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Not to be confused with the boy band 5ive, captains of Disc-O-Inferno during the Series 4 Celebrity Special.

"Five, the new home of the Wars, is delighted to be broadcasting the most metal mangling show on the face of the planet! We are excited to be part of the ever evolving and ever chaotic show that is Robot Wars and we look forward to bringing you the best robotic battles for many years to come."
— Series 7 Programme

Five (stylised as five and now known as Channel 5) is a British free-to-air television channel which aired Series 7 of Robot Wars from November 2003 until March 2004, the only series the channel would air.

History[]

Channel 5 was launched on 30 March 1997 as the fifth terrestrial television channel in the United Kingdom. The name Five would start being used in 2002 after the RTL Group gained ownership of the channel. This name lasted until 2011 when it was rebranded back to Channel 5, the name it still has to this day.

Five was one of the most popular television channels in the country, airing a wide variety of programmes that proved successful for the channel such as The Gadget Show, The Hotel Inspector and Can't Pay? We'll Take It Away!. The channel also aired other popular programmes that originated in other countries including CSI, Home and Away and The X-Files.

Robot Wars[]

Fivepromo

Advert on the Robot Wars website promoting the show's move to Five

In March 2003, it was reported that Five had acquired the rights to Robot Wars from BBC Two after the latter channel had decided to pull the plug on the show following a ratings plummet from 6 million viewers to just 2 million viewers the previous month.[1] The rights were acquired as the second series of Robot Wars Extreme was finishing its broadcasting run, with the final three episodes being the last of the series. These last three episodes did not air on BBC Two after their original BBC Choice airings as the BBC no longer had the rights to the Robot Wars name and could not reair the episodes on BBC Two after the series had finished its original broadcasting run, having passed them onto Five before they could do so.

"BBC2 has pulled the plug on Robot Wars, the gladiatorial combat show for home-made automatons, after its ratings plummeted from 6 million viewers four years ago to less than 2 million last month.

Channel Five will take the programme after its next series in the hope it will be as valuable a cast-off as Home and Away, the soap Five snapped up when it was dropped by ITV.
"
— The Guardian article reporting Five acquiring Robot Wars

Mentorn, the production company behind Robot Wars, comissioned twenty-two new episodes for Five, effectively the next main series, and promised to give the show 'a new look' to fit with the channel. The new deal was to 'exploit the Robot Wars brand more effectively' and plans were even made to enable new opportunities such as sponsorships and pay-per-views.[1] The move to Five was met with positive reception from producer Stephen Carsey, who hoped that the channel would take Robot Wars in a new direction and allow it to continue airing.[2]

"The show isn't going to get pulled. What is happening is that Robot Wars is going to leave its home on BBC2 and move over to Five, and it's very exciting for us. We've enjoyed eight series over five years with the BBC, and we're enormously grateful to them for everything they've done, including the fact that they showed the series in the first place. All good things come to an end, but we're looking forward to taking the show to Five"
— Stephen Carsey discussing the move over to Five in Robot Wars: The Official Magazine

With the move to Five, new changes were implemented to fit in with the channel's new direction, most notably Jayne Middlemiss, who was drafted in as the new Pit Reporter to replace Philippa Forrester. A new House Robot, Cassius Chrome, was also introduced under the request of Five to have a House Robot exclusive to their series.[3]

Fivemessage

The message from Five in the Official Series 7 Programme

The filming of Series 7 began and ended in late August 2003, the official souvenir programme sold at the recordings highlighted the show's move to Five to audience members, and the series would officially start its broadcasting run on Five on Sunday 2 November 2003 at 8:00pm.[4] An advert was created by Five to advertise this.[5] The broadcasting times would later move to a Saturday at 8:00pm timeslot with repeats on the following Sunday at 12:50pm.[6] Due to the channel having advertisement breaks, this meant that all Series 7 episodes filled an hour long timeslot, though the episodes themselves remained forty-five minutes without ad breaks. The main UK Championship concluded on 7 March 2004 with an additional three special episodes also being shown for the next three weeks until 28 March.

Despite the high expectations and positive marketing, The Seventh Wars failed to generate the high ratings previously put up by BBC Two, with none of the twenty-two episodes breaking into the top ten highest viewed programmes for each week. These low viewing figures led to Five announcing in July 2004 that they would not be comissioning an eighth series of Robot Wars, nor would they be airing reruns of Series 7 on the channel.[7] This decision, along with Stephen Carsey leaving Mentorn, effectively brought the original run of Robot Wars to an end, Five having had the honours of airing the last ever classic series.

"Unfortunately Five will not be commissioning a new series of Robot Wars or broadcasting repeats in the near future"
— Five website

The following year in 2005, Jetix acquired the rights to Series 7 from Five and showed reruns of the series, with the episodes being notably trimmed down and other channels such as Challenge would later air the original unedited Series 7 episodes. In January 2016, it was officially announced that Robot Wars would return for a reboot, once again under the control of BBC Two, with Five (now Channel 5) having no input on the reboot whatsoever.

References[]

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