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Crime time on Sleuth 101

Host Cal Wilson says celebrity detectives all had their own way of solving the murder mysteries of Sleuth 101.

Good News Week‘s Claire Hooper this week takes a determined approach to solving the mystery of the ABC’s Sleuth 101.

As host Cal Wilson told TV Tonight, she was intent on solving the crime “Delete Cache.”

“She was great, picking up on lots of clues whereas other people missed everything –and some still got it right and some were hideously wrong,” said Wilson.

“It was really interesting from my point of view having read the scripts to see what clues people picked up and what people left.

“The thing that is so great is that they all have a very different approach. They all attack it in a very different way.”

The cross between a mystery and an improvisation show offers no pre-show assistance to the celebrity detectives.

“They see the footage for the first time when the audience sees the footage. So they’re going in blind,” says Wilson.

“And the recording doesn’t run much longer than what you see on screen. It’s almost ‘as it happens.'”

This week’s victim is Rush star Samuel Johnson with other cast members including Tommy Dassalo, Emily Taheny, Katrina Milosevic and Nazeem Hussain.

Yet to appear as Detectives are Adam Richard, Colin Lane, Hamish Blake, Julia Morris, and Peter Rowsthorn.

Wilson says she would like to see how a non-comedian tackles the job of solving a crime.

“Hopefully if we get another series there’s room to do that, although a politician would probably end up convincing you that the wrong person had done it.”

Sleuth 101 airs 8pm Fridays on ABC1.

13 Responses

  1. I think this show is actually one of the better ones the ABC has done lately. Yes, the guests cannot figure out if it’s a joke-show or a “serious” show, but who cares?

    It’s a harmless bit of light entertainment on a Friday night. Why have we lost our sense of humour about such things?

    Get a life and get a laugh…it’s supposed to be light entertainment.

  2. @Sydney2K, you’ve summed up what is wrong with this show. I watched the first ep and I didn’t like it at all, which is a shame because I really wanted to like it. It might work better if they replaced the comedians with just regular celebs/actors and took it seriously.

  3. I quite enjoyed the show the first time I saw it, and it’s a clever idea, but yeah, the constant cracking of jokes will get old fast imo. I’d like more focus on the actual mystery!

  4. The problem I have with this show is that the guest detectives play it for laughs, and don’t actually try to solve the mystery. This is distracting, as as the viewer, you’re meant to try and pit wits against the guest to solve the mystery. If the guest doesn’t take it seriously, why should you? If he or she at the end gives some illogical reason for someone to be the culprit, it basically craps on the writers developing a decent mystery, and it craps on the viewer, who has no reason to participate if the guest doesn’t want to play. Dave O’Neill’s golddarn reasoning in the first episode PO’d me- it had nothing to do with the mystery, just an theory based on the casting, which indicated to me he had no idea.

    Now, someone like Matt Parkinson would be good. He’s funny but also brainy as well, and he’d have a good go at trying to solve the mystery.

    1. It’s an original format for the genre but obviously it echoes some forerunners such as Whodunnit and Cluedo. If you say it ripped off a format you should really be backing it up with your claim. Copyright law says you can’t copyright an idea, only its execution.

  5. The problem I found with the first episode was that the format couldn’t make up its mind if it was a comedy or a gameshow. Dave O’Neil seemed to feel compelled to crack jokes no matter how little progress he made in solving the case, and actually doing that was almost an afterthought.

    By contrast, Cluedo knew that the game was the thing – any one-liners the cast wanted to drop during the studio interrogation phase had to be worked in around the questioning.

    (side note: come on GO!, let’s have some Cluedo re-runs…)

  6. I was so disappointed with this series so far. I like Cal Wilson, a lot, but this show really sucks in my opinion! Maybe it”s just not for me – not sure who the audience is. I was raised on the ABC’s diet of clever and interesting shows.Whodunit with the wonderful Jon Pertwee in the 1970’s was a favourite – but then I was a child! Even Clue in the 1990’s – or whatever they called it – Cluedo – with great thesps like Peter Sumner and Joy Westmore – was fun.

    This is so try hard and sloppily put together. Real shame, and for the loyal Collectors fans who have lost their Friday night highlight, only to move it to the dead zone of Sunday 6.30pm. Silly silly move.

  7. I have to say we really enjoy this show. My son thinks its great to be able to try and solve the crime before they do on tv. And while I think its a bit spoon fed in terms of clues, and it reminds me of that old show “cluedo” that used to be on in the 90s, its still fun.

  8. Great show so far – well done Cal :) If the show does get another season it’d be great to see it run for an hour instead of the current half. At the moment it is a little rushed and could give the audience a little more time to suss out the murderer. The original Cluedo show in the 90’s ran for an hour and worked very well. Ahh, Brindabella Homestead :)

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