Arguably, the Banker is the most important aspect of the show, aside from the boxes. Over the years on the channel 4 version, we got to know the Banker and his character and were gradually able to build up a picture of this faceless figure on the end of the phone. He had a coloured in life, multiple wives, a dirty old man, an incredible wit and an expert at messing with the player's minds.
How do we think this version is faring? It is, in fairness, early in the show's new life, but I'm leaning towards that not enough is being made of the Banker. I know some HATED the games he used to play with the format back in the day, but my favourite games were the ones where the Banker would be truly evil. We haven't seen him wanting to talk to the players one on one to drip poison in their ear, we don't even get the swap offered these days. Also, the opening offer rarely being above £1500 regardless of how well the opening round goes is slightly dull at this point.

What are your thoughts?

Yeah, I wish the ITV Banker would play a few more serious mind games, he seems to be all bark and no bite at the moment.

In terms of his offer generosity though I'm not too bothered with how the ITV Banker is now, especially considering that with a stingier Banker the last 2 games almost certainly would've been crashes and blue wins. Ideally to me he'd mostly stick with a similar offer pattern but cool it with the 2 box above mean offers and would offer around 80% of the average maximum on volatile finishes. That would be low enough to give players something to think about, especially at lower stakes, but would be high enough to stop nearly every game there's a blue on the table from being a trainwreck.

I posted earlier this month my criticisms about this new banker's offers. Low offers at the start then better ones later on is one thing, but the current extreme is too much. Like you said, the opening offer scarcely varies no matter how good or bad the round was, and at 2-box he nearly always offers above the mean, sometimes far above it.

And you're right too that this banker's personality is incredibly flat and the banter boring - it wouldn't surprise me at all if there's no one on the end of the phone and it's just Mulhern ab-libbing while he gets told offers through his earpiece.

The lack of gimmicks is appreciated, but not offering the swap even to players who've said how much a number means to them is just bizarre.