On each episode, a five-member team (usually made up of either family members, friends or work colleagues) tries to fill in ten answers on a list fitting a specific category in order accumulate money for a jackpot they then play for in the final round. If the contestant gives five correct answers, they get £1,000 for the team's jackpot, and get to play in the final. Every correct answer after that is worth more money, and a perfect 10 will gain the team £25,000 to play for at the end. In theory £125,000 is possible if everyone on the team gets a perfect 10 on their lists, but this never happened. However, if a team member fails to get five right or makes two mistakes, they are out of the game and the team forfeits the money. Each team has a captain who chooses which teammate will get to answer each list, and who has an "Overrule" button that they can press once per round to change a teammate's answer that they think is wrong. Once the captain starts to rack up money on their own list, they can choose to drop back one level after each correct answer and bring back an eliminated teammate instead. The captain, plus any other surviving/reinstated team members, then face one more list which they must complete in order to take home all the money in the jackpot.
Tropes
- Actor Allusion: Happens a lot, since questions about pop culture appear almost daily. If a question about Harry Potter or Star Wars comes up, expect Warwick to mention being in it. Even a question about trees descended into this when a contestant gave the answer of Willow.
- Added Alliterative Appeal: When a contestant gets their fifth correct answer and qualifies for the final, a music cue plays that Warwick frequently describes in this way, such as a "delightful ditty" or "jolly jingle."
- All or Nothing: It doesn't matter how much money teams build up in the show; if they don't get every answer in the last game, they go home with nothing.
- Catchphrase: "[Contestant], it saddens me to say: you are terrible at Tenable. Goodbye."
- Celebrity Edition: Named Tenable All Stars.
- Christmas Special:
- A Tenable All Stars Christmas Special was broadcast on Boxing Day 2019.
- Tenable Christmas Cracker was broadcast on Christmas Day 2020.
- Cloudcuckoolander: Some of the answers given can stray off into this territory, especially if the contestant trying to fill in the list on their board has no clue about the question they’re being asked about. Subverted with some of the teams, who look like they should be this, but prove themselves to be quite intelligent.
- Consolation Prize: Starting with series 6, if a team wipes out in the final, each member receives a show-branded tea towel.
- Continuing is Painful: The captain can choose to give up one level's worth of prize money and bring an eliminated teammate back into the game after each correct answer, starting with the fifth. They have to decide which is more important — a bigger jackpot, or having more people available to play the final.
- Different in Every Episode: When a team captain uses the Overrule button for the first time during a game, Warwick describes it in a different humorous way, sometimes connected to the team name. Examples: the "Shut Your Noise" button, the "That Answer's Rubbish" button, or the "That's an Illegal Answer" button in the case of a team whose members are all solicitors (a type of legal practitioner).
- Double Entendre: The question about Boobies and Tits (as in species of birds), definitely qualifies. It didn’t go unnoticed by everyone in the studio, and Warwick threatened to sack the question writer when he had regained his composure.
- Double Unlock: Teammates who get knocked out in Rounds 1-4 must go through this to return for the final. First, the captain has to get at least five right in Round 5 and then decide to give up one level's worth of money in order to bring the teammate back. Second, the captain has to either finish the list or choose to stop.
- Epic Fail: Any team that manages not to bank any money for the final round and have no teammates left besides the team captain (who gets through to the last list no matter what). It did happen to at least one team. Their captain was given a token £500 to play for in the last round. Unsurprisingly, they didn’t win that either.
- Game Show Host: Actor Warwick Davis, or actress Sally Lindsay if Davis is unavailable.
- Home Game:
- A Board Game adaptation was released in 2019.
- Tenable is also available on the App Store.
- Incredibly Lame Pun: Warwick does this all over the place, both while talking with team members before each round and as answers are given.
- Let's Just See What WOULD Have Happened: Whenever the captain uses the Overrule button, the teammate's rejected answer is always checked first to see if it would have been correct.
- Lifelines: Three times during the game, a contestant may choose one teammate to provide an answer ("Nominate"), and may accept or reject it at their discretion. Each contestant is also given one "Life," which allows them to keep playing after a wrong answer; a second miss knocks them out of the game. The team’s captain also has an “Overrule” button that they can press once per round, which allows them to throw out a contestant's answer and give a different one in its place. However, a wrong answer from the captain takes away the contestant's Life (or knocks them out, if the Life is already gone). Once the contestant has given five correct answers and earned £1,000 for their team, the Nominates and Overrule become unavailable, leaving only the Life if they still have it. The captain can't use the Overrule while playing their own list, and all the lifelines are taken out of play in the final round.
- Losing Horns: Every wrong answer will get this, in the form of one long, low, blaring note.
- Mundane Made Awesome: The Vortex, where eliminated contestants are sent. Warwick makes it out to sound like some kind of torture chamber, but in reality it's just a small backstage room where they watch the rest of the show.
- One-Hit-Point Wonder: Averted in the first four rounds, since the contestant playing in each can survive one wrong answer, and in the fifth, since the captain will go to the final no matter what. Played straight in the final; give a wrong answer, and you're out of the round.
- Pungeon Master: Warwick Davis. He doesn't like it either if a contestant gives one, judging from the look he gave a contestant in one episode, especially if he thinks he should have got it.
- Punny Name: The team names of the contestants are a pun on either their occupation, hobbies, family name or where they come from.
- Rhymes on a Dime: Going into each commercial break, Warwick recites a short rhyme to remind viewers to keep watching, such as: "Grab a glass, it's gonna be class" or "Brew, loo, back in a few."
- Rules Spiel: Warwick goes through this at the start of every episode.
- Spanner in the Works: The team captain has the potential to act as this when using an Overrule. If the playing teammate's answer is correct, they don't get any credit for it, which reduces both the money they can add to the jackpot and their chance to reach the final. If the captain's answer is wrong on top of this, the teammate loses their Life (if they still have it) or gets knocked out of the game (if they don't). The only way the captain can't make things any worse is if the teammate's answer is wrong.
- Unexpectedly Obscure Answer:
- Some of the word questions can fall into this, as there is usually one answer on the list that no one can get unless they are a Scrabble master or a walking dictionary. Cue Warwick reading off a sheet of paper what the definition of that particular word is, mainly because he hasn't a got clue either.
- One episode had a question on "Ten most popular camera brands sold in Currysnote ", and another had "Ten most popular brands of irons sold in John Lewisnote ."
- The Unpronounceable: Warwick normally repeats a contestant's answer when asking if it's correct. If the answer is a real mouthful, he'll instead ask, "Is what he/she said tenable?"
