The Weakest Link


The Weakest Link is a television game show which first appeared in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on 14 August 2000 and originally ended on 31 March 2012 when its host Anne Robinson completed her contract. The original British version of the show is still aired around the world on BBC Entertainment. The game begins with a team of contestants who take turns answering general knowledge questions within a time limit to create chains of correct answers in a row. At the end of each round, the players vote one contestant, "the weakest link", out of the game. Once two players are left, they play in a head-to-head contest, with five questions asked to each contestant in turn, to determine the winner.
The format has been licensed across the world, with many countries producing their own series of the programme and is the 2nd most popular international franchise, behind only the Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? franchise, which also originated in the UK.

Format

The programme sees a group of contestants who will need to work as a team to try and win as much of a maximum cash jackpot by correctly answering general-knowledge questions in a series of rapid-fire rounds.
Each round features a money chain of anywhere from five to nine increasing cash values, with a maximum cash target that the team must attempt to reach within a time limit. The team can quickly achieve this target by stringing together a chain of correct consecutive answers, the minimum number of which depends on the number of "links" in the money chain. A correct answer increases the value of the succeeding question, however, an incorrect answer breaks the chain and losing all money accumulated in that chain. A contestant can secure the accumulated money in the chain by saying "Bank" before their question is asked, however the chain resets to zero and the team must rebuild again. The round ends when the team has either run out of time, or has banked the target. The target amount is the maximum amount available in the round. If the team banks a total exceeding this amount, it is rounded down to the maximum amount. Only money that has been banked is taken forward in the game, and forms the total prize money available at the end.
The round ends with the team voting off one person from the game. Before the votes are revealed, a voice-over announcer reveals who statistically is the Strongest Link and Weakest Link. The votes are then revealed, followed by inquiry by the host for the reasoning behind the vote, along with berating of the contestants. The person with the most votes is named the Weakest Link, is eliminated from the game and wins nothing. In the event of a tie, the Strongest Link is immediately deemed immune from the vote and must break the tie.
This process repeats, with each successive round beginning with the Strongest Link from the last round, and the time limit available to them decreasing. Once there are two players remaining, they play one final round, where the money banked is multiplied by a certain amount.
The final two contestants then compete in a head-to-head round to determine the winner, with the Strongest Link from the last round determining who begins the round. Each contestant is alternately asked a series of five questions. The player who answers the most correctly wins the money accumulated in the game. If there is a draw, the game continues to sudden death, where the first to answer a question correctly over their opponent's incorrect answer wins. The loser, like all other contestants prior, goes home with nothing.

Strategy for banking money

In a New Scientist blog article, Erica Klarreich argues that there are only two sensible strategies in The Weakest Link 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%.

Game rule and format variations

Compared with the original format, the others have some changes, making them not the same as the original.

Format changes

In the UK original series the host acted cold, harsh and mean to the contestants. Some international hosts went to the BBC Studio for instruction and training purpose to replicate the presenting style. However, the format distributor BBC Worldwide changed the rules and this is not required anymore. As a result, some international hosts are nicer and more relaxed to the contestants. This has changed the whole program style compared with the original BBC series. Notable examples are France, Turkey, Finland, Cyprus, Netherlands and Greece. The new Dutch host Bridget Maasland is also the first host worldwide not to wear black clothing on every episode. Although she does wear dark and black suits on about half of the shows, she often wears bright colored outfits in the other episodes. Her style of hosting resembles the style Anne Robinson adapted in the later UK shows, asking contestants more about their private lives, let them sing and dance during the voting and chit chat about more than just the mistakes made.

US syndicated version

In the 2nd syndicated version of the American version, after the 2nd last round, the last 2 contestants do not face the clock and the money tree. Instead, the remaining 2 contestants go straight into the head-to-head round.

French version

The latest French version also does not use the clock and money tree for the final round, and in the penultimate round is the 3-player triple stake round for €15,000 and lasts 90 seconds.

Dutch version

In the current Dutch version that started in May 2019, just like on the latest French version, round 8 was cut from the format after they aired the show for two weeks. Instead, in round 7, the money triples, and one last player is eliminated after that round. Making the top prize money no longer €10,000, but €9,000. After that, the remaining two contestants go straight into the head-to-head round. However, in the 2nd series, the number of contestants dropped to 7. The top prize money decreased to €8,000, and the 90-second round returned.

International versions

The format is distributed by BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of the BBC, and also produced by different production companies. Australia was the 1st country to adapt the format; not all the international versions share the same title as UK.
As with the original British version, all of the hosts wear black clothing. Most versions also have disciplinarian female hosts, again similar to the British original—with exceptions being Fausto Silva, Tasos Tryfonos, Julien Courbet, Riku Nieminen, Nikolai Fomenko, Eamon Dunphy, Edu Manzano, Allan K., Shirō Itō, Pedro Granger, Enrico Papi, Tseng Yang Qing, Baybars Altuntaş and George Gray. Gray and Courbet are comedians, and those versions were designed to play off comedy.
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.
Legend:
Currently airing
No longer airing
Unsold pilot
Future version