Bob Holness was the original presenter staying on for the first ten series of the first incarnation and a 1994 revival on Sky One.

It was remembered that I'd done TV programmes of much the same sort, such as Junior Criss Cross Quiz which I compered in the 1960s and which was also a question and answer show.

Contestants were allowed to do a hand jive during the end credits of the Friday episode of each broadcast week.

The hand jive first appeared in 1986 after one of the contestants was bored while sitting through filming several shows a day waiting for his turn.

All 15 boards followed in the same sequence; if the same player/team won a match with victories in the first two games, the third one was skipped and the projectors were advanced directly to the Gold Run.

The first Sky series kept the same opening titles used from 1987 on the original ITV run (as it continued to be produced by Central).

The original theme in C major was an upbeat pop track incorporating piano, strings, drum machine, and various other 1980s synthesized sounds reminiscent of the day – the four-note opening motif of Beethoven's 5th Symphony is mixed into the theme at the precise moment the composer's head appears on a flipping hexagon in the 1983 opening sequence (this sequence was replaced in 1987, see below).

[7] Marc Sylvan and Richard Jacques updated the original theme for the Comedy Central version.

[8] The original 1983–87 title sequence featured flipping hexagons with various images on them running down an encyclopedia page.

The title sequence used in 2000–01 featured people throwing and catching the letters that spell "Blockbusters" using the Ed Welch theme again.

The game began with a toss-up question to play for control of the board, starting with a letter that was chosen at random.

The solo player attempted to complete a vertical connection of white hexagons from the top of the board to the bottom; that required at least four correct answers.

The pair attempted to connect a path from left to right with blue hexagons (purple during the Aspel era), requiring at least five spaces.

(For instance, if a contestant chose "BS" and the host said "Where people kiss in Ireland", the correct answer would be "Blarney Stone.")

A famous short piece of music (three sharp notes on a synth-like horn in a slapstick style) was played if a contestant ran out of time on a Gold Run, often producing amused reactions in the studio; the same three notes played on an electric guitar act as the time's-up buzzer on the Challenge version.

Sky One brought the series back again in 2000, this time produced by Grundy (which owned the format) and presented by Liza Tarbuck, but it did not capture the same degree of popularity as the Holness incarnation.

On 14 April 2007 at 20:40, Vernon Kay hosted a networked edition of Gameshow Marathon on ITV1 in which celebrity contestants revived the classic 1980s Holness version of the show.

The series started airing on 14 May 2012,[10] with the first episode dedicated to the memory of original host Bob Holness, who died on 6 January 2012.

The series was put on hold for a few weeks and resumed transmission on 9 July 2012, starting with a celebrity special featuring Konnie Huq (who had previously been on the original Blockbusters) amongst others.

It was announced on 3 December 2018 that Dara Ó Briain would host the revived version for Comedy Central.

This version uses a white background during the Gold Run and passes turn the space dark blue.

12 quiz books were released from the show[14] which also led to a spin-off: "Blockbusters Gold Run Volumes 1–5" being produced.

[17] A computer game version of the show was also created for the Amstrad CPC, BBC Micro, Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum.

In 2006, a DVD game based on the show was released by Circle Studio under license from FremantleMedia, with Bob Holness reprising his position at the helm.

The DVD is based on the same format as the TV show, with a virtual set design and game graphics matching the original version of the programme.

The show was always aired on the ITV network, although the first series was repeated on Channel 4 during the summer of 1984, in the Countdown slot.

Blockbusters did share its time slot with other game shows such as Ask No Questions, Connections, and Winner Takes All.

TSW also dropped its time slots to two episodes per week every so often; however, in a bid to catch back up the series, it was moved to 5:10 pm from Mondays to Fridays in September 1992.

For around 18 months in 1991–92, Tyne Tees started airing more local output in the 6:30 pm time slot, which resulted in fewer episodes per week.

The format has been remade in a number of countries during the 1980s and 1990s: Other foreign versions of Blockbusters have aired in  Portugal and  Singapore.