I was a big fan during the first season of DOND, and it was probably one of only about three things I watch on TV, the other two being Jeopardy and Yankees games. I'm not a big TV guy, but DOND was fun to watch.

But over the past year it's getting really hard to watch the show.

It seems almost every case opening after the first batch is preceded by a commercial, but I can understand the reasons for that.

And the games with half a board full of million-dollar cases often times kill the whole anticipation of how a game is going to turn out.

But the thing that gets me the most is the gimmicks. If half the airtime is commercials, then the other half is split between actually playing the game, and standing around watching some sort of spectacle involving NFL players, the favorite bands of the contestants, Star Wars re-enactments, dish-smashing, dance routines, Sesame Street muppets, large animals being brought onto the stage...and on and on.

This kills the pace of the game and ruins what was fun about it. It's a simple game, but it says a lot about luck, greed, self-control, trust and family. The models are just icing on the cake. We don't need a circus to keep it interesting, and the circus is what's killing the show.

Those are just my thoughts. Anyone else feel the same way?

At least you still have a good mix of contestants in terms of their gameplay and some of your gamblers get lucky, which hasn't been the case here in the UK...

You think you got it bad in the US? At least you haven't got the dreaded sob-story!

Virtually every show over here we have to suffer an intro containing floods of tears, tales of death, disaster and catastrophe. Anyone on suicide watch should never watch the show. They'd have hung themselves long before the first break. To cap it all a flock of sheep on the wings would have more brains and gumption than the current crop of contestants who bail out at the first whiff of a few grand completely disregarding the potential on the board.

Noel should just say in the intro 'Hello X. How much do you want. Here's a cheque. P**s off.'

Oh I think they do have sob-stories, just not as many, and they're mixed in with some other spectacular stereotypes.

Contestants seem to be cast for how loudly they can scream and how photogenic they are. That they end up getting a nice variety of players within that is sheer fluke.

It's been difficult to watch since Katie joined the 1p club

Since then we've only had 1 £100K win, so many blue wins and lots of money squandered

It's been flat up till March when there was a bit of resurgence then abysmal til the week with betty's win and other good games and now it's poor again.

Very confused until I realised you were talking about the American version...

If you are talking about the UK version. No.

Love the show, always will.

Ditto here too

No, it hasn't...

I will always watch! Ok at the moment it isn't too good but I still watch it because it is great!!

Remember folks, we have to take the bad with the good.

Yes, that's all well and good but when it's 95% bad, 4% average and only 1% good, you have to wonder what the point in watching still is.

Then again, we all still watch regardless in the vain hope that it will get good again... unfortunately, I don't see that happening for quite some time yet.

Unfortunately we're having to take the bad with the even worse.

The last few minutes of today's game was painful to watch to be honest...