are made from haricot beans, also known as navy beans – a variety of Phaseolus vulgaris – in a sauce. In Ireland and the United Kingdom, a tomato...
were popular choices.
1980–1989
In North America, You Can't Do That on TelevisionYou Can't Do That on Television
You Can't Do That on Television is a Canadian television program that first aired locally in 1979 before ultimately airing internationally in 1981...
, a Canadian
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
children's show popular on Nickelodeon
Nickelodeon (TV channel)
Nickelodeon, often simply called Nick and originally named Pinwheel, is an American children's channel owned by MTV Networks, a subsidiary of Viacom International. The channel is primarily aimed at children ages 7–17, with the exception of their weekday morning program block aimed at preschoolers...
, routinely subjected its characters to gunge when they said, "I don't know.", or any other phrase related to slime, the colour, or pies. It became a staple of the show where other actors would try and encourage their peers to say a phrase to get them "slimed". This aspect of the cult show later became iconized in Nickelodeon's slime logo, and live events where kids would be offered the chance to get "slimed" or publicly humiliated.
In Britain
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
and Europe, in the early 1980s, children's gunge-based game shows were the norm. Particularly shows like How Dare You!
How Dare You (TV series)
How Dare You! was a children's sketch/game show series that was produced by Tyne Tees Television and aired on ITV from 1984 until 1987.The theme tune was a variant on the hit song Stay Out Of My Life by the group 5 Star.-Series guide:...
on ITV and Crackerjack on the BBC ensured that the gunging element featured on shows for the decade to come. On How Dare You!, one of the main games was 'Teach Them a Lesson', where children got the opportunity to drench their teacher or representative from their school in gunge while sitting above a knee deep filled gunge tank. After this game the teachers were sometimes knocked off their perch by one of show's presenters and into the gunge tank. On Crackerjack, the two weekly celebrities would compete against host Stu Francis
Stu Francis
Stu Francis is a British comedian with a camp style of delivery who achieved celebrity as lead presenter on the children's television programme Crackerjack , on which his catchphrase was "Ooh! I could crush a grape". His principal "co host" was Basil Brush...
in a gunge based gamed called "Take A Chance" to try to win points for their child contestant. Usually the ladies (not always) got away with it but the male contestants were always gunged along with Francis who would cop it at least once per show.
Later in the 1980s, the BBC launched Double Dare, based on the US style format, but much sloppier than its U.S. counterpart. Also, gunge started to appear on mainstream shows such as Game for a Laugh
Game for a Laugh
Game For A Laugh was a popular British TV light entertainment show which ran for 56 editions and 4 specials between 26 September 1981 and 23 November 1985, made by London Weekend Television for the ITV network.- Origins :...
on ITV and Noel Edmond's Saturday Roadshow on the BBC.
Other countries in Europe also started to have gunge elements on mainstream shows. Un Dos Tres on TVE in Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
often had contestants throwing buckets of gunge at each other. Also, Donnerlippchen, a television show in Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, had many messy games; the climax of the show was dunking the team's suited boss in a dunk tank and pouring custard down inside every team members pair of boxer shorts.
New Zealand children's show What Now
What Now
What Now is a long running New Zealand children's television program that premiered in 1981. It is filmed before a live studio audience at Whitebait Productions in Christchurch....
has used gunge over the years since its launch in 1981. As of 2010 the show is still broadcasting on channel TV2. Various segments of the show using gunge include, tank of terror, gunge on the run, flushed away, frog in the bog and brain freeze.
1990–1999
In Noel's House PartyNoel's House Party
Noel's House Party was a BBC television light entertainment show hosted by Noel Edmonds that was broadcast live on Saturday evenings throughout the 1990s. It was set in a large house in the fictional village of Crinkley Bottom, leading to much innuendo. The show was broadcast during the...
, the public often voted to determine which celebrities on the television show would be gunged in the Gunge Tank. In later years, the Gunge Tank became the Gunge Train, and celebrities were forced to take a ride on the train and were covered in gunge throughout their journey. Celebrities usually returned with their suits ruined and faces unrecognizable. Sometimes audience members were gunged on the show for reasons of revenge
Revenge
Revenge is a harmful action against a person or group in response to a grievance, be it real or perceived. It is also called payback, retribution, retaliation or vengeance; it may be characterized, justly or unjustly, as a form of justice.-Function in society:Some societies believe that the...
by family members or friends.
The entertainment factor attached to the process of gunging was realised by the producers of the charity event Comic Relief, who held an event, in cooperation with the Guinness World Records
Guinness World Records
Guinness World Records, known until 2000 as The Guinness Book of Records , is a reference book published annually, containing a collection of world records, both human achievements and the extremes of the natural world...
at the National Exhibition Centre
National Exhibition Centre
The National Exhibition Centre is an exhibition centre in Birmingham, England. It is near junction 6 of the M42 motorway, and is adjacent to Birmingham International Airport and Birmingham International railway station. It has 20 interconnected halls, set in grounds of 628 acres making it the...
, Birmingham
Birmingham
Birmingham is a city and metropolitan borough in the West Midlands of England. It is the most populous British city outside the capital London, with a population of 1,036,900 , and lies at the heart of the West Midlands conurbation, the second most populous urban area in the United Kingdom with a...
where an attempt to set a record for the Most People Gunged Simultaneously took place on March 12, 1999. 184 gallon
Gallon
The gallon is a measure of volume. Historically it has had many different definitions, but there are three definitions in current use: the imperial gallon which is used in the United Kingdom and semi-officially within Canada, the United States liquid gallon and the lesser used United States dry...
s of gunge was splattered over 731 people.
All across Europe television producers were ordering more gunge segments to be fitted into mainstream television shows due to its popularity with viewers. In Germany, on Sat.1
Sat.1
Sat.1 is a privately owned German television broadcasting station. Sat.1 was the first privately owned television broadcasting station in Germany, having started one day before RTL Television....
, Halli galli, Glücksritter (RTL)
RTL Television
Rtl.de' redirects here. For other uses, see RTL.RTL Television , or simply RTL, is a German commercial television station distributed via cable and satellite along with DVB-T , in larger population centres...
, Glücksspirale, plus the German version of NHP - Gottschalk's
Thomas Gottschalk
Thomas Johannes Gottschalk is a German TV host. He is best-known for hosting the popular show Wetten, dass..?, which he has led to a huge success in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and South Tyrol.-Early life:...
Haus-Party, all involved a high dose of gunge. Halli Galli had audience members plucked out of their seats and sent down a messy gunge slide and into a pool. Likewise, Glücksspirale and Glücksritter had contestants plucked out of the audience and gunged in the most spectacular ways.
Towards the end of the 1990s, with the demise of Noel's House Party and the dwindling audience figures for other European shows, the gunge segment in many mainstream shows started to fade.
Throughout the 1990s, gunge became a focal feature in many children's television shows. Teenagers and celebrity guests are often seen competing in quizzes on Live & Kicking
Live & Kicking
Live & Kicking was a BBC Saturday morning children's magazine programme, running from 1993 to 2001. The fourth in a succession of Saturday morning shows, it was the replacement for Going Live!, and took many of its features from it, such as phone-ins, games, comedy, competitions and the showing of...
, and are gunged if they lose. Celebrities Lee Ryan
Lee Ryan
Lee Ryan is an English singer-songwriter, actor and member of the British boy band Blue.-Early life:...
, Ben Adams
Ben Adams
Ben Adams is an English singer-songwriter, best known as a member of the boy band, a1.-Early life:...
, Katy Hill
Katy Hill
Katy Hill is an English television presenter, who worked on the BBC children's magazine programme Blue Peter for five years.-Biography:...
, Lesley Waters
Lesley Waters
Lesley Waters is an English celebrity chef. She regularly appears on such cookery programmes as Ready Steady Cook, and is currently one of the featured chefs on This Morning....
, Katherine Merry, Heather Suttie
Heather Suttie
Heather Suttie is a Glasgow-based presenter.In the 1990s she presented BBC Children's Saturday morning show Live & Kicking, children's science programme Hyperlinks, ITV2's youth entertainment show Bedrock and appeared on Channel 4's' 'MovieWatch'....
and Victoria Hawkins
Victoria Hawkins
Victoria Hawkins Born 24 September 1983 is an English actress. She played the role of Sharon Lambert on ITV soap opera Emmerdale....
were gunged on this show. Many other shows used gunge throughout - Fun House, Get Your Own Back
Get Your Own Back
Get Your Own Back is a British children's game show, which ran from 26 September 1991 to 31 March 2003. It has been presented throughout by Dave Benson Phillips with the addition of Lisa Brockwell as a co-host from 2001 to the programme's end in 2003....
, Run the Risk
Run the Risk
Run the Risk was a BBC1 children's show, which aired from the latter half of 1992 until the beginning of 1998. It was aired on Saturday mornings during Going Live, and later Live & Kicking, and was later repeated as its own individual show. It was presented by Peter Simon for the entire run...
and Double Dare.
From 1996 to 2001, The Dutch television show Droomshow featured gunge.
2000–2009
In mainstream television programmes during the noughties, gunge started to be featured less frequently. The Paul O'Grady ShowThe Paul O'Grady Show
The Paul O'Grady Show was a BAFTA award-winning British comedy chat show hosted by Birkenhead-born comedian Paul O'Grady. The format was originally devised by Granada Television and was broadcast on ITV before moving to Channel 4...
sometimes featured a gunge tank on his Channel 4
Channel 4
Channel 4 is a British public-service television broadcaster which began working on 2 November 1982. Although largely commercially self-funded, it is ultimately publicly owned; originally a subsidiary of the Independent Broadcasting Authority , the station is now owned and operated by the Channel...
shows. The ITV
ITV
ITV is the major commercial public service TV network in the United Kingdom. Launched in 1955 under the auspices of the Independent Television Authority to provide competition to the BBC, it is also the oldest commercial network in the UK...
reality television series I'm a Celebrity...Get Me Out of Here! which ran throughout much of this decade regularly contained gungey elements in its "Bushtucker Trials". The Graham Norton Show featured Sploshing when the show was on BBC TWO
BBC Two
BBC Two is the second television channel operated by the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It covers a wide range of subject matter, but tending towards more 'highbrow' programmes than the more mainstream and popular BBC One. Like the BBC's other domestic TV and radio...
. Gunge featured on other shows on an irregular basis, but despite the loss of mainstream appeal gunge continued to feature on children's Television.
In 2000 a BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
children's game show called Insides Out featured gunge throughout the programme, most notably pulling items out of a gunge filled nose and a tug of war involving intestine-like ropes over a pit of gunge. The final game, which consisted of an inflatable assault course representing the digestive system, during which gunge would drop at unexpected points while the contestants were going back and forth to pick up body pieces. The most regularly watched show containing a gunging was the Saturday Show
The Saturday Show (BBC TV series)
The Saturday Show was a BBC children's Saturday morning show that first aired in 2001, replacing the popular Live & Kicking. It had a mix of audience participation, cartoons, games and gunge. Initially it was presented by Dani Behr and Joe Mace. They left in 2002 and were replaced by Fearne Cotton...
, in which a child and an adult, normally Simon Grant
Simon Grant
Simon Grant in Falmouth, Cornwall is a British television presenter and actor.-Biography:Before becoming a CBBC presenter, he studied acting at Middlesex University....
, would compete. If the grownup lost they got gunged and they would remain in the gunge tank the following week, while the child took home prizes, however if the child lost they got gunged instead and took home with them a certificate stating "I Got GUNGED On The Saturday Show".
Other kids' programmes such as Xchange
Xchange (TV series)
Xchange was a factual entertainment BBC television programme for children. It was broadcast initially on BBC Two and later the CBBC Channel. The programme was transmitted live from studio TC2 at BBC Television Centre...
, Best of Friends and Diggin it also featured gunge or messy activities from time to time. Dick and Dom in the Bungalow and Holly & Stephen's Saturday Showdown
Holly & Stephen's Saturday Showdown
The Ministry of Mayhem was a CITV show which broadcast on the ITV Network from January 2004. As of January 2006, the onscreen name was Holly & Stephen's Saturday Showdown. It was the last regular studio-based Saturday morning show on ITV....
(previously Ministry of Mayhem) featured messy segments throughout the programmes, and a while ago Toonattik featured a gunge quiz known as "make em squirm". In 2006, S4C introduced a kids' show called Waaa!!!
Waaa!!!
Waaa!!! is a ten minute-long children's gameshow that airs on S4C during the holiday period.It is presented by Tudur Owen and S4C presenter Mari Lovgreen. Neither appear in the programme, only providing voice-overs.-Format:...
where kids are sat on a chair that moved along rails over tanks of gunge and foam and failing to answer a question correctly resulted in then being dropped into the gunge or foam. In 2007 there was a programme on CITV
CITV
CITV is a British television channel from ITV Digital Channels Ltd, a division of ITV plc. It broadcasts content from the CITV archive, as well as commissions and acquisitions. CITV itself is the programming block on the main ITV Network .The CITV channel broadcasts from 06:00 to 18:00...
called Scratch and Sniffs den of doom featuring gunge, where children fall in to a vat of gunge similar to the Gunk Dunk on Get Your Own Back
Get Your Own Back
Get Your Own Back is a British children's game show, which ran from 26 September 1991 to 31 March 2003. It has been presented throughout by Dave Benson Phillips with the addition of Lisa Brockwell as a co-host from 2001 to the programme's end in 2003....
. Gunged has also appeared on Prank Patrol and Globo Loco. Throughout the second season of the CBBC
CBBC
CBBC is one of two brand names used for the BBC's children's television strands. Between 1985 and 2002, CBBC was the name given to all the BBC's programmes on TV for children aged under 14...
show Hider in the House
Hider in the House
Hider in the House was a British children's game show presented by Jason King and Joel Ross . In the programme, a celebrity had to be hidden in a family's house by three children and a parent. If the family have fewer than three children, they use friends or related children to make up the numbers...
, in order to claim prizes, the adult who had been tricked in that episode must have gunge dumped on them. This was known as Push the Pedal.
New Zealand children's show What Now
What Now
What Now is a long running New Zealand children's television program that premiered in 1981. It is filmed before a live studio audience at Whitebait Productions in Christchurch....
has retained a gunging element over the years. Modern day games involving gunge involves "Flushed Away" and "brain freeze" where two children sit under a giant gunged filled brain and every time a child gets a question wrong they are gunged. Recently there has been "Frog In The Bog" where a child wearing a wetsuit and flippers enters a pool of gunge with a frog spewing out gunge in to the pool. while in the pool the child has to collect items in the pool while being timed and deposit them into a nearby bucket. The idea is to collect as many items as possible before the time is up. "Brain Freeze" succeeded "Frog in the Bog" where two children sit under a giant brain and are paired up with a caller answering questions - for each wrong answer a child under the brain is gunged. The Tank of Terror was a big cylindrical tank, see through, and like a bath, it was quite big, and it would fill up with gunge, to about the chest of the person, who was seated.
The 2008 remake of Swap Shop
Multi-Coloured Swap Shop
Multi-Coloured Swap Shop, more commonly known simply as Swap Shop, is a UK children's television programme. It was broadcast on Saturday mornings on BBC1 for 146 episodes in six series between 1976 and 1982...
(Basil's Swap Shop
Basil's Swap Shop
Basil & Barney's Swap Shop is a British children's television series that was produced for CBBC and ran on Saturday mornings on BBC Two and CBBC Channel from 5 January 2008 to 25 September 2010...
) features gungey games. "Question Line", a game where children ask the celebrity guest questions and if the celebrity chooses to answer it the child does not get gunged. If however, the celebrity chooses not to answer the question the child asking the question slides in to the gunge tank (a pool of gunge similar to the one on Waaa!!!). The children move as they are sitting in or lying across a rubber ring on a ramp with their legs hanging out on the "gungeulator" a red and white travelator. If the child does slide into the gunge tank then they have to move over and sit in the gunge tank until the game is over. Another game called Dunk Beds, is where there are 3 teams of 2 children, 1 is on a bed attached to a platform and the other child is off the bed. The child off the bed pushes the bed off along the platform, where along the platform are scoring zones. Up to a point, the points are negative then past a certain point, the points become positive until finally off the scale. If the bed goes off the scale the child on the end of the bed slides into a tank of green coloured water. 0 points are awarded if the child gets dunked. Each child from each team is on the bed once during the duration of the game. In the final Game, the final two children, left over from the previous game, play on a moving platform called the gungeulator collecting objects, avoiding obstacles, to get them back to the start of the "gungeulator". If a child falls then he or she is automatically gunged and the child that is left continues the game. However, if the child left wins then prizes are awarded to both the children but if both children are gunged the game is over and no prized are awarded. These gungey games meant the return of gunge to Saturday morning children's television in the UK. In the second series, broadcast early 2009, The "question line" and "gungeulator" segments no longer featured. The "Gunge Gallery" along with a tweaked "dunk beds" featured instead. The "Gunge Gallery" is five gunge tanks in a row in which children (members of a karate club, football team, etc.) sit in and after a swap has been completed a child is gunged. The gunge used was either very watered-down gunge or custard.
The end of August 2009 saw a new gungey gameshow on CBBC
CBBC
CBBC is one of two brand names used for the BBC's children's television strands. Between 1985 and 2002, CBBC was the name given to all the BBC's programmes on TV for children aged under 14...
on BBC One
BBC One
BBC One is the flagship television channel of the British Broadcasting Corporation in the United Kingdom. It was launched on 2 November 1936 as the BBC Television Service, and was the world's first regular television service with a high level of image resolution...
. Wait for it..! sees four children trying to avoid being dropped in to the goo portal, a large orange pool of gunge. The idea is similar to ITV's Scratch and Sniffs Den of Doom. The twist is that the longer the children take to answer the questions, the more points are awarded. The person with the least number of points in the first round, "wait" is dropped from a "drop zone" into the goo portal. The second round, "watch and wait" sees the children the player is given a category and the player has to estimate many seconds of clue is needed to be said to be able to answer. Again, the more time, the more points will be won. If the player loses, another player can win the points if they can work out the answer with more of the clue being said. Another player falls into the goo portal via their drop zone if they have the least points. The third round, "wait and see" a head to head round and the player has to guess when the oppolment will come in with their answer. The player has a selection of times to choose from and a point is rewarded is the oppolment answers within the predicted time. Again the player with the least points enters the goo portal via their drop zone. The final round, "wait a minute" sees the remaining contestant try to win prizes on offer by trying to cross the goo portal in less than a minute. The player is asked questions which are descriptions of an object and for each correct answer the player is able to step across smaller drop zones. If the player makes it to the end within the 60 seconds, he/she wins the prizes (a star prize is awarded if the player crosses within 40 seconds) — if not the player falls into the goo portal when the platform which the player is standing on collapses.
During Autumn 2009, three new CBBC
CBBC
CBBC is one of two brand names used for the BBC's children's television strands. Between 1985 and 2002, CBBC was the name given to all the BBC's programmes on TV for children aged under 14...
shows called Planet Ajay, Keep Your Enemies Close and School of Silence launched with gungey segments. Playet Ajay has two gungey segments. The first being called "Under Pressure", where three kids sit under a gunge tank and they are "curried" in order to relieve the planet's pressure winning prizes in the order in which they were gunged. The second game called "Beat Badjay" is where a child goes head to head with Badjay over a dunk tank of gunge, answering general knowledge questions, If the child has the lowest score he/she is dunked in the gunge, or if Badjay has the lowest score he is gunged. In Keep Your Enemies close, the final round sees two groups of two children in mining carts playing along a track. Here questions are asked — a letter on the giant board and a category and the child must give two answers beginning with the letter for the question. The team the furthest along the track before it merges into a single track is the losers and the winning team pulls a lever sending the losing teams cart through the "clag barrier". There is an overhead machine with three pipes filled with gunge or "clag", as the teams cart moves along the track the clag is released from each of the pipes as the cart passes under them. Finally, School of Silence features messy games some involving gunge. There was no gunge tank, instead challenges such as gunge boot, where a child had to stick his/her foot into a Wellington boot of gunge.
2010-Present
Gunge continues to feature in 2010 on children's TV in the UK. Wait For It and Keep Your Enemies Close all returned for new series. Later than usually shown, Basil's Swap ShopBasil's Swap Shop
Basil & Barney's Swap Shop is a British children's television series that was produced for CBBC and ran on Saturday mornings on BBC Two and CBBC Channel from 5 January 2008 to 25 September 2010...
returned minus the gunge gallery but introducing a new game with a western theme called Gold Rush. In this game, the two winning teams from the previous game (dunk beds) take part in the game set in a mine shaft where the aim is to fill up tubes with liquid sludge by tipping buckets with the slop into the tubes which are hidden (so the children do not know who is winning). At the end the four kids take cover in the now shuddering mine shaft. The winning team then receives gold (yellow gunge) while the losing team were initially covered in brown sludge however later episodes they remain dry. In New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
kids television, What Now
What Now
What Now is a long running New Zealand children's television program that premiered in 1981. It is filmed before a live studio audience at Whitebait Productions in Christchurch....
introduced a new gungey game the big breakfast and Splat Cave
Autumn 2010 saw Fe Fi Fo Yum, a show about giants launch on CBBC, a round challenge saw two children go barefoot into a bowl of gunge (Similar to TMI) to collect objects for their team mates such as letters/numbers or other items. The final game also makes use of the gunge bowl, where the last part involves wading in the pool and up a ramp in order to release their captive team mates. A second series was launched in May 2011. In addition, the spin-off from Horrible Histories
Horrible Histories (2009 TV series)
Horrible Histories is an award-winning British children's television series based on the Terry Deary book series of the same name. The first series was thirteen episodes long, and was broadcast from 16 April to 9 July 2009 on CBBC on BBC One. A second series, of twelve episodes , aired from 31 May...
, Horrible Histories: Gory Games
Horrible Histories: Gory Games
Horrible Histories: Gory Games is a television game show co-produced by Citrus Television & Lion Television for the BBC. It is a spin-off of the main Horrible Histories show. The first series began on 30 May 2011, the same day on which the first episode of Horrible Histories series three first aired...
involved a physical challenge involving gunge. The three children in the quiz running barefoot across an inflatable collecting "poo" and depositing it in their tanks at the other end. Above the inflatable are three containers - one for each lane of the inflatable, storing gunge which is released at points in the game.