Yeah, Yeah, "A Few Days"

I know, I know - yet again, I say I'll be back in "a few days" and then disappear for over a week. I'm sorry. I did finally watch Splatalot - it's the Canadian version. It's also a Wipeout clone of the highest order.

Twelve kids each take a turn at facing a giant medieval themed obstacle course and its costumed "defenders", who make lame jokes and have names like "Gildar" and "Knightress". Hosts Jason Agnew and Matt Chin provide the required snarky commentary and little comedy bits.  After each kid takes a turn, the six with the fastest time move on to round two, which all six run at once - it's close to impossible to tell who's where, and having the defenders running around making lame jokes doesn't help. The first four contestants to finish round two advance to round three, and at the end of the show one of the kids reaches the finish line first and wins the game (no prizes, as far as I can tell) - followed, in the grand tradition of shows like this, by a "Splat Of The Day" segment. The end. All that's missing is a trademark sign-off of in the vein of "DON'T...GET...ELIMINATTTTEDDDD!" or "Good night...and big balls".

Of course there's nothing wrong with this - I'm sick of identical Wipeout clones, but I'm not this show's target audience anyway. My eight-year-old self would have thought this was amazing, and that's what matters.

If you're now saying "is there any kids game show your eight-year-old self would not have liked?", the answer is...probably not. I remember being seven years old and making a list of all the game shows on television, from best to worst. At the top of the list was Nick Arcade (a show I currently consider one of the worst game shows ever made), and at the bottom was "every adult game show in the world".

I was a really, really weird kid.

This will probably be my last post in July - maybe I'll post if there's absolutely massive news, but at the moment my heart isn't in this. I'll come back in August when I can find the season start dates.

Aaron

OK, Break Over

I am back for now, but I'll be updating this blog on an irregular schedule until I get myself back together and decide which day to do my weekly posts on. I wasn't planning on restarting this blog until August when I could track down the Fall 2012 season start dates, but I couldn't resist posting as I've apparently tracked down a piece of news no other game show blogger has found yet: July 17, three days after I am typing this, is the premiere of the new Nickelodeon game show...

That name may well sound familiar, as it's actually a kids Wipeout-type show (with a giant medieval themed obstacle course - get the title now?) that premiered in 2011 in Canada and has already aired in a fair number of other countries. It remains to be seen whether the episodes shown on Nickelodeon will be the original Canadian episodes, new episodes with American contestants, or Canadian episodes reshot to include American hosts in place of the originals (apparently, all three have happened). I will, of course, let you know which one it is in a few days after I watch the premiere.

A few other bits and pieces:

• If you're wondering why I titled my May 31 post "Have I Got News For You", it's because I was in London the next week and saw a taping of the topical comedy panel game show by that title. It was a lot of fun live!
• RIP Richard Dawson and RIP Jim Packard. There isn't a whole lot more I can say that hasn't already been said.
• As I say every year, I am going to try to hold off on posting any Fall 2012 season start dates until I have all of them. Of course, I usually end up failing at this, but I'll try again nonetheless. 

So...yeah. See you in a few days. Splatalot.

Aaron

Again, My Sincere Apologies

Yeah, I said I’d have my post up in a day or two, and before I know it it’s been over two weeks. I did type up a review during that time…

Look, if you’re wondering how the revival of Figure It Out differs from the version you remember, at least in written description, let’s get that part out of the way:

• ·      Round one is still one minute long, but rounds two and three have been shortened to forty-five seconds.
• ·      In addition to the Secret Slime Action, there is a “Word Of Honor” that, if spoken by the panelists, causes the contestant to get slimed.

In other words, the format hasn’t changed much. A kid contestant has a secret (“if you want to guess it along with our panelists, cover your ears and close your eyes…”) and four Nickelodeon stars wearing construction helmets and safety goggles (seriously, have liability laws changed? Danny Tamberelli didn’t dress like that…) try to determine it by asking yes or no questions. Each panelist gets to continue asking questions until he\she gets a no answer. After every round, if the panelists haven’t uncovered the secret, the contestant wins a prize, and after all three, if the panelists still don’t know, the contestant wins the grand prize trip. Each round also includes an incomprehensible visual clue (think something like leaves falling from the sky for a secret involving trees). The information the panelists have is recapped before each round as a lead-up to a lame joke (something along the lines of “The secret involves dancing, it doesn’t involve drums, and Victoria Justice needs a haircut.”)

After round one, a Secret Slime Action is revealed to the viewers; if the panelists perform it, they’ll get slimed and someone in the audience will win a prize. The Secret Slime Actions range from something the panelists could easily avoid to something they could theoretically avoid (“looking at the host”) to something basically designed to get them all slimed (“being a cast member on show X”, which of course one of them is). There are two games in a half-hour episode, most of the little gags done between games have been dispensed with, and the Charade Brigade has been renamed…well, I couldn’t hear it clearly, but it was something like “the Slime Squad”.

Look, what more do you need to know? Jeff Sutphen is always reliable, the panelists probably make as much sense to a kid watching Nickelodeon now as Lori Beth Denberg did to me as kid, and probably the biggest complaint I have is that the set and music are a lot louder and tackier then I remember. This is probably the best possible revival of Figure It Out, and I do sometimes have to remind myself that kids TV is meant for kids, not game show bloggers in their twenties.

Finally, I’m just going to go ahead and say this – I’m taking a break from this blog. Sorry. I’ll come back eventually, hopefully in time for the Fall Rush…but at the moment, my heart just isn’t in it.

Thanks for reading.

Aaron

Sorry

I'll have my post for this week up in a day or two.

Aaron

Have I Got News For You

Let’s see here…
 • The revival of Figure It Out premieres on Nickelodeon on June 11. I will of course have my review on June 14.

 • I watched the premiere of the new British version of Blockbusters with host Simon Mayo. I’m not reviewing it, but yes, there was a dedication card for Bob Holness.

 • A new show called Let’s Ask America will begin a syndication test run on September 17 in seven markets (Boston, alas, is not one of them). If this goes well, the plan is to launch the show nationally in Fall 2013. There’s no word on the host, or even really what the game is.

 That’s all I’ve got. As for why I picked this post’s title…you’ll find out next week.

 Aaron

I Need A Drink

OK, Hip Hop Squares on MTV2…

Nine rappers I had never heard of are introduced by the sort of “hip DJ announcer” shows like this always have, followed by host Peter Rosenberg, who tries to be hip but mostly comes across as a plain old robotic game show host. Every question Peter reads seems to include a sexual double entendre of some kind, from a reference to “ta-tas” (they turn out to be cars) to…I kid you not, this is a question from the premiere of Hip Hop Squares… “True or false. Most American boys between the ages of fifteen and nineteen have not had sex.”

Thank you Jungle Princess.

The game played by the two contestants is pretty much the same thing Hollywood Squares has always been. Contestant picks star, Peter reads question, star gives answer, contestant agrees or disagrees, getting it right gets your mark in the square, three in a row is worth $500. As ever, at the beginning of the second game one of the stars is revealed to the viewers as the Secret Square…no wait, it’s not the Secret Square anymore…it’s the G-Spot.

I’ve been waiting for an excuse to use that joke again, by the way.

Hitting the G-Spot…

…and getting the question right is worth a $1,000 bonus that doesn’t count towards your score. When time runs out at the end of the show, each square left on the board is worth $100.

            The contestant with the most money then plays a bonus round in which he\she picks the top, middle, or bottom row of celebrities. Peter reads out a question, and each of those three celebrities gives an answer – two are false, one is true, and picking the correct answer wins $2,500.

            Now, let me make clear that I wasn’t expecting this show to be good. Sure enough, it wasn’t. I was, however, expecting this show to be an absolute train wreck in the vein of the Comedy Central revival of The Gong Show – every other word is bleeped and halfway through one of the women takes off her top.

            It wasn’t that either. It was just…bad. It failed to be hip or funny or edgy or whatever, but it also failed to be a Game Show Garbage – worthy disaster. It was just…bad and forgettable. I was expecting the Game Show Network revival of I’ve Got A Secret; what I got was more akin to…

That probably says it all.

Aaron

Bob Stewart 1920 - 2012

There isn’t a lot I can say about this that hasn’t already been said, but here goes…

One of the most legendary game show producers ever has died at age 91. Bob Stewart began his illustrious career in the 1950s working for the equally legendary Mark Goodson and Bill Todman, to whom he proposed he show titled “The Auctioneer”, inspired by an auction he used to watch during his lunch break. The end result premiered in 1956…The Price Is Right. Yes, this is the man who created The Price Is Right. The current American incarnation was nice enough to give him a dedication card at the end of a recent episode, although the Australian revival was more focused on Ian Turpie.

Creating The Price Is Right would have been enough to make Bob one of the most legendary game show producers ever, but he didn’t stop there, going on to create Password and To Tell The Truth for Goodson-Todman Productions before breaking off to form Bob Stewart Productions, which created such hits as Pyramid and Chain Reaction. Bob was also the father of Sande Stewart, who is a game show producer is his own right.

As someone said on a message board, it is quite sad that, when Dick Clark died, everyone wrote about him as if he had created and produced Pyramid in addition to hosting it. Wrong. That was Bob Stewart. RIP Bob. You earned it.

Next week – Hip Hop Squares!

Aaron