I have to admit the commentary on last night’s Ninja Warrior was a bit much at times.
A female made it up the wall (first one to do so, and congratulations to her!).
Some of the lines that Bec and Ben trotted out were:
“Instant super hero”
… and…
“We’ll all remember this moment for years to come”
(right now, I can’t even remember the lady’s name!).
I’m trying to keep count on how many times “a man on a mission” has been mentioned!
I actually laughed out loud at that one. I guess it adds to the excitement, and I’m clearly in the minority because it appears to be a winning formula, but it would be much more enjoyable to watch without the repetitive, over-excited, ‘you’re watching history in the making folks’ type comment every second sentence.
That said, I do think Freddie found a nice balance of energy without the exaggeration.
So it looks like there will be no “Winner’s Announcement” segment to tomorrow’s ratings as there was no winner.
Apparently a pop up for tomorrow’s Today show half way through the show revealed the person who topped the leader board 
The second stage looked like it would be near impossible to finish in 65 seconds. I think you’d have to be Superman to be able to do it.
Though the hosts said halfway during the final that in overseas series of Ninja, in some cases it took 6 seasons for someone to win it. Interesting that people there kept watching it without seeing anyone win.
Still I think it’s a bit cheap of Nine to not offer some sort of prizes to the say the Top 3 that went the furthest and quickest (even if they didn’t make it all the way through).
In Hot Seat for instance, whilst the top prize of $1 mil is rarely won (only once I think since it started in 2009), at least the lower tier prizes of up to $250,000 go off regularly to make it fair to contestants and add an element of excitement to it, it would be boring to watch if you could only win the $1 mil or nothing at all.
Always thought this would do well in Australia considering it’s success in the US especially and the Aussie grasp of sport and competitition. It would be interesting to see the demos as I suspect it gets a far higher percentage of men watching (and probably a younger audience) than the big bloated reality cooking and renovation shows.
The UK version had the same complaints about there being no winner but that’s the entire point - it’s all about beating the course, not each other. Agree though there should be some sort of prize for the last Ninja standing - surely a sponsor could provide a car or something.
The show has about a 50:50 split between females and males. 350,000 viewers under the age of 17 watched the premiere which got 1.68m.
Source: http://www.tvtonight.com.au/2017/07/ninja-warrior-becomes-a-win-for-all-free-to-air.html
Well nine have found another cash cow (The Block) with advertisers lining up next season and not even having to fork out the prize money.
Cant see it being as popular next year now that people know there can be no winner in the end.
I called it.
It needs to be a tough course not easy… If there was a winner every year it would die off faster, that’s why it’s such a successful franchise, because it’s ‘tough’ and it builds suspense. If this goes for 5-10 years there might only be 1 or 2 people that will take it.
Just look at the other versions and how long it took to get that winner. Only a select few in this world can do the whole course…
Australia is hungry to see that winner and I have no doubt they will watch in the millions until it’s done.
We will see. But a show needs to have a pay off in the end for me to keep watching. I am sure many other people are like that.
Nine:
Nine looks forward to another successful season of Australian Ninja Warrior in 2018 and has today confirmed that the 2017 prize money of $100,000 would be rolled over for next year creating a $200,000 prize and will continue to increase, until a contestant conquers Mount Midoriyama.
“Australian Ninja Warrior will return for a second series in 2018 and we are excited to see not only all of our favourite Ninja contestants from series one return but a host of new Australian Ninja’s inspired by the show,” said Healy.
“For the second series in 2018 we will roll over the prize money not won in series one, creating a prize of $200,000 if an Australian Ninja Warrior can conquer Mount Midoriyama.”
Interesting. When was that posted about the prize money going up? I like that idea, more at stake.
Late this morning.
My money is on 2 x 4 week seasons for 2018 with a higher quality in production, we will see the next season before Easter. Nine will not let this rest for 49 weeks.
I think it was fairly obvious there was going to be no winner this season. There were plenty of stories in the media about how only seven(?) people have ever finished the course. Had someone made it through this year Ch9 would’ve been all over it, making sure viewers watched to the end to see who would be the eighth NW.
Too few viewers understood that there was a chance that there would be no winner. And over the years we’ve become used to someone being the eventual winner on all reality shows.
Do contestants return for the following seasons in the overseas versions?
I heard one of the Aussie contestants interviewed on Fitzy & Wippa and he said he’s going to start training hard for next year.
They are encouraged to apply again, viewers invest in their story.
SMH reveals that the Ninja Warrior format has been shopped around locally by Endemol Shine for the past few years. Both Seven and Ten had a look at it but passed it on. Now they will be kicking themselves.
The article also says it is not certain if season 2 will be filmed at Cockatoo Island and Nine failed to secure a venue for the planned December shoot.