Here’s a comment box to discuss the season debut of American Gladiators today at 8:00PM ET on NBC.
Network: NBC
Airings: Mondays at 8:00PM ET
Host(s): Hulk Hogan and Leila Ali
Vote for how many stars you think the show deserves to the right, and then leave a comment!
American Gladiators is the ultimate televised extreme sports competition. Two men and two women face off against each other and the Gladiators in events of athletic prowess, skill, and determination. By the end of the regular events, each point the leader has equals a half-second lead in the final event: the Eliminator. Whoever crosses the finish line first wins and continues on through the tournament. The grand champions of the season wins $100,000 and a new car.
The first season admittedly had a lot of issues. They tried to reinvent the wheel a bit too much. They made some events too easy (see Power Ball and Hang Tough) or they made them far too hard and complex (see Assault and Eliminator). As season two news came in, we were told they made a lot of changes for the better, and it seems that they did.
Continue reading ‘American Gladiators’
This is a rumor control, but one I’d bet money on and basically confirm. There’s no official press release out yet, that’s the only thing, but I can basically guarantee this is happening. We’re so confident we’re putting a new category up for it. An extremely reliable source tells and shows us that GSN picked has up the trivia/blackjack show we were previously discussing, and the show is called Catch-21. It’s a remake of sorts of the classic game show Gambit and should be debuting in July 2008. They are now casting.
The show is, essentially, the Casino pilot that Distraction Formats taped ages ago. Casino is, essentially the retooling of the old game show Gambit to fit snugly in a half hour time slot. In Catch-21, contestants answer multiple choice questions to earn cards to add to their blackjack hand. After a right answer, the player can keep the card or pass it off to someone else in hopes that they will bust. Each round won earns a “Power Chip” (another item stolen from World Series of Blackjack) which can be used in the end game to trade out bad cards. Speaking of the end game, after three eliminator rounds, the sole survivor goes against the house with four chances to get 21 and a chance at a $25,000 cash jackpot. This is down from the $100,000 in the pilot but that’s to be expected. The pilot had way too much money involved and seemed extravagant even by today’s standards.
I think when I posted about this pilot a while ago the feedback was extremely positive, so hopefully we have a winner here. It’s a shock it’s taken this long. And if anything this should give hope to the people clamoring for Russian Roulette/Whammy! to come back. GSN’s CEO David Goldhill is obviously willing to look back at past shows and bring them on in full force, as is evident with Russian Roulette and now Catch-21. It’s also nice to see some money being thrown at more originals instead of just one. I’ve said it over and over and this is exactly what they need. If they take some chances on some young, fresh, cool game shows with an interesting concept anyone can love and some money that means something, people will take notice. Again, the show is currently casting (apply for it here) and we’ll try to get some more news as soon as possible. The show is now also up on our casting page.
Here’s a comment box to discuss the season debut of Duel today at 9:00PM ET on ABC.
Network: ABC
Airings: Fridays at 9:00PM ET
Host(s): Mike Greenberg
Vote for how many stars you think the show deserves to the right, and then leave a comment!
Continue reading ‘Duel’
Tonight GSN debuts their new show Bingo America in just a bit minutes, and this might be interesting. Their site seems to not be working right now, so either there’s major issues on their end or a lot more people are downloading cards than they expected. But hey, you get to play along with the questions at the very least so that’s a plus. It’s a pretty decent show for the first 27 minutes before it drags to a halt in the end game, so just be warned. I’d love to hear your thoughts, as would GSN. Be sure to leave a comment, and also give your star rating (0 to 5) in the POST INFO box when you click on the story’s headline. Hope you like it.
Continue reading ‘Bingo America’
Exciting new updates for BuzzerBlog today, at least for us and potentially you. The one thing I prize this site on is its interactivity. Honestly, without you guys commenting, I wouldn’t be doing this. There are sites that do the whole new thing equally as well and/or better. One thing I’ve long struggled with is how to do show reviews easier, and we finally have a way. Before shows debut we’ll set up specific posts and pages for the show. In the POST INFO box will be a star system. You can highlight as many stars as you want and click to cast your vote. It’ll average all the votes from everyone and come up with a final score. Just as a warning you only get to vote once per IP.
This is really a way so you can communicate easier with fans of your favorite shows, look at what’s popular and not, look for some recommendations, and also networks and production companies can easily see what people like and what they don’t. For instance, tomorrow night we will start the entire voting process with Bingo America,Deal or No Deal, Russian Roulette, and we’ll add more as time goes on. However, be sure to vote if you can, because trust me, you’re making more of a difference on the TV landscape on sites like this than you know. Shows like The Mole and, more specifically, Russian Roulette, would definitely not be back on today if it wasn’t for. I give you all.
Rating: 
Five out of five stars. And yes, that was a test too.
Update: ABC gave us a response with sadly not much more information beyond “chatter rumors, nothing to confirm,” so it’s at least being thought of making the Craigslist post a bit more believable. Still a rumor until we get some official confirmation, though.
ABC never fails to shock me with renewals. Craigslist just posted a new casting notice for season two of Duel. Still no confirmation as of yet, but we’ll try to find it out as soon as possible. In the season two casting notice there’s no mention of a huge cash jackpot like there was for season one. All it says is “huge cash prize for winners.” Maybe we switched to the British version in terms of how to get the jackpot?
I enjoy the basic idea of Duel, but ABC completely screwed up in the execution in my book. There was no drama until the final match (and even that barely had any because of how it ended), Mike Greenberg was too robotic and had a pen stapled to his fingers, contestants were annoying, and the questions were either really hard or really easy; never a happy medium. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: tournaments just do not work for primetime game shows. There’s no drama until the ending. Maybe if they had another tournament format we can talk. What they had was a really horrendous tournament format.
I’d really like just to see them change to Engand’s game play for season two. It takes four wins to get the jackpot. After each game you can take some money and leave or play on. At least throw in a tiny bit of risk and drama. The idea was fine, but the execution was hideous. It needs some work. If they can realize it, see why people continually turned away from the show, and fix things we might have one of the better quiz shows in recent times.
What would you like to see different in season two?
First off, we wish our best to everyone out in the Midwest who was devastated by the tornado. It’s a very bad situation out there right now with a vast number of deaths and damage, so I wish them speedy recovery and as much hope as I can offer.
Again, we’ve had literally no news at all this week, so I’m sorry for the lack of anything. We got your emails about the “GSN Live” bits popping up on the network, and we will have an update about that next week hopefully. Finally, since we’ve had nothing, we’ll do our next edition of “The British are Better Than Us”, now being renamed as “The World is Better Than Us” with Weakest Link which can still be seen on BBC America. Don’t worry, we’ll have a “We’re Better Than the World” some day.
Ratings will be updated tonight with some very nice numbers for shows all around.
Network: GSN
Airings: Weekdays at 6:00PM ET, Tuesdays through Sundays at 10:00PM ET
Vote for how many stars you think the show deserves to the right, and then leave a comment!
Russian Roulette is the ultimate game of chance. Four contestants stand on “The Revolver” and on their own “Drop Zone”. A question is stated and the player in control chooses who to pass the question to (or they can answer it themselves in the final round). A right answer awards the challenged money while a wrong answer bankrupts a player and forces them to play “Russian Roulette” with however many drop zones are active for the question. When the handle is pulled, lights circle the set, and if a red light stops under the player’s feet, that person literally drops from the stage and is eliminated from the game. The sole survivor plays the Killer Questions and, potentially, one final game of “Russian Roulette” to win $100,000.
This is and was GSN’s quintessential game show and their only remote answer to the big money game show craze. It had it all: big money, amazing set, amazing soundtrack, fantastic host, tough trivia, and one of the best and most exciting end games on television. Honestly, there’s little to fault the show with other than a few production errors, especially in season two. The producers seemed to be very keen on making sure that players who chose not to gamble for $100,000 could have potentially won. It seems they often edited out the first hypothetical spin and threw in a second one to make sure they seemed like they made the right choice instead of losing out on six figures. The sound effects for the spin were completely screwed up for that season as well.
The only other larger issue was the questioning on the end game. They could just never seem to get it right. The five Killer Questions in 60 seconds seemed too easy, but the ten Killer Questions seemed too difficult to some. I really think six questions in the season one brainteaser format would have kept it a bit more original while making sure no one gets a three drop zone $100,000 spin. But that was a minor issue that barely made an impact in my eyes. Why’d the show disappear? Network politics and more. Hopefully with game shows fully back in the public eye some smart production company and network will bring this gem out and let it shine while there’s still a demand to see people fall through holes in the floor.
Rating: 
Links
Clips and episodes of the show courtesy of creator Gunnar Wetterberg
Yes, the 1 VS 100 sale and survey is over. I really thank you for either taking part in either the survey or the sale. I promise, if we have advertisements again it will be better arranged on the website and will only involve game shows or game show related products. I’d also like to congratulate Jason Huhn for randomly winning the $50 from the survey contest!
This week is going to be really slow, obviously. Everyone’s away on vacation and there will be no news until 2008 most likely. So what will you be getting? We’ll dig through our archives and try to find either the most entertaining posts or entertaining video clips of the year as sort of an “end-of-2007″ game show celebration. If you have any comments as to what your favorite moments were, please write them in the comment box, I’d love to hear. Also, tomorrow we will have an interview with The Moment of Truth and Russian Roulette host, one of the best in the business, Mark L. Walberg.
So what do you have to look forward to in BuzzerBlog in 2008? We have a few nice additions coming soon hopefully. We want to try to have a contest every month to thank you guys for reading. For instance, next month we should have a contest for the Family Feud DVD. We are also starting a new celebrity blog, where some of the biggest game show personalities and regular game show fans can write about what they want and whatever they want in a new page. We’re also looking at potentially adding a few games, a larger video content, and more interviews. I’m listening to what you all said in the survey and trying to adapt to everyone’s liking.
I just really want to thank you all for reading BuzzerBlog. It’s unreal to me that I’ve been doing this for a bit over two years now. What’s more amazing to me is that I’ve been doing it for a bit over two years and how far we’ve gotten. It’s only possible because of you readers putting up with my crazy ranting, and I do appreciate it more than you know. As I always say, you are truly changing today’s game show landscape with those comments; people in high places are reading. I cannot begin to tell you how grateful I am of all of you, and I hope we can have an even more successful 2008 with you all on board. I hope you all have an extremely Merry Christmas and a great 2008.
Very quick note. As of now, there’s only around 30 hours left in the iToys 1 VS 100 game sale before it goes away. Again, just the electronic tabletop game is $19.99, but getting both the tabletop and handheld game is $24.99. Both packs are without shipping or handling. This may be the only time we’ll do a sale of the 1 VS 100 games, so get them while you can. Thanks for putting up with the banners. We appreciate it, and we hope you enjoyed the sale.
A review of GSN’s How Much Is Enough? is coming relatively soon.
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