“Million Dollar Mind Game” Episode Two Today on ABC

Devin de Gruyl says:

I posted this review on the GSN boards, and will repeat it here.

As a mental challenge, I loved Million Dollar Mind Game. Its questions really did tickle my brain, especially the ones that required some outside-of-the-box thinking; there just aren’t enough TV shows of any stripe these days that engage both halves of the mind in this manner. I can see how a show like this became a cult favorite in Russia, a country historically noted for its intellectualism (among other things we won’t get into here).

As a game show, however, it was only about average IMO. Better than some, not as good as others. I just couldn’t shake the feeling while I was watching that there should’ve been something more to it than what we saw… a missing ingredient, if you will, that would’ve made it more palatable to American tastes. The problem with that, unfortunately, is that I can’t quite figure out just what is missing here; all I can come up with is some sort of risk to the team for a wrong answer, such as being forced to vote off a member after an incorrect guess or something along those lines. Mind you, I’m not a big fan of “vote-off” gimmicks either, but in this case it might help spice up an otherwise colorless format.

As a previous poster noted, and after thinking about it I agree, the requisite “lifelines” for this quizzer really don’t help that much at all. Replacing the question for one of equal difficulty pretty much leaves you back where you started, and getting extra debate time is about as effective as Phone-a-Friend was during the last few years it was on Millionaire… meaning, not much at all. The only one that can actually bail you out of trouble is being able to give a second answer, though even this is solely contingent on someone else on the team seeing something the captain doesn’t. A multiple-choice option, while it would seem to go against the concept of the show, might not have gone astray here.

The look and feel of the show is outstanding, with the set resembling nothing so much as a high-class casino in Monte Carlo or someplace. If you look in the background you can almost see James Bond at the baccarat table! The circular monitor embedded in the table looks great, and is a nice reminder of just how far we’ve come in terms of display technology; the days when “computer displays” on a game show set meant cheap 19″ Trinitron monitors and basic video titler graphics seem like centuries ago now. The host does a good job in keeping the game moving and engaging the players and audience in the format, but I suspect he may have been a bit too “British” for American tastes (or so sayeth the Network Programming Overlords at 77 West 66th). It’s almost too bad that Million Dollar Mind Game is less a game show than it is a semi-competitive roundtable discussion on a potpourri of riddles and/or intellectual topics, with big money afforded to those who can untangle the correct answers from the web of red herrings and lateral thinking puzzles.

All in all, I’d have to give this show a solid B, maybe even a B+, but no higher. It obviously won’t appeal to everyone, but for those of us who bemoan the imminent death of human intelligence a show like this can feel like an oasis in the Gobi Desert. Unfortunately, by the end of the show I was left with the feeling of “Really? That’s it?“, which is never a good thing. I can understand why ABC passed on it for their main network, but there’s little reason it couldn’t have found a home elsewhere in the corporate family… though right off the top of my head I can’t think of a network in the ABC/Disney hierarchy where it’d fit (the old A&E would’ve been the closest thing, but A&E is no longer what it was even a decade ago, much less when it was one of the more highbrow cablers). Frankly, the best place for a show of this nature might’ve been something like PBS, which can air some of the more esoteric and/or eclectic programs unrestrained by commercial considerations, but PBS’s history with game shows is anything but stellar… remember We Interrupt This Week? Or Think Twice? Of course you (probably) don’t, that’s the point. And of course, as a PBS show the chances of it remaining a Million Dollar Mind Game are about nil to the fifteenth power. But that’s the sort of audience a show like this is crying out for, so it’d probably do well there. (Then again, I also want to see PBS pick up a Stateside version of Only Connect and/or QI…) On ABC it’s little more than a boondoggle, and is treated accordingly. It’s like going into a McDonald’s and finding caviar as a menu offering; it’s a discordant note, wholly out-of-tone with the surroundings.

I’ll enjoy it while it lasts, but I guess I’ll always wish it were more substantial than it is.

Dale says:

Im loving this show, and I dont think it needs to change to fit the mainstream. We need more shows that do thier own thing and try to change the way we perceive out tv game shows a la Duel Season One which was amazing until they did those changes which made it practicably like dond with trivia.