Science Museum On Tour

This evening I visited the Science Museum On Tour. Below is my very very honest review of it. Expletives have been included for impact.

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There I was, seated, popcorn in one hand, slush in the other. This was going to be immense.

The stage looked....interesting, displaying a medley of all sorts of fascinating scientific equipment. Well, I presume it was scientific as this was THE world famous Science Museum on Tour. To be completely honest with you, the only thing which looked familiar to me was the tripod. No bad jokes please.

Oh look, and there’s the Bunsen burner. I suddenly found myself reminiscing back to year 9, Mr Darke’s science lab and an absolute fascination with the blue flame. Oh, and the gauze mat too – now that was just epic. Oh what fun we had.

WHIZZ! POP! KAZAMMM! SNAP! CRANNNK – thank goodness, the show is starting.

Droning clapping of the audience commences.

* clap clap clap clap *

“Give me a woo”

“Woo”

"That’s not loud enough, give me a proper woo"

“WOOOO”

“You can do better than THAT, one more time...”

I’m sure you get the gist.

The posters had promised a ‘fast, furious and frenetically fun experience’ which would ‘propel you on an exploratory theatrical adventure’. I thought this was aimed at primary school kids? Translate to English please.

Basically, it was set to be a good night. In case you can sense a very negative tone in this supposed-to-be-impartial piece of literature, I can only blame the 3:1 ratio of children to adults. Poor sods.

The theatre was oozing with science enthusiasts, and by that I mean geeks.
And then there was me, purely there for research reasons of course. Not an element of ‘geek’ in me. Oh yes, and Pluto is the largest planet.

The museum had been brought to the stage by the producers of Brainiac and Dr. Bunhead. Don’t worry, I’d never heard of them either, but my ever-so-slightly older housemate speaks very highly of them.

They ask for a volunteer on stage, at that point I decide it’s time to tie my hair in a bun – I don’t want to give them an advantage on the ‘static electricity’ related jokes. I sink into my chair slightly, avoiding eye contact of course. But it’s all good, a young lad from two rows in front has been chosen.

I chuckle to myself unreservedly, he looks remarkably like Little My, you know, the girl from the Moomins.

I wouldn’t say it was a very moving performance, but there was a LOT of talk about Newton’s Laws of Motion. I knew that guy was all talk and no action.

Other topics covered include Living Things, Human Processes and Materials.

The only thing I learnt was to get sweet popcorn as opposed to salted. But I’m sure it was a thoroughly educational experience for everyone else in the auditorium.
As we depart from the theatre all I can hear is parents asking their kids:
“So then, what was your favourite part?”

Decoding that parental interrogation, what they were really asking is:
“Have I just wasted fifteen fucking quid, because you clearly can’t remember any of it?!”

The presenters might have lit their splint, but they really didn’t spark my imagination as a member of the audience.

That is why I give this show the following rating: **.

I will write another blog post explaining in more detail exactly what I learnt from the theatrical display. This blog is to establish a writing style and to dictate the success of the show.