I've made a start on viewing the second series of Room 101 from Autumn 1995, still with Nick Hancock at the helm where the first guest was Richard Wilson.
Amongst his items up for disposal were Gardener's Question Time on Radio 4, people who smoked pipes, trainspotters and possibly my favoured nomination; Songs Of Praise.
Nick wouldn't allow the latter inside as it would mean there wouldn't be an excuse for the television viewer to stretch their legs on a Sunday evening. Although to be fair back in 1995 the sort of programmes broadcast on that day of the week didn't exactly set the schedules alight.
However the funniest part and possibly entertaining from a TV point of view was when Nick showed a BBC 1 junction from the early 80s into the Sunday morning programme "This Is The Day" where the announcer instructed viewers to make sure that they had "a candle and matches, some bread, and a bible".
Nick then commented that the only thing you could do with those items would be to make a "toasted bible sandwich".
Or a "bible butty" to put it into my own words which would be anyone's definition of a worst nightmare. Unless their surname's Poulter.
From a TV point of view it was even more bizarre to see the programme introduced with the clock instead of the spinning world which was rather ridiculous although they did used to use the clock to introduce programmes such as Swap Shop and Grandstand around the same time.
The second episode I had a gander at involved Frank Skinner who wanted to put in Action Man, and jokes that fell on their arse unsurprisingly.
Both got rejected, with the reason for the bad jokes being that without them, ITV wouldn't have any sitcoms. And in less then a decade later Frank appeared in his very own which pretty much floundered.
Frank also wanted to put in the film "Sophie's Choice" after a bad experience when he showed it to his Catholic family on an early video player.
Nick compared it to when he felt embarrassed when watching a demonstration of the "wankorotary engine" on Tomorrow's World, which prompted both him and Frank to start singing the programme's theme tune from back in the 70s as composed by Johnny Dankworth.
Rather suprisingly I think it's a rather delightful compostion although I'm more of the generation who grew up with the orchestral Paul Hart theme with that eerie CGI head, which can be heard within this clip from 1990.
One of the items that Frank did manage to get in was Shakespeare which I'd pretty much agree with, although he had more of a reason for inciting hate on the playwright as he studied him on an English degree at University, and had been to see a few of his plays and wasn't impressed.
Pretty much in the same manner I've been to a fair share of mindless over-indulgent jazz performances.
The third one I had a gander at was Caroline Quentin who only got one item inside if I remember correctly, with others being rejected such as a teasmaid given to her by then husband Paul Merton, and weather forecasters who made a habit of saying what the weather was like earlier or the day before.
Something that became a regular feature on The Chris Moyles Show a few years later.
This series saw the addition of a bonus item being allowed into the torture chamber if a guest sucesfully disposed of 3 items.
Both Richard and Frank were succesful with the star of One Foot In The Grave getting the opportunity to put Songs Of Praise in their which had been previously rejected, and Frank got to put in Action Man.
However if a guest failed to get 3 or more items inside, then a random item from Room 101 would be released and with Caroline Quentin who was unsucessful, Paul Daniels got allowed out who on the emergence of his cardboard cut out prompted Caroline to jump out of her chair in fright.
I may watch one more episode, this time involving the veteran if slightly pompous entertainer Jimmy Tarbuck.
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