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London 2012 Opening Ceremony - What did you think?


  

143 members have voted

  1. 1. What are your feelings on the Opening Ceremony?

    • It was fantastic, up there with the best if not the best!
      37
    • It was really good, maybe not one of the best but London did it's self proud!
      40
    • Was good, could have been better.
      34
    • Meh, did not like it.
      9
    • It was poor, was disappointed.
      14
    • Was really bad, one of the worst iv seen.
      9


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To be honest, everyone I know who saw it responded similarly. The only places I'm hearing more positive reviews are in the press and on these boards. Friends, family, co-workers -- nobody hated it, but they all found it disappointingly uneven, confusing and strangely conceived. Rave reviews for Queen. Everybody seemed to like Green and Pleasant set (what they could see of it) and the rings....

Most people I know stopped watching around the NHS segment.

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What was missing was, like the one great effect from Vancouver's show -- the blowing geyser of the "whales." I really thought they would do something similar with that map of London on the stage floor.

We don't have whales in the UK. Only Wales. ;)

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Most people I know stopped watching around the NHS segment.

I had two friends text me during NHS and Frankie and June. One said simply "HORRIBLE". The other said "This is really bad."

I don't think that the whole ceremony deserved those comments, but for me those two sections were quite sub-par.

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To be honest, everyone I know who saw it responded similarly. The only places I'm hearing more positive reviews are in the press and on these boards. Friends, family, co-workers -- nobody hated it, but they all found it disappointingly uneven, confusing and strangely conceived. Rave reviews for Queen.

I assume you mean the lady who accompanied James Bond and not the pop group? ;)

Apart from the Bond sequence (which was filmed some months ago), I didn't like her presence at all. She looked bored and unsmiling even when declaring the Games open and couldn't even raise a smile for the GB team when they entered the stadium!

Very disappointing IMO! :(

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I had two friends text me during NHS and Frankie and June. One said simply "HORRIBLE". The other said "This is really bad."

I don't think that the whole ceremony deserved those comments, but for me those two sections were quite sub-par.

You have to remember though, the general public dose not have the knowledge that Olympic geeks carry when it comes to things like ceremonies. All they were expecting was a giant spectacle, specially those who had only seen Beijing prior.

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There were more faults than positives, and the good was downed out by the bad.

My overall score is a 6/10.

Well at least try and be consistent. If, in your view, the bad outweighed the good then you can't score it 6/10 can you? Surely it can only be a 4/10 at best? B)

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Well at least try and be consistent. If, in your view, the bad outweighed the good then you can't score it 6/10 can you? Surely it can only be a 4/10 at best? B)

You know I thought about this, but a 4/10 just looked to harsh for what it was.

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You have to remember though, the general public dose not have the knowledge that Olympic geeks carry when it comes to things like ceremonies. All they were expecting was a giant spectacle, specially those who had only seen Beijing prior.

But you and I have that knowledge and we didn't like those sections either.

Well at least try and be consistent. If, in your view, the bad outweighed the good then you can't score it 6/10 can you? Surely it can only be a 4/10 at best? B)

Oh please. As if there's a scoring system.

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The Bond sequence was my favorite... :rolleyes:

Talking seriouly, Mr. Bean sequence was SUPERB!

And it could have been better if he'd be rushing his way out of the stadium in his iconic Green Mini, only to be stopped by the family Mini in front of him.

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I think that the Frankie and June love thing ruined it.

It needed more tongue and cheek humor, like I've stated in past posts, it would have been nice to have seen a video homage to the 27+ years of attempted British bids. Poking some fun at the French towards the end.

The NHS segment could have been perfect to showcase more British medical achievements, perhaps more tongue in cheek humor with acknowledging the "Machine that goes ping!".

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It needed more tongue and cheek humor, like I've stated in past posts, it would have been nice to have seen a video homage to the 27+ years of attempted British bids. Poking some fun at the French towards the end.

Yeah...like the IOC would've approved that. :rolleyes:

The NHS segment could have been perfect to showcase more British medical achievements, perhaps more tongue in cheek humor with acknowledging the "Machine that goes ping!".

Well, I sure hope they would not have forgotten The Elephant Man.

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Yeah...like the IOC would've approved that. :rolleyes:

Well, I sure hope they would not have forgotten The Elephant Man.

Who said the IOC had to approve anything? ;) As long as it's not vulgar, just tongue in cheek. All you really need is to obtain BBC footage of such past bids and acknowledging that without the other bidding cities, then the whole idea of a bid race for an Olympics is pointless. If you read my past posts on this concept, it would have had The Beatles' "Long and Winding Road" play then end with Russel Watson's version of "Where my Heart Will Take Me", this would have been after the World Wide Web bit, prior to the "Abide with Me" bit.

Well they did say the rigging could support up to 5 elephants. ;)

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There doesn't seem to be any question among the people I hang out with that it was one of the less impressive ceremonies in recent memory.

Ditto everyone I know, except replace the word less with more. The reception to this ceremony has been overwhelmingly positive.

To be honest, I hear NBC butchered it and I know your commentators are the butt of jokes here for their lack of research and their comments re: Tim Berners Lee, for example. It sounds like they didn't bother trying really. So I'm not surprised America got an impression of bittiness, especially since I read you cut out the 7/7 section and put a Honda ad over the Bean segement. God, I'm so glad we have the BBC.

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I read you cut out the 7/7 section and put a Honda ad over the Bean segement. God, I'm so glad we have the BBC.

What???

Did this happened???????????????????????

Shame!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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Ditto everyone I know, except replace the word less with more. The reception to this ceremony has been overwhelmingly positive.

To be honest, I hear NBC butchered it and I know your commentators are the butt of jokes here for their lack of research and their comments re: Tim Berners Lee, for example. It sounds like they didn't bother trying really. So I'm not surprised America got an impression of bittiness, especially since I read you cut out the 7/7 section and put a Honda ad over the Bean segement. God, I'm so glad we have the BBC.

What you read is incorrect. Don't judge a broadcast you haven't seen.

From what I understand Danny Boyle called the shots with the filming and editing anyway. The things I disliked I disliked because they were poorly conceived and poorly produced. Its convenient for you, but totally unfair to blame NBC. I'm not ignorant of who Tim Berners Lee is and NBC explained anyway. Mr. Bean was shown in his entirety -- no Honda ad. Not sure what u mean by 7/7.

If you look at most of our concerns they would be problematic no matter who televised the show. One ring on the bell. Chaotic satanic mills. Cheeseball dancing nurses. Giant dead fetus. Insipid, disorganized love story with badly choreographed hodge podge of dance music. These things are not NBC's fault.

Of course the Brits think the show was fantastic. You're not likely to say your own ceremony was mediocre. You're excited by Olympic fever and that will color everything. If its any consolation, I thought it was similar in quality to Atlanta. I didn't love either of them.

The fact is that this show did not translate internationally. It was for the hometown crowd and that was it. Danny Boyle's attempt to create a "cinematic live event" didn't work. There were some magical moments and some real clunkers and they were artlessly scrambled together with no discernable structure.

What???

Did this happened???????????????????????

Shame!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

No. Don't believe everything you read.

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We got the OBS version without commercials and Frank and June portion still sucks. Yes I do agree with the inclusion of British pop culture and the internet revolution on paper but the execution was so bad that I think it's one of the worst cultural segment of any OC I've seen. Still can't believe they spent more time on that than the Green and Pleasant portion...

Other than that the rest of the OC I was generally happy with especially the music from the cauldron lighting. That was the best ever.

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What you read is incorrect. Don't judge a broadcast you haven't seen.

From what I understand Danny Boyle called the shots with the filming and editing anyway. The things I disliked I disliked because they were poorly conceived and poorly produced. Its convenient for you, but totally unfair to blame NBC. I'm not ignorant of who Tim Berners Lee is and NBC explained anyway. Mr. Bean was shown in his entirety -- no Honda ad. Not sure what u mean by 7/7.

If you look at most of our concerns they would be problematic no matter who televised the show. One ring on the bell. Chaotic satanic mills. Cheeseball dancing nurses. Giant dead fetus. Insipid, disorganized love story with badly choreographed hodge podge of dance music. These things are not NBC's fault.

Of course the Brits think the show was fantastic. You're not likely to say your own ceremony was mediocre. You're excited by Olympic fever and that will color everything. If its any consolation, I thought it was similar in quality to Atlanta. I didn't love either of them.

The fact is that this show did not translate internationally. It was for the hometown crowd and that was it. Danny Boyle's attempt to create a "cinematic live event" didn't work. There were some magical moments and some real clunkers and they were artlessly scrambled together with no discernable structure.

No. Don't believe everything you read.

So, I ask my apologies for the "shame" thing.

That's Good. It would be unbelievable for a huge network like NBC to do that...

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7/7. It was a day after London won the games and the London Bombings had occurred.

Although most (Well Australia's Channel 9 did) broadcasters would have shown and given some information on this, this segment "Abide with Me", should have clearly made reference to the attacks (I guess they didn't want to be politically insensitive). the announcement should have acknowledge both those unable to be with us tonight and the date of the attacks in question.

This would have been perfect after my proposed "Lead up to the games" segment. Without Boyle's choice of choreography of course.

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