★★★★★ 0/5

Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee

ABC's new quiz show is a lot of nonsense, and the very reason you're going to love it.

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TV may be getting overrun with quiz shows but you’ll need to make room for Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee from tonight.

New Zealand’s Guy Montgomery serves up a nonsense offering that is unapologetic in its whimsy and for that reason alone is a welcome addition to our schedules.

Firstly the set, is a gloriously nostalgic throwback to the 1970s (or is that the ’60s?) with gaudy orange and pink, classic music, huge lecterns, and a Romper Room bee.

Even host Guy Montgomery dwears a great bag of fruit while sidekick, the irresistible Aaron Chen, appears to have wandered straight from an Italian wedding. L-o-v-e it. All that’s missing is Pete Smith Speaking.

Guests for episode one are Urzila Carlson, Danielle Walker, Nazeem Hussain and Tom Gleeson.

The gameplay, which appears to be secondary to the banter, is built around several spelling rounds. The winner will become a returning champ, while the loser must don a Dunce’s camp.

Each must choose from three random pools of varying difficulty, the Coward’s Cup, Person’s Purse and Bucket of Bravery.

Some words prove so simple I can’t believe the players ask for Country of Origin or an example by way of a Sentence (D-r-e-a-m, really?). Are they complete numbskulls? Ok they are celebrities….

Round Two sees Chen highlighting Australian cash with related spelling questions. Again it’s very silly but these people could read the phone book and it would be entertaining.

Round Three brings in some creativity with contestants challenged to reinvent the spelling of a more complex word.

Round Four ‘Hometown Hero’ draws upon the town of origin of our players. Wait for the Townsville Girl Guides leaders as a video lifeline for Danielle Walker.

A Fifth Round (this is beginning to feel very long) adds audience participation with our trusty 4 expected to spell the name of a random audience member correctly. Choose wisely, Obi-Wan.

Other rounds will feature in other episodes.

Effortlessly linking this all together is the cheerful Guy Montgomery, who developed the format on zoom during the worst days of the pandemic. Like Don Quixote or The Pilgrim’s Progress, penned in prison, some good did come out of l-o-c-k-d-o-w-n.

There are a couple of baffling production choices however, which I feel could have made this even more enjoyable. The length at 46 mins without ads is very long for ABC, which has always erred on the side of brevity in panel shows where commercial television has proven greedy. Less is more, methinks.

The other -and I may be wrong here- centres around whether a laugh track has been sweetened to the studio audience mirth. Either that or there was a lot of red cordial in the ABC studio that day.

But these are moot m-o-o-t points. Guy Montgomery, you’re a very silly man with a very fun diversion.

Guy Montgomery’s Guy Mont Spelling Bee screens 8:30pm Wednesdays on ABC.

26 Responses

  1. Also would like to add I was disappointed with Aaron Chen segments didn’t add any value to the program. It will be interesting to see which comedians come back for another appearance.

  2. I couldn’t agree more with Wombat, Blamby. It goes to show how everyone has a different sense of humour. The show failed to me to be a comedy or entertaining as a spelling bee. I didn’t last through the whole first show. The spelling side was too simple. Predominantly primary school level words. When the words were so basic. I was wondering why you would need to ask for the word in a sentence. When the sentence was given the answer the host gave wasn’t very descriptive. I found the Host’s delivery of his questions and comedy lines to be very bland. As if he didn’t even find his lines funny. The comedian contestants a lot of the times seemed to not find what the host was saying as funny and they were either cringing themselves of giving a polite tight smile.

  3. I said it was a tad too long but after watching the whole series I take it back, I haven’t laughed so much in a long time. Fingers crossed it gets renewed. It’s very simple but very clever all at the same time.

  4. I’m reneging on my previous comments that the first episode was worth a look but not a full series having binged the whole thing this week. There are big laughs a plenty throughout. What a simple but great new show!

  5. Watched only the first episode and thought it was great, well done Guy, I usually don’t find him that funny on paying attention but he was really funny on this, maybe it’s his delivery, the use the word in a sentence being the most amusing, and interactions with Aaron Chen as well. As everyone else has said maybe 10 minutes shorter would have made it snappier.

  6. Watching it right now and they’ve just finished the first round and I am yet to laugh.
    Probably one of the cringiest shows I’ve ever seen. Low budget and low entertainment.
    I don’t understand how bad comedians are able to get this much airtime.

    Biggest flop of 2024!

    1. So you watched it on August 14 and thought it was so bad that you watched it again on August 17? And the ratings would suggest it’s not a flop at all.

  8. Completely agree 30 mins better than 45 mins. Also applaud the brown overtones for the host and set. Guy’s brand is brown (or I guess purple-ish) 70s suit for sure.

  10. ABC has knocked it out of the park with this. I was genuinely laughing, which is rare these days. I watched the first episode and proceeded to binge the entire season on iview! I also watched Eve of Destruction, which was okay, but I prefer Mad as Hell. I think the format will wear thin pretty quickly.

  11. I’ve gone and watched the first 6 episodes on iView (my 12 yo wanted to watch more!) and the more I watch the more I enjoy it. Very different to everything else out there, but it’s good to see different comedy styles together and see comedians letting their hair down a bit. Very good for a change for sure. Don’t disagree about the comments saying it could be cut down a bit – probably 10 mins too long but other than that it’s good family viewing!

  12. I mean, bless them for doing it. But the Girl Guides ladies looked like they were being held hostage in that video. I thought this was a fun if forgettable time, agree that it was too long and could have lost 15 minutes. I thought the new Micallef offering was quite ordinary though.

    1. As with so many Australian shows the need for a harsh edit was obvious. This is, maybe, a 25 minute show, but that is pushing it to the absolute limits of its viability. It needed be like a Media Watch – a short, sharp 15 minutes and then on to the next thing. Message to all the networks – shorter, sharper, tighter is always better.

  14. I watched. Enjoyed it, but I do not disagree with anything that’s already been said. As a 28-35 minute show it’d be perfect. There’s some doubt-benefitting here given it’s the first episode. I hope it’ll get snappier as things go along. I’m reminded of the first 10 or so episodes of QI, which I recently discovered on YouTube, God they were painful and I feel something similar might happen here. I’ll give it another try in a couple of weeks I think.

  17. I’m currently watching this on ABC and I’m actually appalled that something so bad could actually air on TV…. Even on ABC!
    I’ve seen the guy on Have you been paying attention and also Taskmaster Australia and I never really found him funny but this show is probably the worst thing I’ve ever watched and I’ve literally watched a whole movie about a car tire that that goes around town with with some weird powers that are able to kill people.

    1. Comedy is one of this really subjective things.

      I have to admit that I find it surprising if you didn’t find him funny on Taskmaster or Have you been paying attention, that you would try watching this.

      I find him quite funny, adore the NZ version and looking forward to checking this out. (The NZ version was picked up for a second season as well.)

    2. Thankyou Blamby for expressing my thoughts. Could not believe why the ABC would consider this show let alone produce it. Why do taxpayers have to pay 1 billion dollars to the ABC when we get this childish entertainment. I was expecting something to do with actual spelling, instead watched well know comedians reduced to antics best left to a play school. (whoops sorry Play School was a very high class ABC show!)

      1. They literally do spell the words. It’s a spelling bee and there’s fun poked at the format.

        The ratings for it have been pretty strong, but comedy is subjective, and while you didn’t find it funny, I on the other hand did. 🙂

  18. “Firstly the set, is a gloriously nostalgic throwback to the 1970s (or is that the ’60s?)”
    I think it’s more reminiscent of a Channel 31 variety/chat show

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