May 2007's been a pretty interesting month for the show, really. We started the month with a group of contestants that seemed really well liked on this forum, pretty much the entire lot from the Catherine Tate special that had given us our first look at the May contestants back on 17th March.

Graeme's amazing £101k win was early on, and we also got Shahid's £44,000 and the massively popular Den beating the banker with £12,500 too. But then came PJ's no-final-offer game which caused a huge kerfifflefaffle both here and everywhere else, and what followed it was a week when lots of really popular players played, some (Derek, Jenine) having more luck than others (Kirsty, Savvas), and then Lynn's nasty collapse after £15,000 seemed to massively influence the players for quite a while, as since then we've seen some very cautious deals, but luckily ending on a high note today with a £10,000 OPW for Colin.

But what's been the month like for you? Have you enjoyed the games, has it been better than April or March, is the current lot of contestants better or worse than the ones at the start of the month?

Overall, I'd say it was a month that promised so much, but didn't really live up to it.

We started with a great line-up of contestants, and I felt the month just needed one or two defining games to launch it into a spectacular run like January this year, March 2006 etc. We certainly had one such game with Graeme, but the momentum wasn't kept up as the next week produced a run of games that struggled to get off the ground.

Then came the middle part of the month, which I had such high hopes for as so many legends were due up in the chair. Den's show was great fun and produced a good result even if the big money was never there. Then of course we had the controversy of PJ's game - to be followed by the unfortunate crashes of Kirsty and Savvas. The highlight of that week was probably Derek's game, "funny and money" to use a Noelism!

But then came Lynn's game, one of the most painful collapses we've seen and certainly few appear to have had as much of a lasting impact. Perhaps in combination with a naturally cautious group of players, it led to the longest run of early deals we've ever seen. We had a couple of OPWs in there but the lack of games with any sort of tension began to bring out the Wakey in all of us! Noel also began to show that sort of attitude again, and less generous offers from the Banker in an attempt to force more players to go further.

At least Lionel gave us a memorable recovery game, before Juliah unfortunately took us back into trainwreck territory and Colin ended the month with a feel-good show even if it was yet another early deal.

In terms of characters I'd put this month up there in the top five, unfortunately for games it's towards the other end of the table. Just to emphasise the wave of caution and bad luck, it's the first ever month (apart from those which had less than 5 shows) where nobody went to the end and won a red!

I don't think it's been spectacular, but better than April and February.

For me May promised much but delivered little.

A couple of memorable games with bravery and guts, some spectacular trainwrecks and some breathtakingly awful deals which sapped any resistance out of an already cautious line up.

And we enter June with a shellshocked bunch of contestants and a loudmouth preacher on the wings intent on convincing everybody to deal. Lord help us!

May has been very good, especially with Graeme's game and PJ's game. They were both memorable games.

May has been ok in my opinion.

Quite a few great games: Greame's, Stephens and Colin's to name but a few.

Lynn's game was a bit of a downer though..

May has been a very mixed month. There were quite a few characters on the wings at the beginning, but now these have played, there seem to be few remaining.

Overall, there have been some good shows - such as Derek's, Shahid's and Stephen's - but there have been some awful ones such as Lynn's due to the way her game went. There was only really one memorable game and that was at the beginning of the month - Graeme's game.

I've enjoyed this month. We've had some fantastic players in Den, Lynn, Derek, Savvas, Graeme and Juliah. It was just a pity some of them didn't go according to plan. The first two thirds of Juliah's and Lynn's games were wonderful, but the last part of both games were so painful to watch, Lynn's in particular. Den was just a complete legend. Derek and Savvas were interesting because they seemed to be such committed no dealers. I enjoyed Graeme's game because it's nice to see people winning loads of money.

Next month should be good. We've got Rodney and Eric, whose games should be good, Violet is shaping up to be a legend, I love Karen and Renee at the moment (but they'll play soon), there's a few handsome men and I've heard a very interesting rumour about Adam's game.

Nothing special about a lad with a tuppence!

Does this rumour contain the words 'first offer' and 'deal' by any chance?

Don't put yourself down...

Oh, sorry I misread that, I thought you said someone on the edge preaching to No Deal all the time...

Summary of the month?

A month we're likely to talk about for a long time as a tipping point in the show's history. Big changes in Banker behaviour, and a set of contestants who aren't here to 'play the game' the way that phrase was hopelessly misdefined in recent months, have totally transformed the nature of the show. It's gone from one wrong place to another, and now it's using the wrong method (Noel's Wakeyisms) to get out of its new hole.

Does this show know where it's going anymore?

Maybe its 'false memory syndrome' but when I first started watching about 6 months ago it seemed the majority of players were prepared to have a go at winning the big amounts and risk leaving with a small amount. Its what I loved about the show.

Then came inflated offers which encouraged people to deal and now people come onto the show with the sole intention of going away with a few thousand. They seem paralysed by a fear of going away with peanuts and will even deal with decent boards left in front of them. Admittedly there has been a recent run of rotten luck and terrible boards but even on the odd occassion when the boards have been good people are just dealing to get out with something.

The show has changed from 'a chance to win a quarter of a million' to the 'chance to win a few thousand'.

May has been the culmination of this growing trend and the change in banker offers and Noel's Wakeyism seems a little desperate and too little too late to reverse the trend.

But they need to do something. People I speak to are getting fed up (I mean viewers, not forum members).

You're quite right when you say that 6 months ago there were more people who were 'giving it a go' as there were more gamblers back then. Personally, I don't mind early dealers, but I do like a bit of vaiety in the show and it is admittedly lacking in that at the moment. I think the recent disasters of Lynn's game (and indeed Savvas', Kirsty's and Juliah's games) have made the players more cautious, and there are cautious characters on the wings - such as Adam and possibly Rodney (I believe he's advised people to deal, which gamblers don't normally do...). I'm (nicely) surprised that they have allowed an obviously cautious person on the wings in the form of Adam, although of course he could've been bluffing when he applied for the show and pretended that he was a gambler. It'll be interesting to see if he does a below-average show count...

The period we are in at the moment reminds me a little bit of the early days of the show when you would often get people dealing for less than £10,000... then just over a year later, there was a period when there would rarely be offers less than £10,000 and very rarely would people deal for such low amounts.



As I have already said, it doesn't bother me too much, but you certainly have a point and I can see it putting the 'casual viewer' off.

Is this the same Rodney who shouted out "NO DEAL!" to Sarah when she had quite obviously made her mind up to deal? I'd put him as the most likely to be a crazy gambler of the current 22, although there's a lot of them we don't really know about yet!

Anyway, without posting spoilers here, the rumour I've heard about Adam's game perhaps isn't what you would expect basicasic...

I've not read any spoilers but suffice it to say that if Adam no-deals to the end I'll join his fan-club!!!!!!!!

MAY WAS BLOODY AWESOME!

If ever I had to choose a month in which every single player could beat the Banker and have the perfect game, I would have chosen May 2007.

Around about mid to late April time, I was really enjoying the show and we were starting to get to know a little bit about the contestants thanks to Noel’s new introduction at the beginning of the show. There seemed to be more banter between Noel and the contestants, and it generally seemed better, and by the time May had come I could name every contestant and was looking forward to all their games.

I know I’ve always said that nothing will ever beat March 2006 as the best month ever and nothing will and I know May 2007 wasn’t a great month in terms of players winning loads of money, but their legendaryness (and the fact Kirsty was there) made up for that which is why I think May 2007 deserves to equal it as best month ever. I think I’m alone on that one, which is fine as we all have different opinions.

I think future contestants will have to do something ultra legendary to be anywhere near as awesome as May’s contestants!

May wasn't as bad as some people make out.

Alain, kev, Graeme, Shahid, Jeff, Kascey, stephen, craig etc all had decent games. It was only disappointing in that noly 3/4 people went all the way and that although the games weren't exciting in that people went to the end, they were still good entertaining games. It was also good in a way to see people play their own games and not get influenced by Noel even though I found Belinda's deal a bit over cautious.
it was also memorable for the wrong reasons e.g. P.J and Lynn.